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A review by timinbc
Tales of Majipoor by Robert Silverberg
4.0
I'd be interested to read reviews of this by people who haven't read ANY of the Majipoor books. I suspect it might be occasionally baffling, but still good.
Well, I *have* read most of them, some a very long time ago. And this was a delightful treat.
Please don't come in expecting a major contribution to the Majipoor series, seventeen years after the first one. But a highly enjoyable re-visit, yes, you can expect that. Guys who have five Hugos and five Nebulas can usually be relied on to tell you a good story.
They're stories separated in time, and in setting/style. A couple of them plausibly fill some not-critically-important gaps in Majipoor history.
Majipoor is a wonderful place, although I suspect hard SF fans could tear it apart if they wanted to. But who'd want to? Ten times the size of Earth. A ludicrously tall mountain, requiring force fields and atmosphere generators so people can live on it. But I don't recall any discussion of the actual logistics of living there. Such as "nip down to the Labyrinth and give this to the Pontifex, there's a good chap" being an order that might well take a month to carry out.
I stalled briefly on the idea that Valentine - in the last story - is way out in the boonies, having ridden in on "mounts" to stay in tents protected by swords and sticks ..... taking photographs of the crime scene. Hmm. Film? Digital? Imp in a box? Silverberg did well back in the late 90s to avoid getting sucked into that. Narrativium is used liberally to fill cracks and keep the story moving.
In fact, as I write this, I can't tell you why this is a good collection. Just that it is. Perhaps it's that it's told in carefully-crafted sentences, but there's never, ever the slightest hint of "hey, ain't I a great writer?" Just the story. Just the story. Mmmmm.
Well, I *have* read most of them, some a very long time ago. And this was a delightful treat.
Please don't come in expecting a major contribution to the Majipoor series, seventeen years after the first one. But a highly enjoyable re-visit, yes, you can expect that. Guys who have five Hugos and five Nebulas can usually be relied on to tell you a good story.
They're stories separated in time, and in setting/style. A couple of them plausibly fill some not-critically-important gaps in Majipoor history.
Majipoor is a wonderful place, although I suspect hard SF fans could tear it apart if they wanted to. But who'd want to? Ten times the size of Earth. A ludicrously tall mountain, requiring force fields and atmosphere generators so people can live on it. But I don't recall any discussion of the actual logistics of living there. Such as "nip down to the Labyrinth and give this to the Pontifex, there's a good chap" being an order that might well take a month to carry out.
I stalled briefly on the idea that Valentine - in the last story - is way out in the boonies, having ridden in on "mounts" to stay in tents protected by swords and sticks ..... taking photographs of the crime scene. Hmm. Film? Digital? Imp in a box? Silverberg did well back in the late 90s to avoid getting sucked into that. Narrativium is used liberally to fill cracks and keep the story moving.
In fact, as I write this, I can't tell you why this is a good collection. Just that it is. Perhaps it's that it's told in carefully-crafted sentences, but there's never, ever the slightest hint of "hey, ain't I a great writer?" Just the story. Just the story. Mmmmm.