This is the third robot novel featuring Elijah Baley and the human like robot Daneel Olivaw. Those familiar with Asimov’s story telling technique wouldn’t be surprised to hear that it’s another whodunit. This time however, Baley is on the world of Aurora trying to solve a puzzle that will determine whether or not Earth will be allowed to flourish.
The solution of the puzzle is a complete surprise and gives a few hints with regard to the revelations encountered in “Foundation’s Edge.” The crucial aspect of the puzzle harks back to one of the stories in the “I, Robot” collection. Unlike the other two books where Baley is quite impressive, he seems completely stymied in this one and has to bulldoze his way primarily through bluff.
Daneel is of course one of the highlights but we’re also introduced to a new robot called Griskard who plays quite a prominent role in the book. It’s also hinted that Griskard will continue to have an influence on future novels in the robot series. We seem to be viewing a convergence between the Robot novels and the Foundation novels. More and more references are being made to the future of humanity and hints are given as to why exactly the Foundation novels completely lack any sort of reference to robots whatsoever.
Of course, Asimov created the two worlds independently, but seems to want them to come together to create a proper cohesive history. It’s not surprising that it won the Hugo award for the best all time series overshadowing even the Lord of the Rings.
With all his foresight though, Asimov misses quite a few technologies in his corpus that are very much in use today. Some of them are:
- The Internet: Asimov completely failed to see the Internet Revolution. He frequently implies that much of Earth’s history is lost and only legends have come down. With sites like Wikipedia, this is quite impossible since no catastrophic even seems to have taken place. We’re more likely to have an excess of information rather than a lack
- Cellphones and Email: Baley can’t communicate with his wife when he’s far away. With Hyperwave Radio, not just email, but also cellphones would exist. No doubt, the stories have “Trimensional viewing”, but these are inconvenient, require a separate room altogether, and you need an appointment before they can be used. Why not just give a call?
- Ebooks! Asimvo’s world has “Film Strips” and these need to be borrowed from (gasp) a library! And they have to be carried around. This is really an extension of the Internet. Who goes to a library these days?
Makes one realize just how revolutionary the Internet is – even one of the greatest science fiction writers of all time failed to foresee it. Even serials like Star Trek didn’t have cellphones (“Kirk to Enterprise! Kirk..to..Enterprise!”). Of course, we haven’t invented warp speed travel yet, so we’ve both failed and exceeded expectations. Not too bad eh?
I just finished reading this the other day. It’s dated, sure. This is actually the first Asimov book I’ve read. My expectations were moderate, as I know this is a famous author, but more than that, he’s an older one that passed on almost 20 years ago. So I went into it prepared for some good writing and some old fashioned science fiction. Mostly, that’s what I got. I’m no expert, by any means. There was, however, a lot of baggage. The back and forth is almost constant. And there’re many points in the book where things are written about that don’t advance the story much. My impression of Bailey is that he shoots from the hip but has an incredible ability to hit the market. The ending was probably the most disappointing thing in the whole book. It didn’t fit, not in my mind. In fact, after I had put the book down and was in my bed with the light off and my mind drifting, I caught myself asking if that ending had really happened??? It seemed so misplaced. Like Asimov had written it for another story and in the last minute added it to this book. It didn’t wrap up anything for me. I ended up on deciding that it had happened and that Asimov is a weird man to write that.
In reply to John
The ending links up to his “Foundation series” books. You must understand that this is part of a series. If you want everything to make sense, read the previous two books and then the foundation novels too.
I’ve read and reviewed all the Foundation books. You can find them here: http://www.bhagwad.com/blog/tag/foundation-series/