"The Stars My Destination" First Impressions *No Spoilers*

[Sarah]

It's time for the winner of our Cyberpunk theme, The Stars My Destination by Alfred Bester. Please keep this discussion spoiler free.

[Jerry]

Hi, this is my first time commenting here. so Hello everyone.

But, how on Terra is The Stars my Destination cyberpunk?
I love the book way too much and am kinda baffled by this selection.

[John]

I'm with Jerry, given I'm not a big fan of the book as it simply jumps all over the place but I certainly don't get how this is cyber punk..

[Marc-André]

Jerry wrote: "Hi, this is my first time commenting here. so Hello everyone.

But, how on Terra is The Stars my Destination cyberpunk?
I love that way too much and am kinda baffled by this selection."

It is generally considered to be proto-cyberpunk, as it touches some of the themes and flavor of cyberpunk. Like how there is a big bad corporation behind the woes of the protagonist, how the protagonist is an anti-hero marginalized in his society, some of the tech, etc.

[Kim]

My advice to everyone: If this is your first read skip the Foreword by Neil Gaiman.

[Jerry]

John wrote: "I'm with Jerry, given I'm not a big fan of the book as it simply jumps all over the place but I certainly don't get how this is cyber punk.."

Thanks John. There is a short story by King named Jaunt, I hated it. But since you didnt like the book much, i would advice a go. :)

[Sarah]

Kim wrote: "My advice to everyone: If this is your first read skip the Foreword by Neil Gaiman."

Thanks.

[Christopher]

So far this has been... disturbing.

[Kim]

It is an interesting book. Definitely a product of earlier times. There's always that disconnect of "future" tech while the things we do have are non-existent or in some very old form, ie. phones.

I do find the idea of corporate dynasties of clans to be quite funny. Interesting to see which ones Bester thought would last.

[David]

My first reaction is amusement that the book basically explains all the rules in an info dump at the very beginning. It may be crude, but it's actually kind of refreshing after reading some books that don't explain anything at all.

My second reaction is that this book has some awful science. Bester seems to have a slightly confused notion of the solar system and gravity and orbital dynamics.

Kim wrote: "My advice to everyone: If this is your first read skip the Foreword by Neil Gaiman."

Indeed; I started a couple days ago and I already regret reading the forward.

[Kim]

Also which name do people prefer? The one we're using here or the original "Tiger! Tiger!" by which it's also sometimes published under?

[Sarah]

Kim wrote: "Also which name do people prefer? The one we're using here or the original "Tiger! Tiger!" by which it's also sometimes published under?"

That poem will forever remind me of The Mentalist so I'd go with this title.

[Wastrel]

Jerry wrote: "Marc-André wrote: "Jerry wrote: "Hi, this is my first time commenting here. so Hello everyone.

Hmm, I checked wiki and it quotes Gaiman calling it perfect cyberpunk novel, with all points you rais..."

No offence, but maybe discussing the villain and their objectives isn't the most appropriate thing to be doing in a thread marked "no spoilers"?

Regarding how it's cyberpunk:
(view spoiler)[
- it's set in the relatively near-future
- it's set in a corporate dystopia
- the protagonist is a (very!) anti-hero
- the protagonist allies with criminals
- people, including the protagonist, have cybernetic enhancements giving them superhuman strength and speed
- there's a very noir-derived plot with a cop chasing a fugitive and lots of interested parties trying to acquire a MacGuffin (two of them)
- one of the MacGuffins is an incredibly dangerous experimental weapon developed by the corporations
- the entire book is morally gray and provocative
- sections are completely mind-bending, with ordinary consciousness broken down and the text dissolving into synaesthesia and experimental typography
- a heavy reliance on eyeball-kick descriptions
- a plot with a breakneck pace relying on audacity and coolness to overcome the confusion of the audience
- William Gibson called it his favourite SF novel, and described it as the "talisman" for his own career as an author
(hide spoiler)]

If Gibson sees the links, far be it from me to deny them...

[Trike]

I'm fine with it being called proto-cyberpunk, because the culture really hadn't developed the core "look and feel" of cyberpunk yet, but I don't think it's actually cyberpunk. As Wastrel mentions, though, it does have a fair number of the elements that would later be incorporated into cyberpunk.

It's analogous to how Gladiator is a proto-superhero novel, in that the genre owes a lot to the concepts Wylie had in his story, but the novel itself doesn't touch enough of tropes that we've come to associate "superhero fiction".

I definitely think this is one of those books that hasn't aged well, and it really benefits from someone reading it earlier in their exploration of the genre since so many of its themes are explored better by later authors. But it's a good idea to read it so we can see where a lot of the stuff we like comes from.

[Yefim]

It's definitely cyberpunk. There are cybernetic implants, trippy experiences, and pretty much every cyberpunk trope in existence other than the internet. William Gibson was heavily inspired by it, and he considered it cyberpunk.

[Ilona]

I started few days ago and if the beginning was intriguing enough, it was really hard for me to care since the MC is a sick character. I finished it fast though since it is so short.

[[deleted user]]

I have read and re-read this book. I reviewed it. It is not everyone's cup of tea. Gully Foyle is not a likeable guy.
But Bester anticipated perfect cyberpunk by more than half a century, with an amoral antihero, nefarious megacorporations, a dystopic society, technology used in ways never anticipated by its creators, and a mysterious, cataclysmically dangerous, hyperscientfic element of desire (PyrE), for which the world’s secret service agencies and multinationals contend.

[Hank, Hankenstein's Modster]

I was suprised how well it aged. David has it right with the terrible science but the premise of the book was so outlandish it didn't phase me much. I consider it a classic but not one that should be on anyone's must read.

[Travis]

I couldn't shake the feeling when reading this one that the author admired his antihero and wanted me to do the same. But that repelled me because I found Gully so beyond unlikeable. One of my favorite novels is Moby-Dick, so I do love an antihero's revenge quest, but that novel distances itself enough from Ahab that we see how poisoned he is by his vengeful desires. For me, though maybe this doesn't make sense, this novel had no distance at all from its antihero, almost like it was giving him a love hug the whole time.

I do think I can really appreciate what its admirers are saying about the historical significance, and I'm trying to understand its appeal. But I really struggled with this read...

[Donald]

Hank wrote: "I was suprised how well it aged. David has it right with the terrible science but the premise of the book was so outlandish it didn't phase me much. I consider it a classic but not one that should ..."

There's a lot of SF novels from this era that I find borderline unreadable because they're just so different from what I'm used to. Slaughterhouse-5 would be one example I read recently. However this holds up relatively well.

[Joseph]

I let changes in science take a backseat to good story telling. There have been a few books written from the 1930s on where the science was questionable and it stopped me, however I chocked it up to "that's the best they knew at the time" and continued reading (if the story itself and the storytelling/crafting was good). Asimov et al thought nuclear power stations would fit on the wrist and (single) computers would cover planets (and they didn't mean the internet). But such "errors" don't stop me from enjoying The Foundation Trilogy and other titles from that era. Science is the best we know now and the best guess we can make of our future. Only the original Star Trek got cellphones right and people have made whole careers out of the science of Star Trek even though most of it was Roddenberry coming up with ways to cut production costs.
So science being exacting? Give me good storytelling and I'll forgive a lot.

[RJ - Slayer of Trolls]

This is one of my all-time favorite SF novels - I would have re-read it with the group but I have too much in my Currently Reading pile right now. I hope you all enjoy it. I really enjoyed the cyberpunk genre and this one is the grand-daddy of them all.

[Jerry]

Phil wrote: "This is one of those books that needs to be read on its own terms. If you can appreciate the things it does well, then there's a lot to love. I go over that in my review:

https://www.goodreads.com..."

Nicely puy Phil. I consider this book as one among my all time fav reads. Good to see that you enjoyed it.

[Phil]

Jerry wrote: "Phil wrote: "This is one of those books that needs to be read on its own terms. If you can appreciate the things it does well, then there's a lot to love. I go over that in my review:

https://www...."

Thanks!

[Jerry]

Wastrel wrote: "Jerry wrote: "Marc-André wrote: "Jerry wrote: "Hi, this is my first time commenting here. so Hello everyone.

Hmm, I checked wiki and it quotes Gaiman calling it perfect cyberpunk novel, with all p..."

Sry Wastrel, I didnt really notice the no spoilers tag. I believe I havnt spilled anything too much.

[Jason]

Wow...this is very enjoyable. It kind of reminds me of Heinlein's early works...and of course it was published during the same period. What I find especially fascinating are the cultural differences that you start to notice when you read Sci-Fi written in 1956. The unconscious sexism etc. I need to go back and read some of Heinlein's juvenile novels from the 50's like "Have Spacesuit Will Travel", or "The Rolling Stones". I read them in the early 80's when I was, well, a juvenile. I imagine they also bear the cultural imprint of the 1950's and 60's as well. Yes some of the science is kind of wonky but hey...it was written in the 50's, five years before Yuri Gagarin orbited the earth. Definitely a book that needs to be read, and appreciated, on it's own terms. I can already see how this novel has influenced authors of our generation. The Expanse series for one jumps out in my mind as having drawn from this literary well.

[Kristin B.]

So I'm only on chapter two and I'm having flashbacks of reading A Clockwork Orange.

There's a forward that shouldn't be read so as not to spoil the book.
There's an unlikable main character who is really just a psychopath.
There is an odd speech pattern that requires me to read some sentences twice just to figure out what the hell is going on.

At least, also like A Clockwork Orange, it's a fairly short read.

[[deleted user]]

I agree with the comment that this is a book that needs to be read on its own terms.
Gully Foyle is totally amoral. Yet, we do find ourselves overcoming our disgust at his lack of morals and "curiouser and curiouser" as he undergoes one transformation after another, vividly demonstrated by the tiger stripe tattoos put on his face by the space-cult scavengers. Bester's original title, remember, was "Tiger, Tiger, Burning Bright."

[Christopher]

I abandoned this in the middle of Chapter 9, I just didn't want to spend another second with Gully Foyle. I admire the creativity of a lot of the concepts (e.g. jaunting) and it's clear that later works have borrowed from them, but I just couldn't get past a despicable main character.

[Joseph]

I'm not sure I agree with "amoral", more that he was doing what he could with the tools he had at the time. Much of his transformations are self-induced; he realizes he needs to change/grow and sets about doing so. It seems he starts off almost one-dimensional (and as he's starting off barely surviving, perhaps one dimension is all he could spare?) and by the end he's...different. I wrote a review (spoilers masked), for those with an interest.