Foundation and Empire

Rating:
Summary: The Golden Age Classic Continues
Review: Asimov's Golden Age classic Foundation Trilogy is one of the early milestones of the science fiction genre. This second installment is less episodic than the first volume, focusing on just two specific stories. The first volume, "Foundation", sets up the whole idea of the Seldon Plan, a mathematically based view of sociopolitical forces that enables one brilliant scientist to grow a new galactic empire from a foundation of one hundred thousand scientists and their families. "Empire" starts off in the same vein, showing how the Foundation staves off annihilation at the hands of the currently decaying, but still dangerous Galactic Empire. Once again, the magic of this section is the subtle means by which the Foundation overcomes impossible odds, and the convincing arguments Asimov uses to make the solution seem inevitable. Part Two involves an internal struggle between the Foundation's authoritarian central government and the Independent Traders who spread that government's economic power. While the Foundation is threatened with civil war, the rise of a new warlord on Kalgan poses a danger to the entire human race.

Because each story is substantially longer than those in Foundation, this volume focuses more on individual characters. In fact, it is not too much to say that a major theme is the historical question, "Do individuals matter?" As a result, the characters are developed slightly more, and there's even a wistful love triangle, and considerably more action than was featured in the first volume, which tended to be distant and impersonal. If you liked Foundation, you'll surely enjoy this and the climax to the series, Second Foundation.

Although these books will strike many as hopelessly dated, Asimov's sweeping historical vision should not be missed by any fans of speculative fiction. They have a directness and honest charm about them that is rare in contemporary science fiction. Later additions to this series, both sequels and prequels, don't adhere to the tone of these original novels, and really add very little except bulk.

Rating:
Summary: If you're used to Star Wars...try this on for size!
Review: This story looks at the world of futuristic warfare in a way that nobody else could have imagined--this is what makes Asimov so unique and why his story doesn't fade into obscurity like others, but rather fades into folklore. My father passed these tales onto me and I plan to pass them on to my children.

Rating:
Summary: Great!
Review: The second book continues the storyline of Hari Seldon and the result of his mathematical equations that would predict the fall of the Empire and bring on a ten thousand year depression. Hari uses mathmatics to reset the prediction so only to allow for a millenium of darkness if a programme he sets up is followed to rule.

Banished to the Foundation planet he sets off a type of timetabled holographic calender that would guide the remains of humanity through a thousand years of darkness. However as we know you can't predict the future and eventually things start to go wrong. A new character arrives to totally disrupt everything he has planed out for the future, The Mule.

Humans are so unpredictable.

Rating:
Summary: A Good Step Forward
Review: Asimov's Foundation Trilogy is seen as classic science fiction. Shockingly, Foundation is hardly a classic. Its theme of history repeating itself is drilled into the readers head. However, Foundation and Empire, the second book in the trilogy, continues with these themes with better fluency and character.

"The General" continues with the stories of Foundation. General Bel Riose of the old empire tries to conquer the Foundation, and Asimov, once again, reassures that Hari Seldon's plan can never go wrong. With this setup of reassurance and the death of the first empire, Asimov raises the reader's hope that the Foundation will never fall.

Immediately in "The Mule" Asimov rattles his audience with the fear that the Foundation, like the empire, will fall. The Mule, a mutant with psychic powers, was not seen by Seldon's Plan. The conquest of the Foundation is unstoppable. The second part of the novel allows readers to actually know the characters. They are not just people who act, but we can see their motifs. The end of the book is supposed to have many plot twist that shock the reader, but with foreshadowing, many revelations are undermined. Bayta, one of the main characters, has a deep dread every time something happens with the Mule. This gives away the identity of the Mule.

Foundation and Empire is a great read through its despair and hopelessness. It left me on the edge of my seat scrambling for the next book.

Rating:
Summary: Confused about "classic" status
Review: Just writing this to provide moral support for anyone who reads this book and is thoroughly underwhelmed.

Asimov's prose is clean but his tone seems uneven in this installment, as opposed to the tighter first book.

The book is essentially two disconnected adventures... not very appealing.

There's a female character in the second adventure that's quite problematic; she's dull, and Asimov spends a lot of time and effort on the fact that she's (gasp) not male.

Finally, this series feels very dated, in terms of language, attitudes, and even vision of the future. "Nuclear" is the buzzword; everything's like the '50s, but nuclear-powered.

I liked Foundation but Foundation & Empire tends to wander away from the idea of the Foundation as the main character, and instead can't seem to decide whether to focus on galactic-level events or protagonists. This would be excusable if the protagonists were interesting.

Go read Jack Vance or Gene Wolfe if you want masterful sci-fi!

Rating:
Summary: Slightly Problematic Second Installment of the Trilogy
Review: The classic Foundation trilogy continues on pace in this second installment. The first half of this book is rather flat with uninspiring political wrangles and a story of the Empire's last general who is defeated by the Foundation and is never mentioned again. This episode has little effect on the overall flow of the story and is a curious piece of filler in this otherwise strong trilogy. However, the second half of this book, taking place many decades later, more than makes up for it. Here we learn that Hari Seldon's once flawless predictions on the course of humanity throughout the galaxy are starting to break down, because of the passage of huge amounts of time and the introduction of an unforeseen variable. This variable is a mutant known as The Mule, who has strange mental powers that are outside the realm of Seldon's psychohistory and throw his ancient predictions out of whack. Soon both the Foundation and the Empire are in ruins, and barbarism reigns throughout the galaxy. Only the mysterious Second Foundation, which has not been heard from since Seldon's day, can possibly help. Whether or not the Second Foundation can save the galaxy from the dark ages, and whether this is all really a part of Seldon's plan after all, are questions that arise in this book but are not answered. Thus we have an excellent intellectual cliffhanger that gives a great reason to continue to the third installment of the trilogy.

There are two strange occurrences in this book that speak volumes on the time period in which Asimov wrote it, that being the 1940's. First, there is a prominent female character in this book, which was nearly unheard of in the sci-fi of that area. Furthermore, Asimov writes as if this is an amazing occurrence, and other characters are shocked and uncomfortable with this woman's status as an "equal" among the male characters around her. This sure seems strange today. Was Asimov slyly commenting on the state of women's rights back in mid-century, or did he think he was making a grand statement about the future? Either way, the sentiment is oddly outdated and even more oddly takes place in the distant future of humanity, where I would hope things would have progressed. Finally, in the second-to-last line of the book, Asimov inserts a rather sick dirty joke through the use of a sly double entendre (the key word is "mule").. Back in 1952 Asimov probably thought he was making a goofy in-joke to his learned friends that would not be caught by the general public. If that's the case, the joke in question seems extremely silly and predictable today, and brings the book to a close that is rather difficult to take seriously.

Rating:
Summary: The "Empire Strikes Back" of the Foundation Series
Review: I just finished Foundation and Empire and so far it is my favorite in the series.
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Foundation presented us a struggling organization of scientists on the Planet Terminus who must deal with the newly formed barbarian kingdoms that arise from the retreating Empire. Important figures within the Foundation use religion, trade and technology to dominate over adversarial planets.
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In Foundation and Empire, we are given a new perspective on the Foundation. Before, we were lead to believe that the Foundation must survive and that no one could hinder its progess; that Hari Seldon's predictions of the Foundation were infallible; that the 1,000 year plan was set in stone and that a new Galactic Empire will arrise in such time thanks to Hari Seldon. However, these beliefs are put into question when an individual calling himself 'The Mule' threatens to destroy Hari Seldon's 300 year old project. He is a mutant of considerable mental powers who can seemingly convert anyone into his cause, even the greatest opponent. Thus, we are asked, "Does Hari Seldon's precious Psychohistory take random genetic mutation into account? If not, then is it possible for the Mule to destroy the Foundation?"
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I loved the ending to Foundation and Empire. Like Empire Stikes Back, it leaves you hanging, desperately wanting to find out what happens to the main characters (and the galaxy) after the book ends.
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I've always loved enigmatic characters in books. The Mule fits this catagory, which, in my mind, makes him even more sinister and evil. We never see him or hear him speak (for all those who have read the book, don't say anything), and yet we experience his destructive force. It reminds me of Sauron of The Lord of the Rings. At the end, however, we are given a profound revelation of the Mule that adds a new dimension to his character.
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All in all, it was the dispair and depression in the book that captured me. There was little hope and yet the human spirit was still evident. I applaud Asimov for creating a believable story in which death, destruction and dispair overshadow an entire galaxy but hope and determination remain. This theme, I think, is present throughout the series and, in my opinion, is the most important human quality that makes us who we are. The foundation is ultimately an exploration of this theme. Clearly, Hope is the most formiddble force that human history and, according to Asimov, the galaxy has ever seen.

Rating:
Summary: The foundation trilogy is overated!
Review: How can this be considered a classic? It's fun, it's entertaining, but it lacks so much qualities all classics have!
The Mule was a disappointment. I knew from the beggining who he was. I found myself skimming sections of this novel because I got bored with it. When I got to page 50 I was ready to give up on the novel and put it down, but I thought this book has to be good it's consider a classsic! So I decided to read the whole novel. A classic novel is suppose to convey a message to the reader about life, the words and writing style is suppose to be superior to the average writer, and the story should stand out as one of the more creative stories. This novels main lesson about mankind is not a unique one : The idea of history being preditced by math ,science, and psychology. People will never change, civilization will always end up destroying itself. Nothing is for certain even if science says so. I have heard this all before he did not invent this idea I want to hear somthing new and original. The great writers have superior writing skills. Askimov writing skills are just average. I expect to see in a classic novel a lot of symbolism, carefully crafted prose, well thought out sentences, better play on words, and better dialog! The dialog spoken by the characters is 3rd gradish and dull. Finally the author lacks the creativity the classic writers have. I expect to see a detailed lay out of how each creation works. I like an author who invents hi-tech gizmos and then educates the reader with all the scientific details of how it works. I like to learn a little physics when I read a science fiction book. --Main point: I liked the robotic novels better. Askimov went into details of how the robots worked. His robot books were good,not classics, but much better I thought.

Rating:
Summary: A big fan
Review: A good solid beginning to a stunning series.

Rating:
Summary: The continuation of an epic series
Review: Foundation and Empire is the second of the original Foundation trilogy written in the 1950s. The first book is Foundation and the last is Second Foundation. I enjoyed Foundation but I liked F&E quite a bit more! Foundation consists of five disconnected short stories, too short for adequate development of the settings or characters. F&E is much more focused, containing only two stories, the second of which really impressed me.

A quick refresher on the background: The psychohistorian Hari Seldon was able to mathematically foresee the future of human society in the Milky Way. It wasn't pretty. Socio-economic forces were to cause the total collapse of the Trantorian Empire and lead to 30,000 years of anarchy and barbarism before a new empire restored peace and order. However, Seldon saw an "alternate path" that could reduce the duration of the Dark Ages to a single millennium. He established two societies (called Foundations) to bring this change about.

In Foundation, we learn how the fledgling First Foundation established itself after Seldon's death and how it grew powerful. In F&E, Seldon is long dead and the First Foundation faces much more serious threats: a war with the dying but still powerful Trantorian Empire and a war with a mutant leader called The Mule who possesses incredible powers. The part about the war with the Empire is a straightforward narrative with a couple interesting twists. The second part about The Mule takes place a few decades later and is written in the style of a mystery, sort of like the first two Robot novels.

Since The Mule is an individual of extraordinary power, Seldon's psychohistorical predictions for the First Foundation are in jeopardy because they deal only with masses of people and large scale socio-economic forces. Hence the second part is a more exciting read. :-) Also, until the end of the second part the Second Foundation is a mysterious society on the other side of the Galaxy about whom we know next to nothing. Although I guessed the nature of The Mule's powers, I did not guess his identity and it was a great surprise for me when it was revealed at the end. The events of the last two chapters are stunning and really make you want to rip into the third book. Yet F&E doesn't end on a cliffhanger and is quite satisfying in and of itself. This unique blend is a testament to Asimov's genius as an author. Also, you'll learn why the mutant calls himself The Mule and it's quite enlightening!

With novels written later, Asimov tied together three series into one huge one! I recommend reading the entire 14-book series in the following order: the four Robot novels, the three Empire novels, and the seven Foundation novels (the original trilogy plus two prequels and two sequels). So far I've yet to read the last three Foundation books (Second Foundation, Foundation's Edge, Foundation and Earth), but so far most have been excellent and all have been well above average.