|
FNORDinc
, December 13, 2010
(view all comments by FNORDinc)
I really hated enjoying this book. Do not confuse it with the collection of short stories by Frank Herbert. Likewise it is not the religious expose book about the Mormon religion. This is just a lowly 70's sci-fi filled with bizarre ethereal dreams-capes and group sex...
Don Pendleton's novel (originally published under the pseudonym Dan Britain) revolves around a government investigator names Patrick Honor. Honor has been roped into driving out to a research lab in the sticks by his boss and a lovely lovely lady (who works in a research lab). The lab is researching the harnessing of PPS (Psychic Power Sources) the ultimate energy.
Strangely, the head of the lab has gone a bit loopy and started babbling about the power of nine (9), he has scrawled a series of strange names and dates, each separated by eighty-one (81) days. Looking at the names, they can see that see that the first seven (7) are either dead or incapacitated on the dates associated. The eighth name is the president of the United States, and the ninth is Honor himself.
With a strange list of dead folks and only 14 days until the date associated with the president, Honor jumps jumps in his steam powered car (there are gas cars as well, but steam is faster, quieter, etc) and heads out to the research lab.
From here the book becomes even more confusing, with topics ranging from: mind powered cars, a killer East Indian, people disassociated with their own minds, melding/traveling to a ninth dimensions where all life began. Apparently everything we know is a dream and we are deluding ourselves.
Oh yeah, and the only way the world can be saved is by having long meaningful passionate (but not selfish) sexual relations with everyone around us..
If you like strange dated science fiction with angry chauvinists who become ultimate caring feminists after having intercourse with strange scientists.. this might be the book for you :)
This book was interesting, but I am glad I only spent a dollar on it. Justifying more than that would be difficult. It was neither good nor bad, entertaining for the time I put into it, but unlikely to stay on my shelf for a second reading.
|