Customer Reviews

- and all the stars a stage

5 star:		(1)
4 star:		(8)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

This is a really good classic science fiction tale.

The elements of classic Science Fiction in this novel:

1. Written with an attempt to make the science match story. No warp drives here. Well ok. Maybe kind of a warp drive but just one!

2. Written before the computer age. It is fascinating to see the writer's visions of the future before our society was digitized to nothing but a series of 1's and 0's.

3. Short. Classic Science Fiction was written cleanly and shortly and rarely filled with fluff. Made for a quick read.

4. Character development. Like most classic Science Fiction the main character is developed and the surrounding characters only to the point needed to tell the story. No extra characters are added if not needed. The story is the point.

5. The technology is there to drive the story not the other way around.

6. And of course there is a shocking ending. Great ending in this case. Well worth the read. (I hope you haven't read one of the spoilers by other reviewers!)

No real cons except when it is over you are left wanting more but that is the way we all would like it I think. Very very good that approaches 5 stars but just misses it in my book. Definitely a must read for fans of classic Science Fiction.

This is a really good classic science fiction tale.

The elements of classic Science Fiction in this novel:

1. Written with an attempt to make the science match story. No warp drives here. Well ok. Maybe kind of a warp drive but just one!

2. Written before the computer age. It is fascinating to see the writer's visions of the future before our society was digitized to nothing but a series of 1's and 0's.

3. Short. Classic Science Fiction was written cleanly and shortly and rarely filled with fluff. Made for a quick read.

4. Character development. Like most classic Science Fiction the main character is developed and the surrounding characters only to the point needed to tell the story. No extra characters are added if not needed. The story is the point.

5. The technology is there to drive the story not the other way around.

6. And of course there is a shocking ending. Great ending in this case. Well worth the read. (I hope you haven't read one of the spoilers by other reviewers!)

No real cons except when it is over you are left wanting more but that is the way we all would like it I think. Very very good that approaches 5 stars but just misses it in my book. Definitely a must read for fans of classic Science Fiction.

This is a really good classic science fiction tale.

The elements of classic Science Fiction in this novel:

1. Written with an attempt to make the science match story. No warp drives here. Well ok. Maybe kind of a warp drive but just one!

2. Written before the computer age. It is fascinating to see the writer's visions of the future before our society was digitized to nothing but a series of 1's and 0's.

3. Short. Classic Science Fiction was written cleanly and shortly and rarely filled with fluff. Made for a quick read.

4. Character development. Like most classic Science Fiction the main character is developed and the surrounding characters only to the point needed to tell the story. No extra characters are added if not needed. The story is the point.

5. The technology is there to drive the story not the other way around.

6. And of course there is a shocking ending. Great ending in this case. Well worth the read. (I hope you haven't read one of the spoilers by other reviewers!)

No real cons except when it is over you are left wanting more but that is the way we all would like it I think. Very very good that approaches 5 stars but just misses it in my book. Definitely a must read for fans of classic Science Fiction.

This is a really good classic science fiction tale.

The elements of classic Science Fiction in this novel:

1. Written with an attempt to make the science match story. No warp drives here. Well ok. Maybe kind of a warp drive but just one!

2. Written before the computer age. It is fascinating to see the writer's visions of the future before our society was digitized to nothing but a series of 1's and 0's.

3. Short. Classic Science Fiction was written cleanly and shortly and rarely filled with fluff. Made for a quick read.

4. Character development. Like most classic Science Fiction the main character is developed and the surrounding characters only to the point needed to tell the story. No extra characters are added if not needed. The story is the point.

5. The technology is there to drive the story not the other way around.

6. And of course there is a shocking ending. Great ending in this case. Well worth the read. (I hope you haven't read one of the spoilers by other reviewers!)

No real cons except when it is over you are left wanting more but that is the way we all would like it I think. Very very good that approaches 5 stars but just misses it in my book. Definitely a must read for fans of classic Science Fiction.

This is a really good classic science fiction tale.

The elements of classic Science Fiction in this novel:

1. Written with an attempt to make the science match story. No warp drives here. Well ok. Maybe kind of a warp drive but just one!

2. Written before the computer age. It is fascinating to see the writer's visions of the future before our society was digitized to nothing but a series of 1's and 0's.

3. Short. Classic Science Fiction was written cleanly and shortly and rarely filled with fluff. Made for a quick read.

4. Character development. Like most classic Science Fiction the main character is developed and the surrounding characters only to the point needed to tell the story. No extra characters are added if not needed. The story is the point.

5. The technology is there to drive the story not the other way around.

6. And of course there is a shocking ending. Great ending in this case. Well worth the read. (I hope you haven't read one of the spoilers by other reviewers!)

No real cons except when it is over you are left wanting more but that is the way we all would like it I think. Very very good that approaches 5 stars but just misses it in my book. Definitely a must read for fans of classic Science Fiction.

Blish's flagship work is his tour-de-force Cities in Flight (CIF) collection, which undoubtedly towers over this mere dingy of a novel. Where CIN is sophisticated like a rich, heady wine that lingers on the pallet, And All the Stars a Stage (AASS) is like a cheap draft beer which aims to quickly quench an urge.

With the comparison now aside, a look into AASS doesn't require a very detailed survey. There's an odd contrast with fairly vocabulary (none of which had me running for the dictionary) and generic, stereotypical science fiction words (i.e. `telefax,' `vocoder,' `astrogator' and `solidiograph'). The general approach to the novel via this writing technique makes me think that it's aimed at the 1960s-70s teenage market. The `big' words will make them wow while the cheesy words will make them daydream. But, for an adult reader, the reading feels immature.

The plot is developed with haste but isn't as sloppy as one would think with the novel only being 191 pages. Here is where Blish gets his `A' for effort. His inclusion of the Familiar creature, which is man's new best friend, is an interesting addition but is developed into the plot very poorly, almost superficially. Another `A' for Blish is the surprise ending, which even shocked me... and I can predict nearly every ending. It's out of the blue and far fetched but still a solid twist to the last 3 pages. But a common failure amongst older novels (50s-70s) is the format. The book feels divided in two stories and glued together at a later time, where some plot items don't get properly developed.

Relish CIF, but it's best to give AASS a single read and throw it in the `return' pile.

This is a really good classic science fiction tale.

The elements of classic Science Fiction in this novel:

1. Written with an attempt to make the science match story. No warp drives here. Well ok. Maybe kind of a warp drive but just one!

2. Written before the computer age. It is fascinating to see the writer's visions of the future before our society was digitized to nothing but a series of 1's and 0's.

3. Short. Classic Science Fiction was written cleanly and shortly and rarely filled with fluff. Made for a quick read.

4. Character development. Like most classic Science Fiction the main character is developed and the surrounding characters only to the point needed to tell the story. No extra characters are added if not needed. The story is the point.

5. The technology is there to drive the story not the other way around.

6. And of course there is a shocking ending. Great ending in this case. Well worth the read. (I hope you haven't read one of the spoilers by other reviewers!)

No real cons except when it is over you are left wanting more but that is the way we all would like it I think. Very very good that approaches 5 stars but just misses it in my book. Definitely a must read for fans of classic Science Fiction.

this being the first book of James Blish i've read, i wasnt sure what it would be like. not being a gigantic fan of Sci-Fi, i was pleasantly surprised.

although the book was a little short, i felt that he got his story across. he was descriptive enough so that i had a good picture of what was going on, but not too much to the point where it would get slow.

an interesting ethical delimma, the idea of leaving your Earth behind, and i think he gave the characters many opportunities to ponder and theorize about their situation.

overall, a good book to read.

This is science fiction about as good as it gets. I read this a long time ago and have read it many times since. A starship prepares to take a group of inhabitants of a planet doomed to destruction. Our unlikely hero slowly emerges as a natural leader. The society described is eerily similar to our own with some differences.

The travelers have adventures on several worlds and almost despair of ever finding one but at last they do. And, of course you know it's Earth. It is early China and they have arrived to see Earth's first king. The epilogue was such a quiet yet powerful summary. Chinese scientists recorded a bright light in the sky in 1086. It is, of course, the travelers's sun going Nova. And, you see, the Chinese astronomer who recorded this event in the imperial records is unaware that he is an ancestor of a union between Chinese and the aliens.

Terrific writing, mesmerizing in fact. A real winner.

This book is a favorite of mine, as it presents a distant world with an interesting "back story" while telling a tale of a stellar diaster. The human inhabitants of the planet have to make a sudden exodus into the galaxy to find a new home. They discover that the universe at large is not as welcoming as they might have expected and they also have to deal with realistic problems such as the scarcity of home-like planets and, when they do find them, some less-than-hospitable inhabitants. I especially liked the ending.