Ring Around the Sun

Rating:
Summary: A unique thriller with one hell of a twist.
Review: Deals with the problem of how human mutants, superior to their fellows, might seek to bring about a better world. Simak offers many interesting ideas and a good overall plot, but the book has a bit of a cardboard, comic-booky feeling to me, with the characters and their actions and dialogue a little cliched. Entertaining, but I don't think it is as good as his "Way Station."

Rating:
Summary: exciting novel
Review: I read ring around the sun years ago and as a translation in my native language, Dutch. The story is gripping and with an unexpected twist. Mr. Simak brings you back to the time when he wrote this story: the fifties. The story encompasses many aspects of its time: the luxury items people surround themselves with, the cold war starting, the big brother watching you idea and the latest trends in Science in those days: quantum technology and the believe of some scientists that there is a paralel universe. After I read Michael Crighton's Timeline I noticed the similarities in the topic. Crichton also references a book that goes deep into the topic: The Fabric of Reality by David Deutsch.
Mr. Simak build a good story around these topics and Ring around the sun is a must read for Science Fiction fans.

Rating:
Summary: A wonderous book that I need to read again.
Review: I read this Simak offering so many years ago that I honestly can't recall how long it's been. All I know is that I really NEED to read it again. Simak was one of my all-time favorite SF writers. It helped in no small way that he lived and worked in my hometown of Minneapolis, Minnesota, and that his fictional settings were so familiar to me because he wrote of places I could see just down the road. His gentleness, good humor and his graceful way of writing only endeared him to me more. Please, Mr. Publisher, see your way clear to reissuing this grand old piece of fine science fiction!

Rating:
Summary: A wonderous book that I need to read again.
Review: I read this Simak offering so many years ago that I honestly can't recall how long it's been. All I know is that I really NEED to read it again. Simak was one of my all-time favorite SF writers. It helped in no small way that he lived and worked in my hometown of Minneapolis, Minnesota, and that his fictional settings were so familiar to me because he wrote of places I could see just down the road. His gentleness, good humor and his graceful way of writing only endeared him to me more. Please, Mr. Publisher, see your way clear to reissuing this grand old piece of fine science fiction!

Rating:
Summary: Worlds without end- human potential without limit
Review: Jay Vickers was an ordinary man, or so he thought. All he wanted was to be left in peace to finish his next book. However, strange things started happening- from his discovery of a mouse that was not a mouse, to the visit of an old neighbor that was not a man. Or at least he was not an ordinary man. For as it turned out, neither was Jay Vickers.

This is the story of human mutation- the next step in the evolution of the species. What if mutants walked among us already? What if they were organized? What if they had unbelievable powers, such as the ability to cross between alternate worlds or dimensions at will, or to intuitively reach the absolutely correct answer by intuition or "hunch", or to telepathically reach out to the stars? Such supermen would automatically try to conquer lesser men, would they not? Or would they do everything in their power to free the rest of humanity from slavery and suffering? Just what would the political and corporate powers- that- be do to keep their power and their slaves? How would mutants undermine the power of these bosses to set mankind free?

This is a story of unlimited freedom, of worlds without end, ready for the taking. It is also the story of powerful, benevolent beings that exist only to help those who need that help. Simak sets this optimism off against the far-flung future- of 1987. This is a future of a lop-sided mechanical culture of technology that could provide creature comfort for a few, but not human justice or security for the many. It is a future of hate, and war, and worry. Nothing like the way the world really turned out....

Years ago when I first read this novel the uncanny "coincidences" with my own life gave me chills.

But then, there couldn't really be an underground of mutants working to free humanity... could there?