BobQuasit reviewed Empire by Clifford D. Simak
A relatively crude early offering from Simak
2 stars
This isn't exactly a bad book. But I wouldn't call it good, either. It's quite old-fashioned, harkening back to the super-science potboilers of pre-Campbell SF. Fortunately Simak soon became much more sophisticated ("Empire" was his second published novel).
The story itself doesn't show any of the humor and imagination of Simak's later works. It's basically a scientific arms race between two groups - one evil, one good. Unbelievable world-changing discoveries are made over and over with ridiculous speed. Titanic forces are unleashed. There's the usual seesawing of power between the two sides, and ultimately the bad guys lose. If you needed a spoiler tag for that...WHY? The only real spoiler would be if the bad guys DIDN'T lose.
There are no female characters at all, as far as I can remember. That's probably lucky for womankind as a whole, in retrospect.
In short: Simak became a fine writer, but …
This isn't exactly a bad book. But I wouldn't call it good, either. It's quite old-fashioned, harkening back to the super-science potboilers of pre-Campbell SF. Fortunately Simak soon became much more sophisticated ("Empire" was his second published novel).
The story itself doesn't show any of the humor and imagination of Simak's later works. It's basically a scientific arms race between two groups - one evil, one good. Unbelievable world-changing discoveries are made over and over with ridiculous speed. Titanic forces are unleashed. There's the usual seesawing of power between the two sides, and ultimately the bad guys lose. If you needed a spoiler tag for that...WHY? The only real spoiler would be if the bad guys DIDN'T lose.
There are no female characters at all, as far as I can remember. That's probably lucky for womankind as a whole, in retrospect.
In short: Simak became a fine writer, but this book, while earnest and not actively painful to read, is nowhere near representative of his later works. You can download it for free from Project Gutenberg at www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/28215, and if you're bored and don't have anything better to do...there are still better books out there. Look for them. I'd suggest starting with Simak's "The Goblin Reservation".