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3.84 AVERAGE
3.84 AVERAGE
challenging
emotional
mysterious
reflective
sad
slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
No
This is an Asimov short story, featured in his collection of stories. The story is about a young boy who is got into the present age by time travel. He is from "Neanderthal era" and nurse trains his boy and shows care and love to him.
slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Plot
Strong character development:
No
Loveable characters:
No
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
"Were all the great stories of the world about wanderers carried to strange places who were striving to reach their homes?"
This one turned out to be a surprisingly interesting read after picking it up on a whim at the library sale. The main plot is a corporation figures out how to bring objects from the past into our time as long as they stay within the stasis portal they create, as well as if they are under 40 kilos. So like any good endeavor they bring a Neanderthal child forward in time to study him and learn what they can. The sun plot revolves around his tribe as they encounter modern humans and the struggle to survive that encounter.
He uses this simple idea to explore various themes. One theme is male vs female power dynamics in society. In the main plot this is emphasized with Miss Fellows and Gerald Hoskins relationship and their struggle on how the boy should be raised. In the past you see this with two female characters and their struggle to try and gain power in the tribe rather than being relegated to roles of child rearing and priestess duties.
You also see the moral theme of science wanting to do whatever it wants at whatever expense. This is emphasized with a character who is a foil to Hoskins as he is advocating for children's rights and is constantly putting pressure on the corp to ensure they are treating the boy correctly. Hoskins of course just wants things to calm down so they can do what they please.
You also see a big theme of loneliness through all the characters. Whether it is the boy being "kidnapped" and brought forward in time. Hoskins dealing with the weight of the corp by himself. Miss Fellows giving up her life for her career, and even the characters in the past struggling with being an aging tribal leader, a woman who after loosing 5 kids in birth is considered tainted and thus no one wants to be her mate, and more.
He packs in quite a bit into this little book. It is a slow read but since it is short it still doesn't take long.
This one turned out to be a surprisingly interesting read after picking it up on a whim at the library sale. The main plot is a corporation figures out how to bring objects from the past into our time as long as they stay within the stasis portal they create, as well as if they are under 40 kilos. So like any good endeavor they bring a Neanderthal child forward in time to study him and learn what they can. The sun plot revolves around his tribe as they encounter modern humans and the struggle to survive that encounter.
He uses this simple idea to explore various themes. One theme is male vs female power dynamics in society. In the main plot this is emphasized with Miss Fellows and Gerald Hoskins relationship and their struggle on how the boy should be raised. In the past you see this with two female characters and their struggle to try and gain power in the tribe rather than being relegated to roles of child rearing and priestess duties.
You also see the moral theme of science wanting to do whatever it wants at whatever expense. This is emphasized with a character who is a foil to Hoskins as he is advocating for children's rights and is constantly putting pressure on the corp to ensure they are treating the boy correctly. Hoskins of course just wants things to calm down so they can do what they please.
You also see a big theme of loneliness through all the characters. Whether it is the boy being "kidnapped" and brought forward in time. Hoskins dealing with the weight of the corp by himself. Miss Fellows giving up her life for her career, and even the characters in the past struggling with being an aging tribal leader, a woman who after loosing 5 kids in birth is considered tainted and thus no one wants to be her mate, and more.
He packs in quite a bit into this little book. It is a slow read but since it is short it still doesn't take long.
hopeful
informative
reflective
tense
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Complicated
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Complicated
emotional
sad
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
Silverberg clearly intended this novel as a kind of eulogy to Asimov. It carefully retains the style and thematic approaches that Asimov used. A book of dialog, a measured pace, minimal action, maximum reasoning and logic. As a result, the novel (this is a big 'IMO') both succeeds AND fails because of its achievement of these elements. The novel succeeds in expanding Asimov's short story in exactly the same way Asimov would have likely novelized the short story, 50 years ago. That makes the novel a 50-year-old object, as if it were found in a time capsule. Concurrently, the novel fails because it does not tackle some of the improvements in more recent SF: There was no attempt to update with new technology, or more detailed scientific background ('hard' SF has improved in that regard, over SF from the 1950s). The logic and moral reasoning, and characterization, could have been more meaningfully complex. The pacing of the plot might be too slow for many readers not from that age (which are almost all readers now). The edginess of the best modern SF is missing.
It would be interesting to see an anthology of novellas from original short story: 'the ugly little boy', written by authors not wanting to emulate Asimov, but to take their world-views and literary skills and apply it to the story's concepts. Simmons, Bacigalupi, Doctorow, Willis....Eulogize Asimov with a modern-day regeneration and interpretation of 'the ugly little boy'.
It would be interesting to see an anthology of novellas from original short story: 'the ugly little boy', written by authors not wanting to emulate Asimov, but to take their world-views and literary skills and apply it to the story's concepts. Simmons, Bacigalupi, Doctorow, Willis....Eulogize Asimov with a modern-day regeneration and interpretation of 'the ugly little boy'.
This book is one with a fascinating core idea that just ends up missing the mark for me. "What if we bring a Neanderthal child to the future to study it, but due to the limits of our time-travel tech it can't leave the dedicated room we have set up?" is a heck of a question, and in some ways Asimov and Silverberg raise interesting questions.
But then, at the same time, there's so much that could have been done differently. The child's caretaker is a woman who is a childless matronly spinster (and was the Goldilocks pick), the scientists who did all this without a care about the effect they were having on the child are painted as perfectly reasonable, very intelligent men who kno what they're doing, and the only character who appears to ever try and argue that this is child abuse is painted as a self-obsessed glory-seeking crackpot, who is being pushed into going after the scientists by a ladder-climbing woman who's mad she didn't get the caretaker job.
At its core, the story of a small child who gets yanked through time just to be studied has a lot that can be done, and some of it is here, but so much of it just doesn't quite make it. Possibly a product of its time, possibly a product of its writers. Not a bad book, but not one I'll be revisiting.
But then, at the same time, there's so much that could have been done differently. The child's caretaker is a woman who is a childless matronly spinster (and was the Goldilocks pick), the scientists who did all this without a care about the effect they were having on the child are painted as perfectly reasonable, very intelligent men who kno what they're doing, and the only character who appears to ever try and argue that this is child abuse is painted as a self-obsessed glory-seeking crackpot, who is being pushed into going after the scientists by a ladder-climbing woman who's mad she didn't get the caretaker job.
At its core, the story of a small child who gets yanked through time just to be studied has a lot that can be done, and some of it is here, but so much of it just doesn't quite make it. Possibly a product of its time, possibly a product of its writers. Not a bad book, but not one I'll be revisiting.
One of my favorite books as a youth. It holds up well. It's just... sweet.
So good. Syfy mixed racism with pulling a kid out of the past.
Excellent collaboration, The story fleshed out is a great moral lesson