Rating: 
Summary: These are the tales that dogs tell....
Review: I still get choked up when I think of generation after generation of highly evolved dogs sitting around camp fires and debating over whether or not the mythical race of gods known as "man" ever really existed. Of course the same goes for the idea of robots carrying out man's dream of exploring the universe, as a sacred trust, long after men have ceased to be. And of course there is also the matter of the supreme sacrifice of man to ensure that his old companions will develop to their full potential- without human interference.
As much as I love Simak's _Waystation_ and _The Goblin Reservation_, this book is probably his masterpiece. It is certainly his most epic, covering so many millenia. I am so glad that Old Earth Books has put it back into print. Here are themes that he would expand in such works as _Ring Around the Sun_, _A Choice of Gods_, and _Special Deliverence_. This is good, because when you finish you definately are left wanting more.
I think that it was Heinlein that once said, "If you don't like Simak, then you don't like science fiction." I couldn't agree more.
Rating:
Summary: A VERY THOUGHT-PROVOKING EXAMPLE OF CLASSICAL SF
Review: "City" is a magical book, a true modern fable, and I highly recommend it. But if you do read it, I hope it doesn't take you as long as it took me to get started. As the old saying goes, you can't judge a book by its cover. Or its first tale, for that matter.Not that it is a bad story. On the contrary, it has a certain nostalgic flavor, a dated atmosphere that has to be appreciated under the correct light, Like the light of the fireplace in the Webster House, the rural property that serves as the common scenery that connects the tales, and leads the story into its climax. But I guess I wasn't prepared for that when this book first got into my hands. I was attending a seminar for English teachers in Southern Brazil and the school where the event was taking place was giving away some old books, the kind nobody wants anymore. City was among the ones I picked. The graphic layout of the cover showed how old the book was, and so was the fact that it was literally falling apart. Anyway, I read the first story, and all these elements together left me the strong feeling that it was just another curiosity, an example of how far from reality SF writers of the past were, of how wrong they were when predicting the decades still to come, and what the end of the twentieth century would be like. Family planes powered by atomics? Yeah, right. Those guys in the fifties thought nuclear energy either would be the ultimate curse or the ultimate solution. References to World War II as "the war"? Of course there wouldn't be any other wars after that one. Hydroponics replacing "dirt farming"? People fleeing the cities to live in large estates in the interior? Yeah, like there would be room for everyone in the country. Th result, I thought, was almost laughable. I thought City was a tribute to the author's lack of sight, his complete inability understand the major social and economical trends. As many SF/fantasy writers have done, he picked one specific phenomenon, the bucolic lifestyle in American suburbs, (and from there to the country) and extrapolated that to the entire human race. All of this in the distant year of 1990... So I put the book aside and didn't touch it for another eleven years. But now, when I'm older and wiser, I did a little restoration work on those old yellow pages, and read it all the way though. As the story advanced, and hundreds, even thousands of years passed, I realize I was before a deep and thought-provoking tale of incredible literary and philosophical value. And the more the story progressed, the more my impression of the author's universe changed. The fact is that the book has many surprises, and is a real gift for the reader. When it finally ended, I was hoping for more, but of course, there won't be more, as it was written a long time ago, and the author is already dead. Like a message in a time vault from a distant past. Sometimes a book leaves me feeling this way. Another was the also classic "More than Human," by Theodore Sturgeon. It's really gratifying when an author has the sensibility to look into the human nature in such an insightful and equally entertaining way. And, who knows, now that we have the Internet, who says people might not prefer to live away from the cities? And perhaps in a not so distant future, the author's predictions might get to be much closer to reality than we thought possible.
Rating: 
Summary: Not Bad
Review: ...but not that great either. I guess you could say I'm a Simak fan, I've read a few of his novels, and I've liked them all pretty well, but this was not really up to his standard. I really don't understand how it got all of these terrific reviews. It was a good book, but nothing out of the ordinary. In my opinion, if you are new to Simak's work, or just have not read it yet, Ring Around the Sun is the book to read. That is a great novel, of a much higher caliber than City. Plus, I think it's still in print. As I said, not bad, but not really great either.
Rating:
Summary: Scifi stories that I grew up with
Review: A wonderful collection of stories with a thread of the Webster Family and Jenkins the robot weaving the tales together. Sit down on a free night and read it,you will be well rewarded for the time you spend being caught up in its magic.
Rating:
Summary: Enjoyable
Review: City is a fairly short book; but, for some reason, I found that it took me longer to read than many books twice its length... possibly because it involves so many different characters (the book is basically a collection of short stories which take place over a period of 10,000 years or so), that it demands more attention... and also possibly because it is more intellectual than dramatic.
I read the SFBC 50th Anniversary Collection edition of this book (check out the scanned image I added). This SFBC 50th Collection started out with a sample of 8 books from well-known SciFi authors that were published in 50's (Asimov, Heinlein, Clarke, Poul Anderson, Pohl, Simak, etc.), and I ended up liking City better than any of the other books from the 1st eight of the Collection. The Collection has turned out to be popular enough, that another 8 significant SciFi books from the 60's were republished as part of the Collection (I found some real gems in that 2nd set), and now 8 more from the 70's are being republished.
Rating:
Summary: Highly original, thought-provoking science fiction
Review: City is great science fiction, a social commentary of sorts told in a unique and highly effective manner. The tales collected in this book are the myths that have been told by generation after generation of Dogs. Dog scholars debate their origin, and only Tige is so bold as to argue that Man ever truly existed. The majority argument makes sense--man was a highly illogical creature, too selfish and materialistic to ever survive long enough to form a lasting, advanced culture. These stories themselves basically tell the story of the Webster family, a remarkable family whose genealogical line was gifted with genius yet cursed with failures. As the story goes, humans abandoned the cities and sought a bucolic lifestyle, shedding the old tendencies to huddle together in cities for protection. They explored the solar system, and in time the majority of the population sought an alien bliss in the form of Jupiter's native life forms. One Webster had a vision of two civilizations, man and dog, working together to plot a new future--he utilized deft surgical means to enable dogs to speak, he designed special lenses to allow dogs to see as men do, and he designed robots to aid dogs by serving as their hands. Over the years, man's society continued to break down, and eventually a Webster manages to shut off man from the world at large, determined to let the dogs create a new earth free of man's dangerous ideas and influences. Jenkins, the faithful robot servant of the Websters, oversees the dogs' evolution. Unfortunately, the Dog world was not isolated from a handful of human beings after all, and eventually a man builds a bow and arrow and kills a fellow creature, thus upsetting the balance of life all over again. There are many more facets of the story than I have just mentioned, but one central point that seems to emerge from the stories is that man is inherently "bad." Jenkins had tried very hard to erase the memories of the straggling number of humans living in the era of the Dogs, and the fact that a man eventually killed a fellow creature means that man's troubles did not arise from our remote ancestors' taking a wrong path on the road to civilization but that in fact the fault lies in fact finds an inherent flaw in man's social makeup. Reading this rich, multi-layered tale, one can certainly understand why modern Dogs simply cannot believe that such a creature as Man ever existed. I enjoyed this book tremendously. The ending did not provide a sense of closure, but such a work of fiction as this would be hard to wrap up tightly with no loose ends. Simak presents a valuable viewpoint on society and mankind in general, and the unique viewpoint offered through the eyes of the Dogs serves to highlight the points Simak makes. My favorite part of the book is the section of notes before each tale, wherein we learn about the debate among Dog scholars as to whether or not these stories have any basis in fact, with the stubborn Tige dissenting from the majority opinion of Bouncer, Rover, and others that these are just myths and legends with no basis in fact, that Man is effectively the anti-Dog and was created by ancient storytellers for satirical or educational purposes. From now on, when I hear someone say the world is going to the dogs, I will think to myself that such a happenstance would not really be that bad, all things considered.
Rating:
Summary: One of the best sci-fi works ever to be written.
Review: City tells the story of mankinds' relationship in the distant future with his environment. The ants, the Robots, Dogs. I first read this story when I was in junior high, some twentyfive or so years ago. I still remember the story of the ants and mankinds' acceptance of itself. This book had a profound effect on me and will stay with you for years to come
Rating:
Summary: An ironic but compassionate sci-fi saga
Review: Clifford D. Simak's novel "City" sketches out the future history of the planet Earth: a future of genetically altered talking dogs, mutated humans, omnipresent robots, and other wonders. Simak uses a richly ironic structure to tell this vast saga. The novel is broken up into eight "tales," each of which is prefaced by a short note. Each of these eight notes is actually part of Simak's fiction. The commentary on the first tale, for example, refers to humankind as a "mythical race" which may have never actually existed. Within this bold but witty structure, Simak deals with such themes as philosophy, phobia, history, legend, violence, culture, and evolution. The book is filled with memorable moments; one of my favorites is a poignant encounter between a genetically advanced talking dog and a primitive wolf. Simak's portrait of the ultimate fate of humanity is comparable to the work of Arthur C. Clarke in "Childhood's End." Throughout the book, Simak has a charming, enjoyable writing style. "City" is a book that, in my opinion, belongs in the canon of science fiction classics.
Rating:
Summary: An ironic but compassionate sci-fi saga
Review: Clifford D. Simak's novel "City" sketches out the future history of the planet Earth: a future of genetically altered talking dogs, mutated humans, omnipresent robots, and other wonders. Simak uses a richly ironic structure to tell this vast saga. The novel is broken up into eight "tales," each of which is prefaced by a short note. Each of these eight notes is actually part of Simak's fiction. The commentary on the first tale, for example, refers to humankind as a "mythical race" which may have never actually existed. Within this bold but witty structure, Simak deals with such themes as philosophy, phobia, history, legend, violence, culture, and evolution. The book is filled with memorable moments; one of my favorites is a poignant encounter between a genetically advanced talking dog and a primitive wolf. Simak's portrait of the ultimate fate of humanity is comparable to the work of Arthur C. Clarke in "Childhood's End." Throughout the book, Simak has a charming, enjoyable writing style. "City" is a book that, in my opinion, belongs in the canon of science fiction classics.
Rating:
Summary: If there was an option for 6 stars, that's what I would give
Review: I am aboslutely positive this is one of the best sci-fi books ever written, and it definitely transcends beyond the genre of fiction. It is a book about the ultimate universal question: Does the human race have any purpose and destiny or is it just merely there for an infinitesimal period of time? The book is astoundingly humane, kind and a little bit poignant and nostalgic. It really touched me. Read it!
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