Customer Reviews

Stars My Destination

5 star:		(191)
4 star:		(38)
3 star:		(14)
2 star:		(12)
1 star:		(7)

 

 

Having read a great deal of Heinlein, Asimov, and Clarke, I was quite taken aback by the very different style and tone of Alfred Bester. It was harsh, dirty, and his characters were more than a little mean. He provides a sharp contrast to Bradbury and Asimov, that much is certain. While he's close in action style to Heinlein, Bester's protagonist, Gulliver Foyle, seems absolutely unpredictable and terrifying--something I cannot really say about a Heinlein hero, anti-hero, or villain.

We start by finding our man Foyle near-death in a starship that has been cast adrift in space. As this not-too-bright crewman struggles to survive, a ship approaches that could help him. However, it doesn't. Instead, it flies away. The rest of the book consists of Foyle's angry, obsessed quest to get revenge upon that ship and the people who own it. We encounter telepathy and "jaunting" (instantaneous travel through the power of the mind--a mixture of telepathy with a Star Trek transporter). We find robber barons, three-ring circuses, violence. Bester does not apologize for the violence in his story (unlike some fiction today), he is writing a straight adventure story, with all the pitfalls and danger and violence that come with it. This is "guys' sci-fi" writ large. If the ending had been resolved a little more realistically, it would have been perfect. That said, buy it anyway.

Capsule Description: Proto-Cyberpunkish dark future with some unique twists, a flawed and driven protagonist, and gripping action. On my Top Ten list. Read it. Buy it. Buy two and give one to a friend.

Review: Alfred Bester is generally recognized as one of the greatest writers of SF, especially on the strength of his plots and prose style. He made his reputation on short stories, but is best remembered for two novels: The Demolished Man and The Stars My Destination (sometimes known as "Tiger! Tiger!" in the UK). First published in 1956, The Stars My Destination anticipated many of the staples of the later cyberpunk movement -- the megacorporations as powerful as the governments, body and mind redesign to specs, the dark overall nature of the world, even the cybernetic enhancement of the body. To this it added the standard "one wierd idea" of SF -- that human beings could learn to teleport, or "jaunte" from point to point, with various personal limitations but one overall absolute limit: no one could bridge the gap between a planet and anywhere in outer space. On the surface of a planet, the jaunte ruled supreme; off of it, mankind was still restricted to machinery. In this future world -- extrapolated with convincing and sometimes frightening accuracy by Bester -- we are introduced to the protagonist, Gulliver ("Gully") Foyle: "He was one hundred and seventy days dying and not yet dead..." Foyle is a former nobody, a man who had lots of potential but never had to use it, completely lazy, doing the minimum he could to get by, who is suddenly marooned in space with no escape. Even this isn't enough to motivate him beyond trying to find air and food on the wreck; he hasn't learned enough to know it's possible to FIND a way out of his situation. But he is galvanized to action when an apparent rescue ship deliberately passes him by.

In a sense, The Stars My Destination is simply a SF rewrite of a far older classic, The Count of Monte Cristo. It's the study of a capable, vengeance-driven man who escapes from an apparently impossible situation (twice, in Foyle's case) and returns as an utterly different man to wreak the vengeance that he was denied under his old name. Unlike many other Monte Cristo homages, however, Bester's is written with language fully as evocative as the original's, and with added intricate plot threads that make Gully Foyle's odyssey unique.

I cannot find sufficiently enthusiastic ways to recommend this book. It is one of the best, shining examples of what science fiction can be, in many ways. Read it.

_The Stars My Destination_ is one of the best novels I have ever read. It's so good that the first time I read it, I was overwhelmed by the number of amazing ideas and action-packed scenes filled in the book. Gully Foyle is one of the most wonderfully ruthless and tortured protagonists ever to be written. And the novel has no limits to its sense of depth and imagination; jaunting across Earth, Foyle's quest for revenge against Vorga, the number of interesting and unique characters Bester created, as well as his wonderful experiments in elaborate prose manipulation...this book is the very definition of compelling. About the only flaw I can say that the novel has is that some of the references are a bit dated from the 50's. But it's still so fresh and innovative that it makes a lot of today's SF novels seem dated. And it has influenced thousands of other writers, myself included. Along with this book, there's Bester's _The Demolished Man_. Another great book that shouldn't be missed.

That this book is over 45 years old and still an "underground" classic is a travesty.

This author perfected the concept of world building before the phrase was coined. Bester visualized a future three hundred years from now that will be demolished and reconstructed by humanity's discovery of a talent for teleportation (jaunting). His insights into how this one factor has affected every level of our society are so fresh and well thought out that my preconceived notions about early sci fi writers being quaint and naiive have been permanently obliterated.

If, like me, you also expect the characters and dialog to reflect a '50's cliche, you will be shamed. Our so-called hero is every bit the foul-mouthed, amoral neanderthal from the beginning, when he is pushed to stretch his mental powers in order to survive abandonment in deep space. From there on, he uses everything and everyone in his quest for vengeance, which necessitates his surface transformation into an educated, civilized man -- indeed, only his language really cleans up. The other characters are also revealed one by one to be ruthless and driven, once they have been crossed or betrayed by Gully Foyle. Bester draws a chilling, fascinating portrait of human nature that is sharpened by dystopia.

For all these admittedly dark and depressing themes, this novel avoids melancholy or bleakness. The pervading feeling is strangely light and hopeful, the people oddly likeable. At the last fifty pages or so, we find plot twists that cause us to question and reevaluate our assumptions once again.

In all, The Stars My Destination was so well conceived that I can only marvel at the distinct lack of copycat authors in ensuing decades. Perhaps Bester is in such a class of his own that the rest of the sci fi genre intuitively shys away from mimicry. Bravo, well done.

Alfred Bester tells the tale of a seemingly ordinary man who finds himself caught in the grip of hatred and thrust toward greatness. Driven by an insane lust for a seemingly impossible revenge, Gully Foyle pushes himself to become more than he is, and more than anyone could have dreamed he could become. He is an evil man whose greatness is destined to transcend his evil, eventually raising all of mankind to a greatness it was unable to foresee.

This book is definitely worth reading, though it might be disturbing if you're not prepared for a story in which the protagonist is driven by hatred.

What a shame this immortal story of Gully Foyle, the man shipwrecked and forever marked by the Maori tattoo on his face was never made into a movie! His rise from simpleton to cosmic Donald Trump (and then some!) is a classic of modern fiction, never mind "science" fiction! There is more richness of detail here than in many current "hard" sci-fi books. The whole aspect of "jaunting" has never been duplicated by anyone since. The characters are alive, sympathetic, ugly, real, weak, strong and demented. The story is rich with classic motifs and underpinnings. This is a Story (with a capital S) that deserves continued praise and a movie adaptation (and don't anyone say Leonardo DiCaprio)!

When I (a not-too-informed-SF-reader) said I wanted to read a good science-fiction novel that does not require being familiar with dozens of other SF-works for reference, a friend of mine recommended "The Stars My Destination" by Alfred Bester and he was right. I have read a number of SF-novels since, and now I can see how basic and important this one is. Here is why.

With very imaginative descriptions of possible future technology, Alfred Bester has set standards for some later developments in cyber-punk and likes. Some of the most fascinating among these are drugs that he describes and that put humans into state of very primitive animals (python, for example), and, of course, jaunting technique and PyrE, the omnidestructive matter.

In these two futuristic concepts lies the real greatness of Bester's idea while writing this book. Although heavily supplied with all sorts of "advanced technologies", he makes a point of making them essentially connected with humans and power of their mind (jaunting being possible only with the power of thinking; PyrE activated only by the wish). With these ideas, Bester is trying to tell us that there is no force bigger than human mind, instinct and emotion.

The idea is personified in Gulliver Foyle, madly driven character who has been left in destroyed spaceship in outer space, to float for years before he was spotted by another vessel, and even then not rescued from his "floating coffin". Managing to find his rescue on a nearby planet (society of which has left an unerasable mark on his face, brought out every time he loses his balance), he finds his way back to Terra (Earth) and pledges revenge on "Vorga", the spaceship that failed to rescue him. Foyle is unstoppable, and he does not choose the means to his end. Eventually, that brings him to be the person upon whom the future of the all humanity lies.

Foyle's character is very well described, in depth and range equally. He is violent, immoral and uncontrollable, like everyone's unconsciousness. However, his unrelentlessness proves to be the driving force of the plot, and a convincing one too.

One star less goes to the superficial treatment of some other, possibly interesting characters (Dagenham, Olivia Presteign), and a bit rushed ending.

Still, it is one of the best SF novels I have ever read, and one of the better novels in general. If you are looking for a start in reading science-fiction, start here.

The prologue of this book paints a whole world and time, into which is placed a truly unlikely, but unforgettable, main character, Gully Foyle. Who is introduced with: "He was one hundred and seventy days dying and not yet dead." Possibly the best opening line in all of SF. I still remember it 10 years after my last reading. Only the opening line in "Ringworld" comes close. Literally the textbook example of the "narrative hook."

The story, as such, is "The Count of Monte Cristo in the 25th Century" -- and Bester never claimed otherwise. But it's the fabric of the world he creates to set it in, the sheer mastery of prose, and audacity of his ambition, that sets this book apart from most. It's such a grand ride, like a roller coaster that keeps on going every time you thought there wasn't any more it could do.

A grand display of a first-rate writer at the peak of his form.

Is Demolished Man a better book? I don't think so, but, heck, read them both and decide for yourself.

What incredible news for another generation of science fiction fans. Ever since I first read this novel, more than twenty-five years ago, I have always included it in my own "Top 10" list. This is rich tale of revenge and redemption set in a well-sketched, complex future society, bouyed by enough semi-hard SF to mask [pun intended] plot origins in Dumas, "The Stars My Destination" is a catching page-turner for a captive afternoon's enjoyment. THIS is one science fiction novel that would be a great movie. Arnold, are you listening? The central figure, Gulliver Foyle, floats through his life on the bottom of his society's ladder, until, under duress, he exhibits a skill that transforms him, and his society. In the process, he loses himself, his freedom, his heart and his humanity, in an excruciating series of incidents and challenges, ultimately finding simple love and simple human bonds are the true steel of existence. And society's beauties/norms/conventions may in truth be ugly. As would be typical of almost all novels from this era, the future society lacks obvious modern touches, but, overall, this book will have aged well. The S-F, rockets/space travel, planetary colonies, and the like are merely stage dressing for a psychological adventure. But don't worry, this isn't a psychobabble baby story. We should hate and despise Foyle, yet but the tale's end we are cheering him on. Since, "feeling his pain," we undergo the same transformation, and the stars are truly our destination. Can I say enough? They don't make them like this anymore.

I came to Alfred Bester's oeuvre long after he died, and when most sci-fi readers thought that Frank Hebert's Dune was the be-all and end-all of all science fiction. (I am not dissing Dune here -- that book remains the definitive example of what critics mean by "worldbuilding" and is a must-read in its own right.)

But The Stars My Destination is something completely other. What I mean is, the writing is crisp. Unlike Clarke and Asimov, Bester's Gully Foyle doesn't explain, he DOES. In fact, that is what makes Gully Foyle so special, both as a character in a fictional novel, and as the main character in Bester's fast-paced story. Gully, with all his anger and violence and baser instincts, manages to become a groundbreaker because he is not hampered by conscience or intellectualism. Gully does everything from the gut -- the personification of what it means to have a "fire in the belly." Consequently, nothing he does is boring. Gully will keep you on the edge of your seat, hungering for what's next. That's what makes this book so compelling, and keeps it compelling nearly fifty years after it was written. We believe Bester's vision because it is not based on airy-fairy, overthought "what-if" concepts that have plagued science fiction writers from the beginning. Bester's vision draws from our animal instincts, those parts of us we just can't seem to think away. It's a breath of fresh air, even today.

Maybe that's why some of today's most innovative writers cite to Bester's work, and this book particularly, as a key influence.