Customer Reviews

The History Of Our World Beyond The Wave: A Fantasy

5 star:		(18)
4 star:		(3)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(2)

 

 

There are four dramatic moments in my life that I will always remember. One of them is the day I finished reading this book. It was at an outdoor cafe. I had a cup of coffee that had long grown cold. The sky was greying. I sat back and closed my eyes and thought to myself, it doesn't get any better than this. I wondered how so much feeling and creativity and a way with words could be confined in one person. Every generation produces a thinker for it's times. R.E. Klein is probably a thinker for the ages. I found myself lost in this book and I don't think I will ever get out. And...I don't want to.

As I get older, it is a rare joy to find a book destined to become part of my life. Klein explores a world both wonderful and dreadful; though the novel was never gruesome, I had the feeling at any moment the writer might reveal an image too terrible for me to bear. If you loved C.S. Lewis' "The Great Divorce," "Phantastes" by George MacDonald, or Lindsay's "A Voyage to Arcturus," you will like this book.

This book draws in the reader from the first page. It is literate, elegant, and exciting. The story keeps coming to mind after you've read it once, and you'll want to share it with friends because you'll want to have people to discuss it with! This book reminds me of C.S. Lewis' "Perelandra" with its good-and-evil tug-of-war with the ocean as a background.

I happened upon this book at the public library, have lent it out once, read it twice, and it's not due back for another week yet. I hope to find it on tape for my husband so WE can discuss it!

Most fantasies follow fairly strict conventions: They tend to either adopt or adapt one of the existing congeries of folklore such as Camelot, Middle Earth, the Brothers Grimm, Star Trek, and so on. There are very few free-form practitioners of the art who take you down entirely different paths "where no man has gone before." Off hand, I can think of only three: the late John Cowper Powys, Olaf Stapledon, and Edgar Allan Poe.

Reading THE HISTORY, I felt I was in the world of Poe's NARRATIVE OF A. GORDON PYM: There was a sense that anything could happen. The giant wave that inundates the world not only destroys but seems to modify the nature of reality. Solid land could suddenly turn squishy. Strange monsters from the sea, called Gugs, prey on man. A lemur becomes a man and creates a disfunctional anti-human society. Ships without sails or oars sail against the current, because that is where "they" want to go. Then there is the matter of the horror in the yellow Volkswagen.

Klein is obviously a bibliophile. The only things that stem the irreality are -- books! When the narrator, Paul Sant, stumbles upon a library, the tide begins to turn against the squishiness. In the first part of history, the one tower of sanity is Hiram Bell, who holds tight onto one book, Stoddard's STEAM ENGINES, and manages to create an island of reality.

As I finished the last pages of this book, I can only express the hope that Klein continues writing. He is a real original, and he has something to say that needs saying in our present world of increasing squishiness.

For lovers of both science fiction and fantasy, I highly recommend this book. I sat down to read it and couldn't put it down. It provokes a lot of thought, and made me consider a lot of "what if's." It's drama, humor and symbolism draw together a great narrative, with interesting characters (both human and otherwise). Get it, read it, enjoy!

Without having had much leisure time for reading in my recent life, I couldn't put this novel down. Klein motivates readers with ongoing adventure, mystery, fantasy, and fun woven cleavery throughout the story. This is definately a "no miss" for the closeure of our century.

I checked this book out at the library about 10 years ago and I fell in love with it. I wrote the title and author down and was always looking in walk in book stores, none ever had it. I decided to look on Amazon and there it was. I bought it immediately and have read it 3 times since I bought it. It's a fantastic end of the world type fantasy book, but it offers hope of starting over. This is one of my favorite themes to read. This book could probably be labeled as my all time favorite book. I really wish that the author would write a sequel continuing with the characters and their new lives.

this book was a good, easy read full of allusions. Take it to the beach, not to the library.

Paul Sant, teacher of English, is spared by a fortunate set of coincidences from the ravages of The Wave when it submerges California and the rest of the world bar a few mountain tops. On his fortuitously acquired surf mat he sails the seas until he finds land, and eventually one or two others who also escaped destruction.

But not everything is as it seems since The Wave, there are a few mysteries that need unravelling, and at times reality and illusion become confused, and Paul and his few survivor companions struggle to make sense of life as it never was. Paul Sant (is there a play on names there?) chronicles events since The Wave, as the title suggests.

A History of the World Beyond The Wave is refreshingly different from all other post destruction of the world stories I have encountered, stories which unfailingly degenerate into survival of the fittest or most violent, accounts which lead us to believe such a catastrophe would bring out the worst in people. This story, or fantasy suggests otherwise, and offers hope of a better and more civilised way of life. That is not to say it is all plane sailing for Paul and company, they have their moments of drama and encounter situations that threaten their to dash their hopes, but good triumphs eventually.

I found this a thoroughly enjoyable tale: likeable and interesting characters, touches of humour, enough mystery to keep one guessing, and the occasional confusion of dream and reality (but never to the point of confusing the reader), and a positive outcome that leaves the reader more than a little something to contemplate.

This book is a fantastical book that explores many themes in an allegorical sense. The details are hazy for me as I read it over a year ago, but in general I remember that I loved this book. It has a very nice easy to read and enjoy plot, a little over the top at times, but with very strong undertones. I highly recommend.