Customer Reviews

Inherit the Earth (Future History)

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

 

 

If you have read any of Brian Stableford's previous works, you know that he creates wonderfully drawn characters and has a highly inventive mind. He proves himself again in this 22nd century science fiction tale of mankinds fate after a century or two of nanotechnology and biotechnology being driving sociological and monetary components of society. Artificial (virtual) reality and computer interfacing are de rigeur, and there are plots within plots, and conspiracies galore.

The plot is nicely developed, but the conspiracies get a bit thick and hard to follow. Unfortunately the themes of immortality and *emortality* are discussed ad nauseum and leave the storyline a bit flat.

Overall a very good read, but I'd advise you supplement your reading of this novel with James Halperin's "The First Immortal", which discusses similar issues through it's storyline.

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Set in the bioengineered nanotech future of Les Fleurs du Mal and
the eponymous novella, Inherit the Earth is a taut and well-drawn
thriller. Life-extension internal technology (IT) is good enough that
the people who put the world back together after the Crash and
Plague Wars some 75 years before still rule the world, albeit behind
the scenes. Stableford is exploring a familiar sfnal question:
If rich, powerful people get life-extension first -- as they will -- how
do you ever get shed of them?

Stableford's writing and characters, at their best, are as good as
anyone's in the business. Here's Silas Arnett, a hundred-twenty-
something, entertaining his young lover Cathy:

'She was wearing nothing but a huge white towel, wrapped twice
about her slender frame. The thickness of the towel accentuated
her slimness -- another product of authentic youth. Nanotech had
conquered obesity, but it couldn't restore the full muscle tone....

"It must be strange," she said, insinuating her slender and naked
arm around his waist, "to look out on the sea and the sky with eyes
that know them so well...."

She smiled at him, as innocently as a newly-hatched sphinx.'

Stableford acknowledges his editor, David Hartwell, for "suggesting
that I rewrite the final section so drastically as to obliterate any
lingering similarity to the ending of the earlier version..." Perhaps
Stableford should have stuck to his guns -- the last couple of chapters may
remind you of Asimov or Heinlein at their most dialogorrheous.
Skim. The path from novella to novel is fraught with peril... To be
fair, the actual *ending* is crisp and satisfying.

And while I'm nitpicking -- the American characters do sound
veddy British...

...but don't let me put you off from reading the book, which is well-
worth your while. Even if the plots, conspiracies, treacheries and
wheels-within wheels do get confusing...

Note: the attractive cover art SFAICT has nothing to do with the contents.

review copyright 1998 by Peter D. Tillman

I bought this book because it seemed like it might have a good hard sci-fi plot and an interesting hard sci-fi society, but it was extremely difficult to read. I finally gave up even though I had only 2 or 3 chapters to finish it - by that time it was obvious the plot was going to fail. The writing was sometimes unbearable to read - the dialogs were incredibly unrealistic; people saying stuff like, "As you know, in 2180 the Fertility Wars lead to the death of 100 million people, until Conrad Helter's invention saved the day." Like, that should be narrative, not dialog, and it also shouldn't be repeated over and over again. The only reason I stuck with this book as long as I did was because, despite the bad writing, the plot was at least somewhat suspenseful, but as I got near the end, it was obvious the main questions the plot raised weren't going to be answered. This is one of those books that might be good if the author re-wrote it.

For the hard SF fan looking for another satisfying set of extrapolative ideas about the future of mankind, Brian Stableford's "Inherit the Earth" has a lot to offer: nanotech, genetic engineering, geopolitical business, and cultural critique are all present here in good measure. Unfortunately, the excellent content of the novel is undermined by the flat characterizations, minimal exposition, and lack of suspense. The novel reads as if Stableford had no idea what to do with his great ideas, especially the generational conflicts raised in the wake of longevity medicine and the longterm impact of longevity on the notion of inheritance. These ideas, which form an interesting critique of current generational disputes and of the postmodern notion of collapsing timeframes, go almost completely unexploited as Stableford drones on page after page with unsympathetic characterization or worse, detailed descriptions from the point of view of these totally unsympathetic characters. Stableford's ideas are on par with those of Bruce Sterling, Rudy Rucker and Neal Stephenson, but his ability to convey them in a narrative is as limited as Franklin W. Dixon.

This was the first of Stableford's books that I've read, and I enjoyed it thoroughly. The characterizations were a little flat, and there was more emphasis on the "thriller" aspects of the story than on the "science fiction" elements, but it held my interest and in fact prompted me to go out and buy two more books by this author.

If I have any negative comments, it's that I felt I came in on the middle of a story; there was a lot of unfilled backstory. Also, I feel that the novel ended without a completely satisfying resolution, but what the heck.

I don't read this sort of novel expecting great literature, just a good diversion, with some originality, creativity, and imagination. At that, it was quite satisfying.