- Hardcover: 304 pages
- Publisher: Arrow Books Ltd; New edition edition (1 Jun 1989)
- Language English
- ISBN-10: 0749300388
- ISBN-13: 978-0749300388
- Product Dimensions: 17.6 x 10.8 x 2.4 cm
- Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars See all reviews (1 customer review)
- Amazon Bestsellers Rank: 897,782 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
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Customer Reviews
Most Helpful Customer Reviews
5 of 5 people found the following review helpful
Format:Hardcover
This was the last of the many books written by the master. The craftmanship is faultless, and the characters highly memorable. It is also very puzzling for a long way into the book, and doesn't gain much clarity until after a second or third read. Then the magic grips you.
It is a classic journey tale, with the characters all following their own agendas, and being cross-universe and trans-time it becomes quite involved.
Many of the characters are not human, nor are they anthropomorphised, and the alienness is handled so subtly that it only strikes you some way through the book just how odd they really are. I'll not spoil it by telling you too much. Simak was far more able at spinning the web than I am.
It is a lot more complex than, for example, his excellent Way Station, and the reader needs to do some brain work to enjoy it, but the effort is well rewarded. It is another one of those books that is needed to complete an SF collection.
It is a classic journey tale, with the characters all following their own agendas, and being cross-universe and trans-time it becomes quite involved.
Many of the characters are not human, nor are they anthropomorphised, and the alienness is handled so subtly that it only strikes you some way through the book just how odd they really are. I'll not spoil it by telling you too much. Simak was far more able at spinning the web than I am.
It is a lot more complex than, for example, his excellent Way Station, and the reader needs to do some brain work to enjoy it, but the effort is well rewarded. It is another one of those books that is needed to complete an SF collection.
Most Helpful Customer Reviews on Amazon.com (beta)
Amazon.com:
8 reviews
7 of 7 people found the following review helpful
The old magic never dimmed....
8 Jan 2003
Format:Unknown Binding
This final book of the master was a joy to read. Here, he returns, one last time, to many of the favorite topics, characters, and settings of so many of his other books and stories. All in one book you have time travel, alternate dimensions, robots, a vast brotherhood of friendly aliens, a very dog-like wolf (ala City), not to mention many other familiar elements. It is all contained in a very complex, skillfully woven, unpredictable narrative.
It is fitting that that this book should address the issues of immortality, eternity, and the purpose of life. After all, it was written only two years before the author died (peacefully and in his sleep.) You find immortality achieved by means of fields that hold time at bay, by artificially becoming points of pure intellect, by evolutionary means, by intelligent machines, etc. There is also the understanding that mankind has infinite potential to grow in intellect and understanding. Indeed, it is clearly stated that without consciousness and understanding the universe would lack meaning. That is the ultimate purpose of all sentient beings- to give meaning to the universe.
This is a mature, thoughtful, science fiction novel. It is not an old style shoot-em-up space opera, though it does have some pretty good killer monsters in the pay of sinister aliens from the future.
All in all, I found this novel to be an excellent capstone to a distinguished career. The old magic never dimmed. I actually postponed reading this book, for I knew that there would be no more coming after I had finished this one....
5 of 5 people found the following review helpful
I loved it!
6 April 1999
Format:Hardcover
Regardless of what the other reviewers said about this book, I guess you can't please everyone. I thought this book was wonderful, and as a matter of fact, one of my favorites from Clifford Simak! It has great characters, a very interesting story, and makes you feel good, and something I've not heard others say about him is that Cliff's stories are so descriptive that you feel the texture of the grass and smell the air in the story. Pick this book up, if you can find it! You won't be dissapointed!
2 of 2 people found the following review helpful
The road to Everywhen
27 Jun 2001
Format:Mass Market Paperback
It all began simply enough. A client had vanished and Jay Corcoran went to investigate the man's empty hotel suite. But Corcoran's trick vision spotted a room sized box stuck to the outside wall of the suite. There was no way to get into the box, so Corcoran cabled his long time pal Tom Boone.
Boone had a talent. When threatened he could "step around a corner" into some otherwhere. Boone stepped into the box, taking Corcoran with him.
The box turned out to be a time travel machine that transported them back to 1745 England, where they found a family of refugees from a million years in the future.
In that far future, alien Infinites were converting humanity to incorporal form. When the family had refused conversion, they had to flee. For more than a century, the family had lain hidden in their time bubble. Suddenly, the Infinites' killer monster broke through and things grew very complicated as the family fled to the distant past and the farther future.
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