- Paperback: 380 pages
- Publisher: Voyager; New Ed edition (16 Mar 1998)
- Language English
- ISBN-10: 0006482112
- ISBN-13: 978-0006482116
- Product Dimensions: 17.8 x 11 x 2.8 cm
- Average Customer Review: 3.6 out of 5 stars See all reviews (7 customer reviews)
- Amazon Bestsellers Rank: 46,878 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
| ||||||||||||||||||
Did you know you can trade in your old books for an Amazon.co.uk Gift Card to spend on the things you want? Plus, get an extra £5 Gift Certificate when you trade in books worth £10 or more before June 30, 2012. Visit the Books Trade-In Store for more details. |
Product details |
More About the Author
Product Description
Review
‘Jack Vance is a peerless creator of strange landscapes, and in Night Lamp he conjures up a kind of Asia among the stars. Buy it. It’s cheaper and at least as exotic as two weeks in the sun’
Financial Times
‘Vance is near the top of his form in this tale of interplanetary adventure and financial skulduggery… Night Lamp yields rich rewards in its humorous complexities’
Publishers Weekly
‘He has a genius of place’
Encyclopedia of SF
Product Description
Against the backdrop of the Gaean Reach, the widely populated region of space where the full diversity of human development is revealed, the story of Jaro Fath unfolds: from wildling orphan to spaceship captain, a tale of adventure and discovery wittily told.
In The Handbook of the Planets, the entry describing Kammerwelt: the fourth world in the entourage of Robert Palmer’s Star, drifting through a sector known as The Dragon’s Maw out toward the edge of the galaxy. Here a boy aged five, beaten and alone, is found by tourists Luel and Perceia Fath from the distant world of Gallingale. The boy knows his first name, Jaro, and is thereafter haunted by an inner voice of torment and a memory of his mother’s terror – throughout a childhood and youth made happy by the Faths on Gallingale. Academics both, Jaro’s adoptive parents insist that Jaro gain a good education before embarking on a quest to learn the truth of his origins. However, before Jaro has completed his course at the Institute, the Faths are both blown to bits by a fellow academic making a statement about the neglect of his own work.
Jaro teams up with space vagabond Evan Tarr and old schoolfriend Skirl to journey to Kammerwelt where the appalling events of his early years come into focus – and his quest becomes a search for vengeance. His mother was murdered; his father was lost on the strange and deadly planet Romarth. And on Romarth the full truth is at last revealed: Evan Tarr is his father, and in a deep dungeon there lives Jaro’s twin Garlet… the voice in Jaro’s head, now that of a twisted psychopath who will stop at nothing to kill Jaro…
Inside This Book
(Learn More)
Browse and search another edition of this book.
Browse and search another edition of this book.
First Sentence
Toward the far edge of the Cornu Sector of Ophiuchus, Robert Palmer's Star shone brilliant white, its corona flaring with films of blue, red and green color. Read the first page
Front Cover | Copyright | Excerpt | Back Cover
Toward the far edge of the Cornu Sector of Ophiuchus, Robert Palmer's Star shone brilliant white, its corona flaring with films of blue, red and green color. Read the first page
Explore More
Concordance
Browse Sample PagesConcordance
Front Cover | Copyright | Excerpt | Back Cover
Suggested Tags from Similar Products(What's this?)Be the first one to add a relevant tag (keyword that's strongly related to this product)
|
Sell a Digital Version of This Book in the Kindle Store
If you are a publisher or author and hold the digital rights to a book, you can sell a digital version of it in our Kindle Store.
Learn more
What Other Items Do Customers Buy After Viewing This Item?
Customer Reviews
Most Helpful Customer Reviews
4 of 4 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
This is the book that really got me hooked on Jack Vance. Beforehand, I had read some of his earlier books, and was utterly astounded at the vocabulary and detail that goes into them, and Night Lamp surpassed any I had read at the time.
The book tells of the life of Jaro Fath, found half-dead as a child on a roadside on a harsh planet, and adopted by a husband and wife, to be taken to a new world where he can recover and live in peace. But as he grows up, Jaro wants more and more to discover more about his past, to do which he must venture into space in search of the planet from which he originated.
Nightlamp must be one of Vance's richest works, and has enough twists to keep anyone interested. Of course any fan can only love the book, it is quite an incredible work and in the end can only be regarded as a true work of art, and nothing less.
The book tells of the life of Jaro Fath, found half-dead as a child on a roadside on a harsh planet, and adopted by a husband and wife, to be taken to a new world where he can recover and live in peace. But as he grows up, Jaro wants more and more to discover more about his past, to do which he must venture into space in search of the planet from which he originated.
Nightlamp must be one of Vance's richest works, and has enough twists to keep anyone interested. Of course any fan can only love the book, it is quite an incredible work and in the end can only be regarded as a true work of art, and nothing less.
4 of 4 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
Vance takes time to describe the background of his main character. In the case of Night Lamp, it's a slow and not too exciting part of the book. It changes however from the Demon Princes where the personality Kirt Gersen is far too thin. Once the lengthy introduction read, the story takes a very nice dimension. And again, Vance takes you to amazing regions and strange worlds. A good book, especially for Vance's fan.
4 of 4 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
This book is much more like the classic vance that I'm used to. It rolls along very nicely, with some sharp suprises..........very different to ports of call.
I didn't want to put it down, but I never do with jack's books.
Would you like to see more reviews about this item?
Were these reviews helpful?
Let us know
Most Recent Customer Reviews
A bittersweet tale of the Gaean Reach
If I had to guess - and I do - I'd say that originally this was going to be Jack Vance's Magnum Opus to the Gaean Reach, his universal sci-fi setting. Read more
Published 4 months ago by John Middleton
To be missed!
Insipid and miserable book - plot plods along, barely reaching 1st gear. Varies from painful and quite unnecessary detail on minor things, to broad brush- stroke generalisation of... Read more
Published on 15 Nov 2000
Very disappointing. Have ghost-writers caught up with Jack?
After a promising start of some good old Vance reading, the story whithers away. In the end it has only (barely) the outward appearances of A Jack Vance Science Fiction Novel with... Read more
Published on 1 Dec 1999
Classic example of Vancian writing
Night Lamp is highly rated by most Vance fans, some however considered it overly long a little simple in its handling of the main character.
I loved it. Read more
Published on 12 Jan 1999
Customer Discussions
|
This product's forum
Active discussions in related forums
Search Customer Discussions
|
Related forums
|
Listmania!
Look for similar items by category
Look for similar items by subject
Feedback
- Would you like to update product info or give feedback on images?
- I am the Author, and I want to comment on my book.
- I am the Publisher, and I want to comment on this book.
