Rating: Summary: One of the best Review: This is simply one of the best books of Leiber. It is poetic, filled with entrancing images, beautiful cats, utterly bizarre situations. It was one of the first to use the "mosaic" form of writing, where several different plots are being exposed simultaneously (a later example is John Brunner's Stand on Zanzibar). If you like to dream, read it, you 'll love it.
Rating: Summary: The first half of Wanderer is the reason its out-of-print Review: This is the second book by Leiber to win hugo award. The plot is the same as in Clarke's Rendezvous with Rama. Alien spaceship arrives, eats the moon and that causes major earthquakes and destruction on Earth. Finally the question being answered: we are not alone. However, the revealing of the truth, why aliens came to our system is frightening, because it has nothing to do with human species, who aliens at first do not even recognize as intellegent beings. They opinions of humans is the same as what we think of ants. Now to the bad part. The first 150 out of 300 pages book are badly written. It feels like it was translated in Engish from a different language by amateur translator. The writing is chaotic, ridiculous at times ( the whole Moon episode), etc. What win this book the award was the great second half of the book and the idea within.
Rating: Summary: e-reads edition is execrable Review: This review deals only with the quality of this edition, not with the story as such. It appears this edition was produced by an optical scan of an earlier edition, with no evidence that the result was proofread. There are about four 'typos' per page, enough to distract from the story. Some are easy to puzzle out ('fight' instead of 'right'); others less so.I'll be looking at all my future purchases carefully to make sure they are not e-reads editions.
Rating: Summary: A wonderful sci-fi/disaster book Review: While everyone's eyes are turned to the skies to watch a lunar eclipse, a planet appears out of nowhere. At first, people are intersted in this new planet, then the devastating earthquakes and tidal changes begin as the Wanderer, as many have named the planet, begins threatening the Moon. This engrossing novel catalogs the catastrophic events following the Wanderer's appearance through the eyes of many people instead of focusing on just on small group. From the saucer students, gathered on a California beach near Vandenburg 2 to watch the eclipse, to a treasure hunter in the waters off Vietnam, to a man crossing the Atlantic on a small boat and a cruise liner being hijacked off the coast of South America, and even to a few astronauts on the Moon. The author Fritz Leiber does't just give an anecdotal visit to each; he returns to them, keeps their storylines going so that the reader gets mutliple viewpoints of the same events. This is especially effective when the saucer students on Earth watch what the Wanderer does to the Moon, while the astronauts on the Moon live through the experience. It keeps reminding you that the events have a global impact. Plus, Leiber's descriptions are rich and detailed, even with some hand drawn illustrations showing the phases of the Wanderer. Full of rich descriptions and great characters, this is a very entertaining sci-fi novel.
Rating: Summary: A wonderful sci-fi/disaster book Review: While everyone's eyes are turned to the skies to watch a lunar eclipse, a planet appears out of nowhere. At first, people are intersted in this new planet, then the devastating earthquakes and tidal changes begin as the Wanderer, as many have named the planet, begins threatening the Moon. This engrossing novel catalogs the catastrophic events following the Wanderer's appearance through the eyes of many people instead of focusing on just on small group. From the saucer students, gathered on a California beach near Vandenburg 2 to watch the eclipse, to a treasure hunter in the waters off Vietnam, to a man crossing the Atlantic on a small boat and a cruise liner being hijacked off the coast of South America, and even to a few astronauts on the Moon. The author Fritz Leiber does't just give an anecdotal visit to each; he returns to them, keeps their storylines going so that the reader gets mutliple viewpoints of the same events. This is especially effective when the saucer students on Earth watch what the Wanderer does to the Moon, while the astronauts on the Moon live through the experience. It keeps reminding you that the events have a global impact. Plus, Leiber's descriptions are rich and detailed, even with some hand drawn illustrations showing the phases of the Wanderer. Full of rich descriptions and great characters, this is a very entertaining sci-fi novel.
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