Getting Back

Rating:
Summary: Tiresome At Best
Review: A letdown after having read Ice Reich. Where Ice Reich served up Nazis as antagonists, Getting Back offered United Coporations, a big brother-esque entity as controlling as they are ubiquitous. Dietrich sets them up as an evil corporate entity early on, but inexplicably spends the entire book convincing the reader, over and over, that United Corp. is bad. He spends way too much time preaching through Dyson about what it means to be free, what it means to truly live, what individualism is, etc., etc. "Why one does" is a recurring question that Dietrich apparently sees fit to ask every twenty pages or so, as if expecting the reader to need reminding. The plot is interesting, but the characters seem almost an after thought, as not much effort seems to have been put into developing them. Each are confusing caricatures - Amaya The Innovator, emotionally stricken by her crush on Dyson yet capable of making powerful bombs out of raw sulfur; Ico The Skeptic, possessing a deep hatred and distrust of the Corporation yet embracing it in the end; Daniel The Doofus, painted as a clumsy failure with women, yet capable of turning a seemingly dyed-in-the-wool United Corporation agent to his way of thinking, and winning her love to boot! Gimme a break, Dietrich! I bought Getting Back to read on a plane trip, but would have been equally entertained reading the vomit bag. Don't waste your money.

Rating:
Summary: Getting Back to the Future
Review: As William Dietrich sees the future in Getting Back cities have expanded beyond all boundaries and everyone is given a pleasant career nook under the rule of United Corporations. The problem is not everyone feels happy or copperative in their given career role. Daniel Dyson, the main character feels alienated and unhappy. He spends his free time in the cyber world trying to uncover secrets of the UC or running "outside" an extremely dangerous way to pass time. Dyson buys onto a trip by Outback Adventures and finds himself in the outback of Australia under extremely trying conditions.

In purchasing this book, labeled a mystery thriller, I assumed it was more of a man against nature with a human adversary thrown in for good measure. Instead it is a futuristic novel whose vision may not be far off the mark - there are genetic engineering fowl-ups, mega conglomerates who rule the world and massive epidemics which wipe out large segments of the population. While the book promotes a back to nature perspective it does not adequately describe the scenery and the struggles with nature.

After a prologue that catches the readers interest and is exciting and intriguing. The author spends over one hundred long pages setting the scene of the future before the action really gets rolling. There is a side romance to satisfy everyone, however Raven(the woman) never fills out to be any more than a shadow woman.

Having said all that I would recommend this book to those who enjoy futuristic novels and a look at the five star reviews proves that there are those who found the book to be more to their taste.

Rating:
Summary: A Fascinating Book
Review: Getting Back is one of the best books I have read. It is simple and complex at the same time and leaves the reader hanging onto each page. One of my favorite things about the book is the intensity of it. The scary part is that something like this novel could really happen! The author is obviously a talented writer and weaves a suspenseful tale that is worthy of being read by all readers. I am not a reader that is usually attracted to this type of book but a friend recommended it to me and I am so glad that she did - I would recommend this book without reservation to any reader. It is a hit!

Rating:
Summary: A gripping story of the future.
Review: In a world packed with people and few real freedoms, a radical new organization offers an unheard-of year-long journey to a previously-forbidden land. Daniel falls for a beautiful woman and the company's allure, only to find himself stranded in a wilderness which tests his character and ability to survive in Getting Back, a gripping story of the future.

Rating:
Summary: A winner that will keep the audience mesmerizes
Review: In the twenty-first century, the world is perfect with everyone employed and no one going hungry, lacking shelter and advances in biology eradicate many killer diseases. United Corporations believe in a win-win philosophy that leaves no one outside the basic human needs. However, switching from Maslov to Plato, perfect also means boredom.

Just ask the occupant of Quadrant 43 Level 31 Cubicle 17 Daniel Dyson who feels like everyday is "playing solitaire with a deck of fifty-one. His stunts gain him lectures, threats of firing (no chance that ever happening in this win-win world), and increasing ennui.

However, when Daniel meets Raven his life changes. She persuades him to try Outback Adventures where he will have an opportunity to taste freedom during a survival trek across the bio-engineered destroyed continent. Daniel agrees to the journey. Unbeknownst to Daniel and his fellow bored trekkies is that Australia has become a "penal colony" again where the dangerous and the bored are left to survive or die because these two groups are most menacing to the perfect world.

GETTING BACK is a terrific tale that centers on a futuristic Daniel Boone type seeking and receiving something new in his drab life. What is admired in early nineteenth century frontier America is criminal in the twenty-first century. Dropping individuals into elements outside their norm has been a staple of literature and movies for a long time. However, William Dietrich keeps the tale original by retaining an amusing undercurrent and parodies of vogue theories that enhances a taut thriller.

Harriet Klausner

Rating:
Summary: I Could Not Put The Book Down
Review: Its 2048 A. D. and Daniel Dyson is a bored malcontent stuck in a cubical which is buried in a company (called Microcore... what a great name) with little future and less opportunity. In this future United Corporations controls everyone's lives and if you don't rock the boat they let you work in one of their win-win companies. This is OK for most people except Daniel who feels suffocated, stifled and underemployed.

Daniel is convinced by Raven, a beautiful mysterious woman, that he can escape this phony world and test his hidden talents in an Outback Adventure. Australia has been quarantined off-limits for human habitation for many years due to Virus 03.1. Nevertheless, Daniel is ready for a challenge and signs up for the vacation of his life. Although, this is no ordinary vacation.

This is a vacation from hell. Daniel and his group suffer snakebite, starvation, extreme thirst depravation and exhaustion. Unbeknownst to Daniel, Australia has been the repository for the Morally Impaired (a.k.a. convicts). I guess even in the future we still don't know what to do with our social misfits. These convicts (visualize rejects from a Mad Max movie) are interested solely in escaping the island. The head convict aptly named "Warden" wants to get off the island and he believes that Daniel's group can supply him the means for his freedom. Warden captures Daniel's group and make it part of his weird collective. But Daniel and his group escape and make a mad dash to the east coast of Australia where they hope to signal an air rescue. However....That is as much as I wish to give away at this point.

There is very little about this book that I didn't like. It had science fiction, good dialog and a George Orwell
1984-like feel. Perhaps Dietrich could have added a map to help us visualize the trek better but that is a minor complaint to a book that I enjoyed. Dietrich's world of the future is a bleak one but that makes the adventure all that much more fun to read. Overall a good story and well worth the price.

Rating:
Summary: I Could Not Put The Book Down
Review: Its 2048 A. D. and Daniel Dyson is a bored malcontent stuck in a cubical which is buried in a company (called Microcore... what a great name) with little future and less opportunity. In this future United Corporations controls everyone's lives and if you don't rock the boat they let you work in one of their win-win companies. This is OK for most people except Daniel who feels suffocated, stifled and underemployed.

Daniel is convinced by Raven, a beautiful mysterious woman, that he can escape this phony world and test his hidden talents in an Outback Adventure. Australia has been quarantined off-limits for human habitation for many years due to Virus 03.1. Nevertheless, Daniel is ready for a challenge and signs up for the vacation of his life. Although, this is no ordinary vacation.

This is a vacation from hell. Daniel and his group suffer snakebite, starvation, extreme thirst depravation and exhaustion. Unbeknownst to Daniel, Australia has been the repository for the Morally Impaired (a.k.a. convicts). I guess even in the future we still don't know what to do with our social misfits. These convicts (visualize rejects from a Mad Max movie) are interested solely in escaping the island. The head convict aptly named "Warden" wants to get off the island and he believes that Daniel's group can supply him the means for his freedom. Warden captures Daniel's group and make it part of his weird collective. But Daniel and his group escape and make a mad dash to the east coast of Australia where they hope to signal an air rescue. However....That is as much as I wish to give away at this point.

There is very little about this book that I didn't like. It had science fiction, good dialog and a George Orwell
1984-like feel. Perhaps Dietrich could have added a map to help us visualize the trek better but that is a minor complaint to a book that I enjoyed. Dietrich's world of the future is a bleak one but that makes the adventure all that much more fun to read. Overall a good story and well worth the price.

Rating:
Summary: Insights from "Getting Back"
Review: These are more insights than a review on "Getting Back". More are available about the adventure. I found it an excellent book, both politically and in the adventure aspect, but I could have done without the more mundane romance and human conflict aspects.
"Why do you do?", instead of "What do you do?", should be a question asked by every culture, about itself. What was United Corporations' ultimate meaning or purpose for existence?
Apparently in the United Corporations world, technology was sufficient that it left no physical needs unfulfilled. Why wasn't outer space available as a frontier? The best adventures also have outside purpose.
Why accept back only the tip of the elite, especially with chance being a major factor? Why not test and advance people according to how well they can "think outside the box"? Too often we reward only the very best, and forget the many runners-up. And those that did get back are given the rather mundane job of recruiting.
I strongly believe in the principle of community, and the consciousness of the community, with government as part of it's lower brain, to the point of Gaia, the world community. I put the value of community consciousness above that of the individual. But as a community gets bigger and develops more power, it's ego also gets bigger. It feels justified in dominating individuals. It begins to think it has a much higher level of consciousness than the reality. This misperception makes it vulnerable to individual resistance action, resulting in collapse and rebuilding. [...]

Rating:
Summary: I adored it and will read it over and over
Review: You know I used to have a really high rating as an Amazon reviewer.

I don't know exactly what it was but it was in the top 1000. I used to do fairly boring reviews devoid of controversy and in my opinion - interest and my rating was high - lots of "helpful" votes. Lately I have started to write about more emotional works such as "Runaway Jury" and global warming, aids, evolotion and ID, that sort of stuff. My reviewer rating plummeted.

I think Amazon rates on the ratio of favorable to unfavorable reviews. I think they ought to rate on the number of revews that get commented on whether they are rated as helpful or not.
I am sure that my reveiw of this novel will cost me at least 500 points or so on my reviewer rating.

I loved this book.

I hate to categorize but his is like a mix of "The Prisoner"; "This Perfect Day" with a taste of "Mad Max" thrown in for fun.

Dietrich has written an wonderfully inventive version of both the aforementioned works with the Mad Max thing spicing the work rather well.

Imagine a world of the future where it has all been done. A trek to Mount Everst is no more challenging or interesting than a run up Disney's Matterhorn. While this may thrill 99 44/100th of the human population, the remainder thinks something is sorely missing.

The main entity: "United Corporations' the universal employer and de-facto government does however have a problem (issue - there are no problems) in that the remaining 76/100th of folks are not happy.

Daniel Dyson is one of the not happy. As is Tucker, Amaya and Ico and a few others even one who does not know she is unhappy (Raven).

UC gives the the chance to change all that. Pay a years salary and get the adventure of a lifetime where the ultimate chalenge is to survive. After which you will of course be one of the "elite".

Trek to Australia and try to live long enough to get back out again. Just make to to the Exodis Point, we will be ther waiting for you.

Not to worry - the bioengineered plague that wiped out the population of "down under" is gone, all you need now are your wits and whatver you can carry on your back.

I will not tell any more about this book. It is too good to spoil.

You will have to read it and either get it or not. If not then welcome, United Corporations needs you. Take your place on the anthill.

If you get it - then be preapred for a wonderfully clever novel of human survival and a quest for purpose. One that will cause you to self-evaluate.

My advice - read my other reviews. If you agree with two or more, then read and enjoy this terrific novel of adventure and self-discovery.

If you hate my reviews, the go buy "It Takes a Village" by Hilary Clinton and join the swarm.

Hows that for a litmus test.

Rating:
Summary: I adored it and will read it over and over
Review: You know I used to have a really high rating as an Amazon reviewer.

I don't know exactly what it was but it was in the top 1000. I used to do fairly boring reviews devoid of controversy and in my opinion - interest and my rating was high - lots of "helpful" votes. Lately I have started to write about more emotional works such as "Runaway Jury" and global warming, aids, evolotion and ID, that sort of stuff. My reviewer rating plummeted.

I think Amazon rates on the ratio of favorable to unfavorable reviews. I think they ought to rate on the number of revews that get commented on whether they are rated as helpful or not.
I am sure that my reveiw of this novel will cost me at least 500 points or so on my reviewer rating.

I loved this book.

I hate to categorize but his is like a mix of "The Prisoner"; "This Perfect Day" with a taste of "Mad Max" thrown in for fun.

Dietrich has written an wonderfully inventive version of both the aforementioned works with the Mad Max thing spicing the work rather well.

Imagine a world of the future where it has all been done. A trek to Mount Everst is no more challenging or interesting than a run up Disney's Matterhorn. While this may thrill 99 44/100th of the human population, the remainder thinks something is sorely missing.

The main entity: "United Corporations' the universal employer and de-facto government does however have a problem (issue - there are no problems) in that the remaining 76/100th of folks are not happy.

Daniel Dyson is one of the not happy. As is Tucker, Amaya and Ico and a few others even one who does not know she is unhappy (Raven).

UC gives the the chance to change all that. Pay a years salary and get the adventure of a lifetime where the ultimate chalenge is to survive. After which you will of course be one of the "elite".

Trek to Australia and try to live long enough to get back out again. Just make to to the Exodis Point, we will be ther waiting for you.

Not to worry - the bioengineered plague that wiped out the population of "down under" is gone, all you need now are your wits and whatver you can carry on your back.

I will not tell any more about this book. It is too good to spoil.

You will have to read it and either get it or not. If not then welcome, United Corporations needs you. Take your place on the anthill.

If you get it - then be preapred for a wonderfully clever novel of human survival and a quest for purpose. One that will cause you to self-evaluate.

My advice - read my other reviews. If you agree with two or more, then read and enjoy this terrific novel of adventure and self-discovery.

If you hate my reviews, the go buy "It Takes a Village" by Hilary Clinton and join the swarm.

Hows that for a litmus test.

By the way - I fell in love with Amaya.