The Fountains of Youth

Rating:
Summary: Stableford gets better and better
Review: I always thought Stableford was an enjoyable writer, but with his future history, he has rapidly turned into one of my all-time favorite SF writers.
As with many of the other volumes of his future history (Inherit the Earth, Architects of Emortality, The Cassandra Complex), the Fountains of Youth is an expansion of an earlier novella (in this case "Mortimer Gray's History of Death"). The novella was good, but this expanded version is stunning.
The narrator, Mortimer Gray, is one of the first human children to receive a new immortality treatment. Although his parents and many previous generations have had access to many life expanding techniques, Mortimer is one of the first children who can look forward to (barring accident) virtual immortality (called emortality by Stableford). Ironically, Mortimer becomes obsessed with the subject of Death, and decides to spend his life writing the definitve academic history of Death. As he pursues his obsession over the centuries, we see through his eyes a fascinating possible future for humanity.
All of the novels in Stableford's future history are entirely independent of each other, although it might be helpful to read any one of the earlier books to have a hint of the background for this novel.

Rating:
Summary: thought-provoking science fiction
Review: The Emortals that the human race has evolved into wonder why Mortimer Gray would write his epic tome, "The History of Death". It is to answer that question that he has posed to himself that has led Mr. Gray to write this autobiography of his five centuries of life.

Mortimer was born in 2520 with nothing in his background to suggest he would become so famous for the epic work that has shaken humanity. In 2535, Mortimer climbs a Tibetan mountain where he meets world leader Julius Ngomi inside an ancient ruin. Julius explains that the dead past resides side by side with the Emortals. Not too long after that encounter, Mortimer tastes but survives death due to a shipwreck that shows that mankind may have defeated aging and disease, but accidents can still kill. Mortimer becomes obsessed with the way the past coped with death and begins his treatise that leads to many fringe groups claiming him as their guru and chronicler.

THE FOUNTAINS OF YOUTH is a deep, thought-provoking science fiction tale that is not for everyone. Fans who enjoy action at the rate of "Stars Wars" need to pass on this tale. However, those readers who gain pleasure from a cerebral, philosophic futuristic look at mankind will relish this novel. Written more like an autobiography than a novel, Brian Stableford demonstrates his abilities to paint a distant future that raises questions about the present.

Rating:
Summary: thought-provoking science fiction
Review: The Emortals that the human race has evolved into wonder why Mortimer Gray would write his epic tome, "The History of Death". It is to answer that question that he has posed to himself that has led Mr. Gray to write this autobiography of his five centuries of life.

Mortimer was born in 2520 with nothing in his background to suggest he would become so famous for the epic work that has shaken humanity. In 2535, Mortimer climbs a Tibetan mountain where he meets world leader Julius Ngomi inside an ancient ruin. Julius explains that the dead past resides side by side with the Emortals. Not too long after that encounter, Mortimer tastes but survives death due to a shipwreck that shows that mankind may have defeated aging and disease, but accidents can still kill. Mortimer becomes obsessed with the way the past coped with death and begins his treatise that leads to many fringe groups claiming him as their guru and chronicler.

THE FOUNTAINS OF YOUTH is a deep, thought-provoking science fiction tale that is not for everyone. Fans who enjoy action at the rate of "Stars Wars" need to pass on this tale. However, those readers who gain pleasure from a cerebral, philosophic futuristic look at mankind will relish this novel. Written more like an autobiography than a novel, Brian Stableford demonstrates his abilities to paint a distant future that raises questions about the present.

Rating:
Summary: eh
Review: This book struck me as being saddled with two principal flaws. One, Stableford loves to use the five-dollar-words, and neither his dialogue nor his interior monologues (even given that this book is supposed to be the autobiography of its principal character) ring true at all. No actual human beings talk or think the way Mortimer Gray does. The style is turgid in the extreme.

Two, for a philosophical novel of ideas, there's little that's innovative. The philosophical issues of "spacer vs. planet-dweller", "genetic engineering vs. cyborging", "hedonism vs. stoicism", and even "death vs. life" are not dealt with in a way that is more interesting or entertaining than has been done by previous authors. Plus, Stableford commits the great error (in my mind) of actually trying to depict the contents of a Great Work for the Ages.

Bruce Sterling's _Schismatrix_ went over much similar ground 15 years ago in a much more entertaining way.