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Ler #3
The Day of the Klesh
His name was Meure and he hired out on an alien ship to see the universe. There were ler aboard that vessel-transmuted humans who were partial supermen-and specifically there was the ler girl Flerdestar who had a mission. When Meure and Flerdestar were marooned on the world they called Monsalvat, they were confronted by a planetary enigma involving time and space. For Monsalvat had a myriad human species, all alien to each other, and all in awe of the Mystery that dominated their isolated planet. Here is the long-awaited major novel by the author of THE GAMEPLAYERS OF ZAN and WARRIORS OF DAWN. It is a masterwork of alien wonders, human ingenuities, of the past invading the present, and of the perverted legacy of the legendary mistress of the first starship, the mad ler Sanjirmil...
- GenresScience FictionFiction
271 pages, Paperback
First published October 2, 1979
2 people are currently reading
147 people want to read
About the author
M.A. Foster
20 books29 followersLibrarian note:
There is more than one author in the GoodReads database with this name
US writer, former data-systems analyst and sequentially a Russian linguist and ICBM launch-crew commander to the US Air Force; he is also a semiprofessional photographer. After some poetry, released privately as Shards from Byzantium (coll 1969 chap) and The Vaseline Dreams of Hundifer Jones (coll 1970 chap), he began to publish sf with the ambitious Ler trilogy about a race of Supermen created by Genetic Engineering whose social structure is built around a form of line marriage here called a braid.
The Gameplayers of Zan (1977), a very long novel formally constructed on the model of an Elizabethan tragedy, describes a period of climactic tension between the ler and the rest of humanity, and is set on Earth. The Warriors of Dawn (1975), published first but set later, is a more conventional Space Opera in which a human male and a ler female are forced to team up to try to solve a complexly ramifying problem of interstellar piracy. The Day of the Klesh (1979) brings the ler and the eponymous race of humans together on a planet where they must solve their differences.
The Morphodite/Transformer sequence which followed comprises The Morphodite (1981), Transformer (1983) and Preserver (1985), all three assembled as The Transformer Trilogy (omni 2006), and similarly uses forms of meditative Shapeshifting to buttress complex plots, though in this case the alternately male or female, revolution-fomenting, protagonist dominates the tale as assassin, trickster and Superman.
Waves (1980) rather recalls Stanisław Lem's Solaris (1961) in a tale of political intrigue on a planet whose ocean is intelligent. The four novellas collected in Owl Time (coll 1985) are told in challengingly various modes, and derive strength from their mutual contrast.
More recently, the author has been involved with the writing of storylines for Acme comics http://www.acmecomics.com/node/69.
There is more than one author in the GoodReads database with this name
US writer, former data-systems analyst and sequentially a Russian linguist and ICBM launch-crew commander to the US Air Force; he is also a semiprofessional photographer. After some poetry, released privately as Shards from Byzantium (coll 1969 chap) and The Vaseline Dreams of Hundifer Jones (coll 1970 chap), he began to publish sf with the ambitious Ler trilogy about a race of Supermen created by Genetic Engineering whose social structure is built around a form of line marriage here called a braid.
The Gameplayers of Zan (1977), a very long novel formally constructed on the model of an Elizabethan tragedy, describes a period of climactic tension between the ler and the rest of humanity, and is set on Earth. The Warriors of Dawn (1975), published first but set later, is a more conventional Space Opera in which a human male and a ler female are forced to team up to try to solve a complexly ramifying problem of interstellar piracy. The Day of the Klesh (1979) brings the ler and the eponymous race of humans together on a planet where they must solve their differences.
The Morphodite/Transformer sequence which followed comprises The Morphodite (1981), Transformer (1983) and Preserver (1985), all three assembled as The Transformer Trilogy (omni 2006), and similarly uses forms of meditative Shapeshifting to buttress complex plots, though in this case the alternately male or female, revolution-fomenting, protagonist dominates the tale as assassin, trickster and Superman.
Waves (1980) rather recalls Stanisław Lem's Solaris (1961) in a tale of political intrigue on a planet whose ocean is intelligent. The four novellas collected in Owl Time (coll 1985) are told in challengingly various modes, and derive strength from their mutual contrast.
More recently, the author has been involved with the writing of storylines for Acme comics http://www.acmecomics.com/node/69.
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Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews
August 15, 2011
just came across this gem while cleaning out the attic. I loved this book, and it is now at the top of my read/ reread pile:) I didn't know it was book 3 of a series when i read it. i will now have to go back and read the first two books. however will I suffer through those as well.. such sweet sorrow.. woodchuck hard cider doth wax poetic:)
September 4, 2024
I liked some of the ideas in this book. I expected it to be more related to the other LER books, but really was its own story simply set in the backdrop of the culture that you have familiar with from the first two books. There were many different types of people numerous names and complicated ideas. I think I might have been better off reading this rather than listening to it, because I became confused about who was who about 3/4 through. I enjoyed some of the quotes for example “Unless we live in the present, we do not live at all.”
—A.C.
I also enjoyed this little snippet of text: "Meure had seen no indication whatsoever that wealthy people formed a quarter of their own, or, for that matter, existed. Morgin had assured him that they were few, and so retiring as to be almost invisible. Meure had been somewhat surprised at that, for from the poverty he had expected to see evidence of at least part of a leisure class, but apparently in Yastian things had progressed much further than that; originally there had been a stratified class society, but that structure had eroded away long ago, by the operation of a sociological equivalent to Gresham’s Law: once the low classes reach a certain majority percentage, their values swamp the entire society. A wealthy class was only possible where there was something left over for the poorest"
—A.C.
I also enjoyed this little snippet of text: "Meure had seen no indication whatsoever that wealthy people formed a quarter of their own, or, for that matter, existed. Morgin had assured him that they were few, and so retiring as to be almost invisible. Meure had been somewhat surprised at that, for from the poverty he had expected to see evidence of at least part of a leisure class, but apparently in Yastian things had progressed much further than that; originally there had been a stratified class society, but that structure had eroded away long ago, by the operation of a sociological equivalent to Gresham’s Law: once the low classes reach a certain majority percentage, their values swamp the entire society. A wealthy class was only possible where there was something left over for the poorest"
July 9, 2015
1980 grade B-
Series book L3
Series book L3
Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews