A review by avalon111
Dying of the Light by George R.R. Martin
2.0
Martin's first novel and the first in his "Thousand Worlds" universe.
The issue is that I reckon it misses an awful lot of opportunities. With the world of Worlorn, a wandering planet that has seen a brief summer and has been stocked with wildlife, some of it lethal to mankind, from numerous settled planets, there was a novel waiting-to-be-written.
Having set the scene though, DotL focuses on human drama, whilst the planet and its abandoned cities take second place. There are some great scenes, but no character who the reader will want to empathise-with, indeed they all as bad as one another. There are some troubling narrative holes, not fixed even with a re-read of some pages, and some of the technology - flying cars for instance - read like novels from the 1950/60's.
Ultimately though, despite not being anything like a ground-breaking first novel, DotL demonstrated Martin's potential. He was really at this point in his career, a short-story writer, and a damn good one too. The longer pieces would improve, and indeed they did, hugely.
The issue is that I reckon it misses an awful lot of opportunities. With the world of Worlorn, a wandering planet that has seen a brief summer and has been stocked with wildlife, some of it lethal to mankind, from numerous settled planets, there was a novel waiting-to-be-written.
Having set the scene though, DotL focuses on human drama, whilst the planet and its abandoned cities take second place. There are some great scenes, but no character who the reader will want to empathise-with, indeed they all as bad as one another. There are some troubling narrative holes, not fixed even with a re-read of some pages, and some of the technology - flying cars for instance - read like novels from the 1950/60's.
Ultimately though, despite not being anything like a ground-breaking first novel, DotL demonstrated Martin's potential. He was really at this point in his career, a short-story writer, and a damn good one too. The longer pieces would improve, and indeed they did, hugely.