Early Novels of Asimov Reading Idea

[Extollager]

I'll have Nightfall and Other Stories, Earth Is Room Enough, I Robot, The Rest of the Robots, Before the Golden Age, Early Asimov, and Buy Jupiter, so is that pretty good for a set of Asimov's short fiction? In novels, I'll have Pebble in the Sky, the Foundation Trilogy, Caves of Steel, Naked Sun, End of Eternity, Currents of Space, The Stars Like Dust, Fantastic Voyage, and The Gods Themselves.

I had a nagging feeling that I was forgetting something, and I was -- The Martian Way.

How important is Nine Tomorrows?

 

[J-Sun]

I'll have Nightfall and Other Stories, Earth Is Room Enough, I Robot, The Rest of the Robots, Before the Golden Age, Early Asimov, and Buy Jupiter, so is that pretty good for a set of Asimov's short fiction? In novels, I'll have Pebble in the Sky, the Foundation Trilogy, Caves of Steel, Naked Sun, End of Eternity, Currents of Space, The Stars Like Dust, Fantastic Voyage, and The Gods Themselves.

I had a nagging feeling that I was forgetting something, and I was -- The Martian Way.

How important is Nine Tomorrows?

It's hard for me to order the collections but It's definitely nearer the top end than the bottom. It has two stories that would make any "Best of" in "The Last Question" and "The Ugly Little Boy" (but you probably have those in some anthology or another) but also has "The Feeling of Power", "I'm in Marsport Without Hilda" and others that I like. Looks like you're missing that, Asimov's Mysteries (which, despite the title, is SF), The Bicentennial Man, and The Winds of Change. So, yep, pretty good but TBM is essential and TWOC has "Belief", "Fair Exchange", "Found", "Ideas Die Hard", and several other pretty good ones. AM is not bad, either though a couple of stories repeat from Nine Tomorrows.

What I think of as "the major collections" are

• The Martian Way
• Earth Is Room Enough
• Nine Tomorrows
• Asimov's Mysteries
• Nightfall
• The Early Asimov
• Buy Jupiter
• The Bicentennial Man
• The Winds of Change

Then there's Gold and Magic, of course, but they're posthumous and really one volume's worth of fiction annoyingly split into two and padded with nonfiction. And Azazel as a connected collection of fantasy stories involving the titular pocket demon. And, obviously, the robot stories are essential but haven't been definitively collected. First I, Robot and The Rest of the Robots (which includes the first two robot novels before the eight stories were split into their own paperback) and those two were somewhat superseded by The Complete Robot (which was definitive at the time) but then he wrote more robot stories which appear in dribbles embedded in reprints in Robot Dreams and Robot Visions, as well as some in the all-original but not-all-robot Gold. And I think of the original Foundation trilogy as collections rather than novels but, either way, you've got them. As far as the novels go, that's it for the early/middle ones (aside from the Lucky Starr juveniles). I love his first two "comeback" novels (the fourth Foundation book, Foundation's Edge, and the third Robot novel, Robots of Dawn) and I like all the rest, too, but many people wouldn't consider them essential.

Could the novel Nightfall be regarded as early Asimov since Asimov approved of it?

I don't count it as Asimov at all. It's more like a late Silverberg novel and I didn't especially like it and certainly don't see any need for it. But opinions vary - some people do like it. There were actually three of those - I think "The Ugly Little Boy" was turned into a novel by Silverberg and some robot story (possibly "The Bicenteninial Man") was turned into something - maybe The Positronic Man or something like.

 

[Bick]

I kinda did this reread maybe 3 of years ago. In the space of about 4 months I read:

Foundation (all 7 books)
The Stars, Like Dust
The Complete Robot Stories
The Caves of Steel
The Naked Sun
The Robots of Dawn
The End of Eternity
The Martian Way
Earth is Room Enough
The Early Asimov (all of I, some of II and III)
Buy Jupiter
The Gods Themselves
The Stars in the their Courses
Other bits and bobs (i.e. selected short stories, e.g. Nightfall, Bicentennial Man, Last Question, etc)

I was struck, when I went through these, how well written they were, easy to read and it became hard to turn to something else. There are still books I need to read or reread from Asimov. All this talk of Pebble in the Sky reminds me its on the shelf, and so long since I read it I remember nada from it.

 

[j d worthington]

On the novels (Nightfall, The Ugly Little Boy, The Positronic Man) mentioned... I found them worth reading, but not particularly adding much to the original stories, save here and there some nice nuances. Not essential, but enjoyable.

 

[Extollager]

I read (or reread... after all these years, I don't know for sure) I, Robot. It was pleasant reading, but I might not have finished this reading if it weren't that it's by Asimov. Asimov would set up a situation in which it seemed that, somehow, one of the Laws of Robotics had, impossibly been violated; or in one story posits a situation in which one of the Laws has been modified prior to the completed assembly of a robot, etc. -- and would work out the results. Like a locked-room mystery, these placed little emphasis on atmosphere, characterization, etc.

Now I've begun to read The Stars, Like Dust, in a 1966 Lancer paperback that is in marvelous condition for a book of its page, the corners sharp, the pages hardly showing any toning, etc. I'm not a collector; if I were, this one would go into a plastic bag and stay there.

 

[psikeyhackr]

If you're asking me, I'd say, "No, the Nightfall novel isn't early Asimov, though it's related to an early Asimov story."

I haven't read it... do you like it?

Yes. I had read the original short story years earlier. If anything the characterization may have been somewhat better than I would expect from Asimov but it certainly isn't a Silverberg kind of story.

psik

 

[psikeyhackr]

The input file is: IA.Foundation.txt with 406502 characters.
It uses 53 SF words 271 times for an SF density of 0.66666
The word count limit of: 40 was exceeded by: 45
It uses 9 Fant words 53 times for a Fantasy density of 0.130

The input file is: IA.FoundatnEmp.txt with 442049 characters.
It uses 61 SF words 270 times for an SF density of 0.611
The word count limit of: 44 was exceeded by: 4
It uses 8 Fant words 34 times for a Fantasy density of 0.077

The input file is: IA.2ndFoundation.txt with 422037 characters.
It uses 54 SF words 263 times for an SF density of 0.623
It uses 4 Fant words 8 times for a Fantasy density of 0.019

Does this mean that 0.6 is the Foundational standard density for science fiction? LOL

psik

 

[Bick]

I don't suppose it means anything at all, psik. Asimov famously wrote clearly, without unnecessary jargon or buzz words. The themes are all SF. I suspect the method you use to analyse the degree to which something is SF is a rather blunt tool.

 

[psikeyhackr]

I suspect the method you use to analyse the degree to which something is SF is a rather blunt tool.

It is curious. I had someone tell me that Asimov couldn't write.

The problem with words is that they are "blunt tools". What connotations does the phrase "blunt tool" carry?

I could just as easily compare my program to a laser scalpel. It hits exactly what it is aimed at and nothing else. It does not try to tell what it cannot tell. But it is totally exact about what it does tell.

How could anyone know that Dan Simmon's used the word 'Sol' 396 times in The End of Hyperion? That is precise but what is its significance? It hit the limiter which was 111 because the book is 1,111,440 characters long. But the next most used word is 'singularity' and only used 31 times. Even with the limiter it is counted 80 more times. That affects the density.

The problem is every reader must decide for himself what he cares about. I like Asimov's works. I don't need this program or any reviewer to tell me that. But what this program does tell me is that you may have a hard time finding an Asimov novel that scores below 0.5. What does that say about Dune and Ender's Game that score below 0.4? It may not be what the program says about a particular work but what it indicates relatively between different works and authors.

There are factors involved that my laser instrument does not touch. I acknowledge that it has excess precision. I do find it disturbing that so many SF readers are so lacking in curiosity. Isn't that what science is about? What is the name of that robot on Mars?

psik

 

[Extollager]

I wonder if some of the Sixties TV writers checked Asimov's I, Robot for ideas. One of the stories in Asimov's book -- "Liar," I think -- has humans defeat a robot by demanding an answer it can't provide. For a while, such scenarios popped up all over the place. At least two or three Star Treks ended with computers freaking out -- I'm thinking "The Return of the Archons" (sparks and smoke flying out of computer), "The Apple" (smoke billowing out), maybe "The Ultimate Computer"...possible "For the World is Hollow" also? Then there's also an uncharacteristically poor teleplay in the Prisoner series, "The General," that ends something like that, I think, and maybe even one of the Fugitive episodes. I'm a bit vague on details but the same type of resolution seems to have been used in these. I think one was the "compute the value of pi" schtick...

 

[Bick]

How did you like "The Stars, Like Dust"? And what next in the list, Extollager?

 

[Extollager]

How did you like "The Stars, Like Dust"? And what next in the list, Extollager?

I'm reading a few pages an evening -- and not every evening. I'm liking Stars as an unpretentious specimen of old-fashioned sf, the kind of thing in which you have hyperspace drives coexisting with intraplanetary rockets that deliver mail (presumably in stamped envelopes!). After I finish it, the next sf novel I read will probably be one of Simak's -- I'm thinking Time and Again -- since I'm on board with the Simak challenge. The next Asimov looks to be Foundation, since I'm going in chronological order according to the bibliography on Wikipedia. Somewhere in there I would like to find time for a "mundane" novel, and I was also thinking about reading the original version of White's Sword in the Stone (I've only read the version in The Once and Future King). It might be several weeks before I get to Foundation.

 

[Ray McCarthy]

I've had eMail since 1987 and I got a stamped envelope today with a personal letter!

From someone with email.

But the Penguin Book on Punctuation (Trask) wouldn't fit into his PC.

 

[Extollager]

How did you like "The Stars, Like Dust"? And what next in the list, Extollager?

The Stars, Like Dust was mildly entertaining pulp adventure, but, having read it mostly in very brief bits spread over more than two weeks, I didn't keep up with all of the supporting characters and the intrigues. The novel is vulnerable to the criticism that the science fictional trappings are of slight importance to the plot about colonists resenting an imperial power, and, of course, the surprise ending just emphasizes the possibility that Asimov transposed a situation from America's past to his far-future setting.

If there's little sense of space and the stars to give the story more than plot interest, there also wasn't much of interest in the characters of brawny Biron and his love interest, Artemisia. She is on the scene more often than many sf ladies of similar lack of substance.

I'm not sure I'll want to undertake a rereading of the Foundation trilogy in the next few months. (I'm pretty sure I read the trilogy when I was in my early teens, many years ago.) The next Asimov novel that I'll be reading should be The Currents of Space, which will be, like Pebble in the Sky and The Stars, Like Dust, first-time reads for me.

 

[Extollager]

The next Asimov novel that I'll be reading should be The Currents of Space, which will be, like Pebble in the Sky and The Stars, Like Dust, first-time reads for me.

Yep -- I expect to start Currents yet today. Is anyone else reading or rereading this one?

 

[Bick]

Yep -- I expect to start Currents yet today. Is anyone else reading or rereading this one?

I've been on the lookout for a decent used copy of this for years, but never found one. If/when I do locate a copy, I want to re-read it - it's been 30+ years and I have little memory of it.

 

[Extollager]

I started Currents yesterday and, if it keeps up as it has begun, it will be my favorite of the three "Galactic Empire" novels, though I did enjoy Pebble in the Sky and The Stars, Like Dust.

My copy has this dull cover, from a 1984 edition:



However, it cost me only $3.46 including postage.

 

[Vince W]

I started Currents yesterday and, if it keeps up as it has begun, it will be my favorite of the three "Galactic Empire" novels, though I did enjoy Pebble in the Sky and The Stars, Like Dust.

My copy has this dull cover, from a 1984 edition:

View attachment 22061

However, it cost me only $3.46 including postage.

Dull cover? My first thought was that I love the cover. Different strokes eh?

 

[Extollager]

Well, I'd prefer to have a retro-type edition like this one:

 

[J-Sun]

Dull cover? My first thought was that I love the cover. Different strokes eh?

Thank you. I was going to ask Extollager to not disrespect my cover. The three Empire novels from that edition make a nice set, as well.