Rating: 
Summary: Hmmm....
Review: After the Supertoys trilogy, (which dwarfs the sappy film by Steven Speilberg) we get a couple of stories that are either ideas for longer works, or longer works that turn out to be harmless, yet enjoyable SF...
After the story "Panic Button" the book becomes very un-interesting, as the stories don't seem to generate much interest....you don't get pulled into the story(unlike what you might find in a Bradbury or Heinlein short story).
The first three stories are the best, and the tightest...standing out from the rest...but for true SF readers, you may definitely have to look elsewhere...
Rating:
Summary: Do Not Buy This Book If You Are Drawn To It Because of A.I.
Review: Although A.I. is based off this book, it should be noted it's loosely based. The short stories in this book that are on the supertoy theme are only a very small portion of the book. They do not lend any insight, (as many other book which movies are based off of do), to what was going on in the movie or provide any answers to the Kubrick/Speilberg turn of events in the movie that made you wonder what was really going on in their heads. This book may in fact be an excellent book, but I only bought it for the basis of being the basis for the movie and was sorely disappointed. If only I had known it provided nothing much to A.I. except a very loose plot for the beginning of it and some names. I know this isn't a glowing review, but I only wish I had known it didn't give me that information before I had bought it and perhaps I'll prevent this book from being bought by a reader who can't appreciate it.
Rating: 
Summary: Extremely Clever and at the Same Time, Foreboding
Review: Brian Aldiss knows how to envelop you in a story. He doesn't waste time on descriptions of people or places, but just gives you the characters and their situation and goes from there. Some of the stories are just descriptions of a future corporation's plans or a strange occurance. But most become epic in meaning by the time you hit the end of the story. One thing that might bother some readers is the way some of the stories seem to go on and on and on and nothing is really happening. Don't let it get to you because at the end of each story the REAL meaning is shown and it makes total sense. You'll be reading one of the stories thinking you know what's going to happen, but you never do with Aldiss. As far as the Supertoys/A.I. stories they are among the weakest of the collection and are almost totally different from the movie. No Gigolo Joe, No Rouge City, NO BLUE FAIRY. Just David, Monica, a completely different Henry, Professor Hobby, and of course, Teddy. Aldiss is truly a master of Sci/Fi and somehow his bleek view of the future seems eerily possible...
Rating:
Summary: Disappointed
Review: Having written twenty-five short story collections to date, Brian Aldiss's recent achievement, "Supertoys Last All Summer Long," is typical of most post-modern science fiction, lacking the "intense and powerful drama of love and intelligence" he mistakenly suggests the book has in his foreword. One would think that after more than thirty-five years of working with movie directors, including Steven Spielberg and Stanley Kubrick, Aldiss's recent accomplishment would borrow some of their subjectivity. Unfortunately, Aldiss degrades the purposefulness of religion (such as is symbolized in "Apogee Again," a short story within the "Supertoys" collection), and human emotion is left to a pedophilic version of Darwinism where "nothing in life is ever enough," not even sex with twelve-year-old girls.Nineteen short stories in the book, and not one can truly be classified as "contemporary." Imitating a determinism not seen since Melvilles's "Bartleby, The Scrivener," the book is Naturalism in a futuristic setting. Protagonists are "almost human," narrators are mere "visual representatives" with gearbox bodies, and final thoughts for each story echoes a familiar "Ah, Bartleby! Ah, humanity!" Comic relief is the only relief from this book's dreary perception of our future. In "Beef," the Western world is nearly brought to an end because terrorists have destroyed the beef industry. Although completely unbelievable, the story's parodying of our modern meat eaters is quite hilarious. Without the comedy within the book's collection, the overall theme of science-based determinism would be neither consistent nor consistently biased. The varying lengths of each story promotes reader friendliness; longer stories are often interrupted with shorter ones. Each story also avoids the repetition of a single genre, as love, adventure, horror, and even mythological themes are introduced and played upon. In this sense, "Supertoys" succeeds in creating a very entertaining collection of works, moving from each story to the next like scenes in a movie. Language in many of the stories gives away Aldiss's talent for detail. A world economy "crumbles like an old man without teeth," nature is a "frozen eyeball, diminished under its eyelid of eclipsing cloud," and love is an experience where "we became solemn, gazing, marvelling, at each other's body, made ruddy by the setting sun." Even in the detail the comedy does not stop as a penis is described as a "little winkle, which responded readily to her grasp." Without mentioning what the object is, Aldiss succeeds in planting its image in our minds--forever and sometimes with a laugh. Aldiss could have done better. His knack for comedy and grasping so many genres in a single volume is lost to the overemphasis on determinism. The book is far from uninteresting, however, and deserves to be read just for the beauty in its language if nothing else.
Rating:
Summary: Disappointed
Review: Having written twenty-five short story collections to date, Brian Aldiss's recent achievement, "Supertoys Last All Summer Long," is typical of most post-modern science fiction, lacking the "intense and powerful drama of love and intelligence" he mistakenly suggests the book has in his foreword. One would think that after more than thirty-five years of working with movie directors, including Steven Spielberg and Stanley Kubrick, Aldiss's recent accomplishment would borrow some of their subjectivity. Unfortunately, Aldiss degrades the purposefulness of religion (such as is symbolized in "Apogee Again," a short story within the "Supertoys" collection), and human emotion is left to a pedophilic version of Darwinism where "nothing in life is ever enough," not even sex with twelve-year-old girls. Nineteen short stories in the book, and not one can truly be classified as "contemporary." Imitating a determinism not seen since Melvilles's "Bartleby, The Scrivener," the book is Naturalism in a futuristic setting. Protagonists are "almost human," narrators are mere "visual representatives" with gearbox bodies, and final thoughts for each story echoes a familiar "Ah, Bartleby! Ah, humanity!" Comic relief is the only relief from this book's dreary perception of our future. In "Beef," the Western world is nearly brought to an end because terrorists have destroyed the beef industry. Although completely unbelievable, the story's parodying of our modern meat eaters is quite hilarious. Without the comedy within the book's collection, the overall theme of science-based determinism would be neither consistent nor consistently biased. The varying lengths of each story promotes reader friendliness; longer stories are often interrupted with shorter ones. Each story also avoids the repetition of a single genre, as love, adventure, horror, and even mythological themes are introduced and played upon. In this sense, "Supertoys" succeeds in creating a very entertaining collection of works, moving from each story to the next like scenes in a movie. Language in many of the stories gives away Aldiss's talent for detail. A world economy "crumbles like an old man without teeth," nature is a "frozen eyeball, diminished under its eyelid of eclipsing cloud," and love is an experience where "we became solemn, gazing, marvelling, at each other's body, made ruddy by the setting sun." Even in the detail the comedy does not stop as a penis is described as a "little winkle, which responded readily to her grasp." Without mentioning what the object is, Aldiss succeeds in planting its image in our minds--forever and sometimes with a laugh. Aldiss could have done better. His knack for comedy and grasping so many genres in a single volume is lost to the overemphasis on determinism. The book is far from uninteresting, however, and deserves to be read just for the beauty in its language if nothing else.
Rating: 
Summary: disappointing
Review: I bought this book based on the connection to the movie A.I. I am always interested in how a science fiction story or novel has been converted to the screen. I was suprised to find that all the stories except for the cover title were written recently, rather than in the time period of Supertoys, which was 1969. I have read a little Aldiss over the years and find him an OK science fiction writer with novels like Helliconia Summer. I thought the other two Supertoys stories, while written 25 years after the original, did a good job of keeping the tone of the original, they just weren't that interesting. The remaining stories were not enjoyable to me at all and I finally gave up without finishing the book.
Rating:
Summary: disappointing
Review: I bought this book based on the connection to the movie A.I. I am always interested in how a science fiction story or novel has been converted to the screen. I was suprised to find that all the stories except for the cover title were written recently, rather than in the time period of Supertoys, which was 1969. I have read a little Aldiss over the years and find him an OK science fiction writer with novels like Helliconia Summer. I thought the other two Supertoys stories, while written 25 years after the original, did a good job of keeping the tone of the original, they just weren't that interesting. The remaining stories were not enjoyable to me at all and I finally gave up without finishing the book.
Rating: 
Summary: Superb alternative to going to the movies!
Review: I saw A.I. and was thoroughly disappointed in every respect. I purchased this book on the basis that the original story must have been great and that the "creative" minds of Kubrick and Spielberg had to have destroyed it. I was not disappointed by the Aldriss original piece. There is no "blue fairy" tale in this story. I have read the short story three times and the third time has been the best so far. You can read the original version online at various sites. Aldriss has followed-up the original Supertoys story with two additional thought provoking stories, each equally well written and worth the cost of this paperback.
Rating:
Summary: I rarely give 1-star reviews, but this book was horrible
Review: I shelled out [price] for this book because I wanted to read the title story, which inspired the movie “A.I.”, and its two sequels, which formed an outline of how Aldiss wanted the screenplay to evolve. In the three stories, Aldiss poses two good questions: “Can robots feel love?” and “If so, are they human?”, but he never gives us satisfactory answers. Throughout the trilogy, David remains a static, unchanging little boy incapable of articulating or learning from his experiences. The only character the audience can empathize and grow with is the aging, philandering father, who learns nothing in the end except that greed can ruin your life. The worst thing about these stories, though, is that they fail to cover any new ideas that have not already been discussed before, most notably by Isaac Asimov’s far superior “Bicentennial Man”. The sixteen short stories that follow are much, much worse. Most of them teeter on the edge between dramatic fiction and satire, so that they are neither interesting nor funny. Only “Apogee Again” contains any imaginative ideas and descriptions. Some of the stories, such as “A Whiter Mars” and “Cognitive Ability and the Light Bulb”, are not really stories at all; they are summary descriptions of how society will evolve into a vegetarian, religion-less utopia. Others, such as “Dark Society” and “Steppenpferd”, start out promising but leave the reader with lady-or-the-tiger endings, without any resolution to the conflict. Please, please don’t waste your money on this collection.
Rating:
Summary: Book VS movie
Review: Movies never do justice to books. I can't believe Mr. Speilberg put his name on something like this. It was the MOST ridiculous movie I have ever seen. Way too many inconsistancies and unexplained things.
|
