Customer Reviews

The Visitor (Gollancz)

5 star:		(10)
4 star:		(5)
3 star:		(4)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

The Visitor, by Shari S. Tepper, is a post-apocalyptic science fiction novel set 700+ years after a giant object slams into Earth. I've heard many good things about Tepper, and I read one of her books a long time ago (After Long Silence) and really enjoyed it, so I was looking forward to dipping back into one of her books. However, after a very promising beginning and middle, the book screeches to a halt, falling apart at the seams.

Tepper really has a flair for interesting characters. The story of Disme is almost heart-wrenching at times, as we see her go through despair after despair at the hands of her stepsister, Rashel. Tepper portrays her vividly, making the reader care deeply about her. From the very first pages, when she goes out alone at night to get away from her family and to think about things, she is seen as an innocent who seems fated to feel nothing but despair. It seems that every time she is shown to love or treasure something, Rashel is there to take it away. As the story progresses and Disme grows into what she will become, you are overjoyed with the way she starts to handle things. The book follows her from a very rough childhood to when she becomes a woman who can look after herself, and the transformation is remarkable. She is a wonderful main character.

The villains in the novel are also well-portrayed. Rashel, of course, is thoroughly evil, but Tepper provides enough backstory to show not only why she is, but also makes you almost pity her instead of hating her. Her mother saved her life once by making a dreadful bargain, a bargain that Rashel must live with for the rest of her life. It feeds on her natural selfishness, but you still feel a little bit sorry for her even as you're rooting for her to get her comeuppance. She is a completely three-dimensional character. I didn't like the fate Tepper gave her, however, as it seemed a bit pointless and unfinished. I'm sure Tepper was making a point with it, but I couldn't fathom what it is. It just seemed a bit lazy, and I was beginning to wonder if she was going to finish Rashel's character arc. She does, but in a perfunctory fashion.

I have heard from other readers that Tepper has a tendency to make her male characters evil, following from her feminist tendencies. I'm glad to say that this time, she generally avoids that. Of course, there are only a couple of them to worry about, but Doctor Ladislav is a very good man. He's dedicated to his craft, his patients, and to the eventual downfall of the despotic regime that has a hold of Bastion. He's very kind, and he becomes very protective of Disme. He is a great help to her on her quest, and he has a fine mixture of warmth, intelligence, and humour to help things along.

What can I say about the plot? I loved the way Tepper balanced things, telling the story from many different angles before having them all come together in what is almost an explosion of tension. At first, you have trouble deciphering what all of these disparate plot elements have to do with each other, but Tepper really handles it well. She uses Nell's Latimer's journal to give a bit of history about this world and what happened to it up until the time the asteroid hit. She then uses effective exposition to inform about what happened afterward, but avoids the massive infodumps that some authors use to explain this. Instead, you get snippets that you have to put together. I found the world Tepper created to be very interesting.

Unfortunately, the book has to end. The Visitor, after chugging along so wonderfully, just completely collapses at the end. I will avoid giving any spoilers about the ending, but I can tell you that, after the exciting story that has been told so far, and after avoiding all of the political, social, environmental, and feminist dogma that she is supposedly famous for, Tepper all of a sudden spends three whole pages lecturing the reader on almost every one of her pet causes. The book slams to a halt, losing all sense of momentum that it had reaching this point. When Tepper explains what the book has been about, when our heroes finally meet their destiny, we find that destiny to be one of fulfilling all of these social dreams that Tepper apparently has for making our current world a better place. As I was reading this book, I found myself saying "It looks like she's avoided everything bad I've heard about her." And then I get to the end and I almost screamed. It completely destroys almost everything I liked about the book. What a complete waste. I felt betrayed.

I find I have to give the book a marginal recommendation, because the evocative world that Tepper has created, and the sheer wonderfulness of the storytelling up to that point. If you like science fiction, you will love everything about this book. Until the ending. Of course, if you like being preached to, then you won't mind the ending and you will really love the book. Keep the ending in mind, be ready for it, and maybe you'll enjoy it more than I did.

It's sad, really.

Her older stepsister Rashel, who cares nothing about her except to insure she does not get in her way, raises (a loose verb for Cinderella-like slavery) Disme Latimer following the strange deaths of family members. As Rashel becomes conservator of a renowned Museum, Disme finds a book written by an ancestor that explains the "magic" that followed the asteroid catastrophe that destroyed the planet. The book hints that her distant relative Nell, author of the tome, still miraculously lives.

Disme knows she must hide this book from Rashel who would turn her and her book in to the authorities to further her own career. The youth begins to learn the ancient magic. If the government finds out what she is doing, they would "bottle" her away and her relative would gladly turn her in. However, THE VISITOR who caused the pandemic destruction in the long ago twenty-first century is apparently returning. The world needs a hero, but could that person be a so young, too frightened, and clearly all alone female hiding her activities from her guardian?

THE VISITOR is science fiction at its bleakest best as Sheri S. Tepper paints a dark panorama of a distant future filled with repression and gloom. The story line is as complex and furnished with intelligent concepts as much as any genre novel contains yet THE VISITOR is also loaded with action and deeply drawn charcaters. As Zager and Evans break into song, readers will agree that Ms. Tepper has written a tale that will be on everyone's short list as a candidate for the genre's book of the year.

Harriet Klausner

Tepper has a strong and vibrant voice in her books that knits incredible, terrifying, beautiful worlds together. The Visitor is a shining example.

A book to answer the questions of what happens to us in the very near future after the Earth is struck by an asteriod, it leaps eons to raise issues of science, magic and science as magic. Its underpinnings are futuristic and fantastic, but its story is an emotionally honest tale of the herione's life, disasters, and future consorting with "gods."

The characters in this book are wonderfully broad and deep, providing true warp and weft to a fantastic story. Tepper reaches into each of them, pulls out their loves, dreams and fears, and lays them bare for reweaving into a solid story. The imagery of the book's unbelievable violence is tempered by the delicate empathy in its touching humanity. Strong, warm, bloody, icy: you care about the people in this book.

Strongly recommended, I wish it had never come to an end.

One thousand years from now -- give or take -- the Earth and her population is recovering from a 21st century asteroid impact that wiped out a good deal of life forms and introduced some things hitherto unknown. Humanity survives in a number of independent city-states, each with its own particular values. One of these is Bastion, settled by religious fundamentalist survivors of the strike. In Bastion, the inhabitants' lives are bound up by dehumanizing rules and dogmas. The main occupation is the search for "the Art," real magic that, as an article of faith, existed before the asteroid strike wiped everything out and will be rediscovered some day. Unfortunately, the search for true magic is so bound in rules, regulations, and dogmas that when it does appear, it is immediately destroyed. Born in Bastion, Disme' Latimer is an odd changeling who neither understands nor subscribes to the dogmas surrounding her. In the process of escaping from her abusive step-sister, she discovers that she is not alone in her feelings and that, in fact, her personal struggles and those of her friends are part of something very much greater than any of them.

To readers familiar with Tepper's work, _The Visitor_ reads something like a cross between _Raising the Stones_ and _A Plague of Angels_, although the tone is both more serious and less angry than that of either of the previous novels. There is not a lot of humour to leaven the message, yet the simple, matter of fact way that even horror is presented only makes it that much stronger. Tepper does not try to sway the reader to her point of view; she merely states her case and leaves you to make up your own mind.

Like many of her previous books, _The Visitor_ is concerned with the nature of god and the nature of evil. Unlike some writers, however, Tepper makes it plain that in her view true evil does, in fact, exist and is so seductive that even well-meaning people can fall prey to it. The way to combat it, according to Tepper, is to learn to think objectively, without falling prey to any dogma or "ism," even those that seem, to outward apperances, benign. One of the ways she shows this is by extrapolating various dogmas to their farthest, and sometimes frightening, conclusions and then basing societies upon those conclusions. Her findings at times stike one as fantastic, but they are nearly always horribly probable.

Although Tepper's worlds may contain almost Utopian societies, she mostly bases her stories in places with serious problems; thus the task of her characters is to overcome those problems. Her vision of the future at times seems bleak, but invariably she holds out hope that things will get better. She does not, however, offer any simplistic solutions for betterment. This may be troubling for readers who like everything to be wrapped up in a nice, neat package with clear instructions as to what's right and what's wrong.

_The Visitor_ is a book that every thinking person should read.

Tepper is one of the best at blending hard science, socio-political questioning, and edgy almost-fantasy. In The Vistor, she's created a captivating melange of bioengineering, astrophysics, legend, and religion, a post-apocalyptic story both fascinating and frightening. She's adept at infusing mythic elements into her mysterious, twisty plot-lines. At first, the story of Dismé reads almost like the old, original Grimm version of Cinderella, with the stepmother and stepsister revealing their evil intentions ever so gradually, and I could never be quite sure if the spirits and visions which Dismé sometimes experienced would prove to have a "scientific" or a "science fiction" explanation---is it magic? Or leftover, half-forgotten science? Or extra-terrestrial visitation? It didn't matter---as Dismé grew into her powers and her heritage, I was rooting for her all the way, absolutely engrossed by the story, and wondering how it could possibly resolve. I also find it fascinating how Tepper postulates this not-terribly-far-distant society from the trends and attitudes of the present day: self-serving, conservative politics and religious bigotry leading to a terrifying, restrictive future. Very well done!

The Visitor is a post-apocalyptic novel. An amateur astronomer, Selma Ornoesky, detects an object occluding the stars in a small segment of the sky and brings the photographs to the local observatory for confirmation. Since the man she has come to see is in Australia, Selma shows the pictures to Nell Latimer, who later passes them on to Neils. After other observatories have confirmed the object and calculated its orbit to intersect with the Earth, the astronomical community holds back the news to prevent a doomsday panic.

The astronomers track the object as it falls into Saturn's gravity well and sigh with relief as it swings around and away from the Earth. At that point, a joint announcement is made of the averted danger; the politicians are totally irritated that they were not informed first thing, but mollified by the argument that the orbit parameters had to be refined more precisely before an announcement was made. Then the object swings around Jupiter and right back on track to hit the Earth. BIG panic, worst than the millenial troubles. Prayer becomes a part of life for people who have never even enterred a place of worship before. The government builds a survival bunker near the observatory where the whole thing began and Nell Latimer joins others in suspended animation to wait for, and help, mankind to climb back to a technological society.

As the object passes the Moon, it splits into two pieces, one of which sets down at the north pole. The other piece smacks the Earth with a boom heard around the world. This Happening results in an instant population reduction. After the nuclear autumn from suspended dust and water particles, the survivors find their world greatly reduced, with the ocean taking away great chunks at the edge and middle of the North American continent. Moreover, mankind is apparently extinct on the other continents. However, the Moon colony is hanging on and the Mars colony is beginning to prosper.

Earth survivors have monsters to fight after the Happening Which Came and Went Again as well as the tectonic upheavals, starvation, disease, and other natural disasters. One group of survivors, the Spared Ones, find a home in the Bastion, a formation of three valleys, and build their capital, Hold, in the intersection of the valleys. There they compile the Dicta of their beliefs and establish the Regime to guide the believers. One of the dicta is the belief in the magic of the before-time. At first, they attacked the demons outside the Bastion at will, but recently have been forced to forgo such pleasures. However, they have gained greatly in machines and other trade goods from the demons which are not otherwise available in their society.

Disme Latimer is a resident of the Bastion who lives with her father and brother, as well as her aunt, step-mother and step-sister. The step-sister is a poisonous little snake named Rashael, who likes to cause pain, and Disme is her favorite victim. Rashael discovers rather early that she is not to physically injury or kill Disme, but discovers that psychological pain is permissible. Since Rashael kills or removes people/things that Disme loves so as to cause emotional distress, Disme pretends to be disinterested in anyone or anything as much as possible. Nevertheless, Rashael manages to steal Disme's loved one and marries him so as to keep the pain fresh.

Rashael has been bound as a girl to something called Hetman Gohdan Gone. It is the Hetman that gives her orders to watch, but not injure, Disme and punishes her when she disobeys. The Hetman also has a willing follower in the leader of the Regime, General Gregor Gowl, and other Regimic leaders. The Hetman possesses very real magic formulas which he provides to his followers upon request; of course, the magic binds these people to the Hetman, increasing its dark powers.

The Hetman has enemies, the Council of Guardians, that also appear to have magical powers. The Council is reputed to consist of 21 entities, of whom Tamlar of the Flames seems to have appeared immediately after the Happening, but others have risen from among the common people over time.

A millenium after the Happening, the thing at the north pole is moving south and everything seems to be coming to a head. General Gowl has received orders from the Rebel Angels to move against survivors outside the Bastion. A mysterious fortress, Goldland or something like that, has appeared in the wastes. The sleepers are running out of everything in their bunker and are arguing about moving out among the survivors.

This novel, like many of the author's works, is a demonstration of Clarke's Third Law: "Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic." Add to that the possibillity of psionic talents and you have science fiction that reads like fantasy ... or fantasy that reads like science fiction. This story may be classified either way. I went with the flow and enjoyed the whole experience.

Recommended to Tepper fans and anyone else who enjoys science fantasy set in the far future.

-Arthur W. Jordin

Tepper is an odd writer, each book different (at least, after her early fantasy trilogies), each book often exploring a different moral or idea. Some more successful than others. Always well written.

The Visitor starts some generations into the future, on an Earth considerably changed after a catastrophic occurrence. We find, as does the key protagonist Disme Latimer as she reads the diary of her ancestress Nell Latimer, that something like an asteroid hit the Earth hard enough to shift tectonic plates, and kill most of the humans then living.

The survivors split into many smaller communities. Disme is essentially an orphan, watched over for some ultimately nefarious purpose by her stepfamily. She sees and hears things and beings that others don't, but she keeps that information to herself.

Nell joined a group of scientists who built a shelter deep underground hoping to survive the catastrophe. They took shifts in cryogenic sleep and kept an eye on the survivors. Eventually, Nell comes out of sleep to the time of Disme. Which is when things get strange.

Without giving anymore away, there's a `god' with a small `g,' a being of the Fell,and people who get called to take on the aspects of avatars (for want of a better word), all brought into the mix. They go on a quest, find their various counterparts, and let the avators use them when needed, all of which leads to a confrontation between the avatars and the creatures of the Fell.

Sounds like a fantasy in some ways, but it's more religious than anything else. The god is there to give humans yet another potential turning point. The questions at the end relate to whether or not we'll take a correct fork.

Is it successful? I'm not sure. The characters are well crafted, and stay individuals even when their avatars take possession. The world is interesting. The Latimer family is interesting. But somehow the interactions are unconvincing, forced. I won't forget it, but I'm not sure I'll want to read it again.

The subject line summarizes my take on this book. Here are some corroborating details...

Tepper takes artistic license on the first few pages by repeatedly saying "Picture this:" and following with long descriptive paragraphs. Being a writer, I was intrigued, but as a reader I found myself sloughing through, trying to get started on this book.

After the first few pages, the actual reading became a breeze, and I found myself more intrigued by the content than by the writing. But once again I felt confused and lost and struggling to get a foothold in the book, and it took several chapters before I got a grip and finally felt like I could escape into this other world without tripping.

And what a great run it was. I was ready to count this among my favorite books. There are 500 pages in the book, and at least the middle 400 or so are fantastic. Others have summarized the plot, so I'm not doing that here. I've been on a stint of fantasy for the past year, and I have to say that this was the most creative book. It got me wondering about how myths are born, how real can they be made, and what powers might humankind discover were we wiped out and forced to start again.

However, at the end, at what is supposed to be one of the culminating points of the story, we get preached to for page after page. I have my own spiritual take on life, and I'm glad to learn and borrow from the views of others, but at the end of this book Tepper manages to turn the entire story into a particular present-day religious point of view. I had the sense of mankind evolving into something new throughout the book, but at the end I felt like I had a modern-day missionary at my door.

For me this book is about what we humans can discover about ourselves and about the power of myth in human motivation, but only because I reject Tepper's own culminating exposition. Even so, I feel like the story wrapped up nicely, unlike most of the books I've read this year.

Not up to her usual standard. I just kept reading it to see what would happen, but it was not gripping and TOO GORY!! If you like this author, read Gate to Womens Country, Beauty and some of the others; this wasn't what I was expecting.

Throughout most of the novel, The Visitor is great. Its well-written, filled with interesting ideas, and quite suspenseful. But about 25 pages before the end it just tanks. This book has, and no hyperbole can exagerate, the worst ending ever. Truly, truly stunningly bad.