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tastybourbon's review
3.0
This was such a mixed bag...it starts so mysteriously when Sutton, an astronaut who has been gone for twenty years, returns to Earth. The reader is led to believe this will be a story about time travel and the unraveling of the mystery of what happened to Sutton. The focus of the plot jumps tracks several times before settling on the theme of whether androids should be considered equal to humans. The angling of the human and android factions to win over Sutton was probably the best part of the story.
My biggest beef with the book? It was Sutton’s supposed greatness. The reader is told he’s destined to write a book that will ultimately change the world for both humans and androids...it’s why they’re all fawning over him. When the reader is introduced to one of Sutton’s core concepts that will supposedly reshape everything, my reaction was “that’s it? WTF!!” Seriously. A Chicken Soup for the Soul book may have more depth. Another issue is that the writing was clunky and meandered a bit, especially in the first half or the book in which Simak kept introducing new threads to the story. Other things were just weird. Seriously, what was with humanity loving dueling so much?
I’ve read a major critique of Simak, especially in his novels, is that he tries to juggle too many concepts and introduce too many interesting quirks and details to where things devolve into a mess. I think that’s a fair description of Time and Again. The story could have been much more interesting and meaningful if Simak had kept things more focused and if he had paired down the message(s) he conveyed. Overall though, the book was engaging and thought provoking enough, and it had a fun plot twist at the end that I’ll probably read more of Simak’s work eventually.
If anyone can provide some recommendations from his other novels and short stories, please do so!
My biggest beef with the book? It was Sutton’s supposed greatness. The reader is told he’s destined to write a book that will ultimately change the world for both humans and androids...it’s why they’re all fawning over him. When the reader is introduced to one of Sutton’s core concepts that will supposedly reshape everything, my reaction was “that’s it? WTF!!” Seriously. A Chicken Soup for the Soul book may have more depth. Another issue is that the writing was clunky and meandered a bit, especially in the first half or the book in which Simak kept introducing new threads to the story. Other things were just weird. Seriously, what was with humanity loving dueling so much?
I’ve read a major critique of Simak, especially in his novels, is that he tries to juggle too many concepts and introduce too many interesting quirks and details to where things devolve into a mess. I think that’s a fair description of Time and Again. The story could have been much more interesting and meaningful if Simak had kept things more focused and if he had paired down the message(s) he conveyed. Overall though, the book was engaging and thought provoking enough, and it had a fun plot twist at the end that I’ll probably read more of Simak’s work eventually.
If anyone can provide some recommendations from his other novels and short stories, please do so!
the_scribbling_man's review against another edition
4.0
High 3.
"Sutton sensed resurrection and he fought against it, for death was so comfortable. Like a soft, warm bed. And resurrection was a strident, insistent, maddening alarm clock that shrilled across the predawn chill of a dreadful, frowzy room. Dreadful with its life and its bare reality and its sharp, sickening reminder that one must get up and walk into reality again."
The first third/maybe half of this is pretty much as close as Simak gets to writing a thriller. The ideas are big, but the pacing is relatively snappy (you know, for Simak), and the whole set up feels very PKD. Then in the latter half, Simak goes full Simak and enters into classic rural, contemplative, pastoral Sci fi - and by that I mean the main character quite literally gets stuck in 1970's Wisconsin for 10 years, spending his days fishing, farming, rambling, writing, and discussing the arrogance of man with our antagonist.
On one level, Time and Again is super messy, and possibly one of Simak's least satisfying novels; on the other hand, it can be very satisfying... It's packed with ideas, it has some of his finest prose and it wraps things up much more neatly than many of his other outings. It's probably a bit too big for its boots, touching on concepts it doesn't really know how to explore; but the attempt to explore these themes is still pretty interesting, even if the whole destiny angle is little more than a vague Mcguffin.
Still, Time and Again is pretty readable, pretty fun at points and (as with many Simak stories) just plain pretty. It's charming in its quaint ambition, and difficult not to admire.
A delightful tale, if inconsistent. Probably not a stretch to call it one of his best (take that how you will).
And that ending... Considerably more brutal than I remember it being.
"Sutton sensed resurrection and he fought against it, for death was so comfortable. Like a soft, warm bed. And resurrection was a strident, insistent, maddening alarm clock that shrilled across the predawn chill of a dreadful, frowzy room. Dreadful with its life and its bare reality and its sharp, sickening reminder that one must get up and walk into reality again."
The first third/maybe half of this is pretty much as close as Simak gets to writing a thriller. The ideas are big, but the pacing is relatively snappy (you know, for Simak), and the whole set up feels very PKD. Then in the latter half, Simak goes full Simak and enters into classic rural, contemplative, pastoral Sci fi - and by that I mean the main character quite literally gets stuck in 1970's Wisconsin for 10 years, spending his days fishing, farming, rambling, writing, and discussing the arrogance of man with our antagonist.
On one level, Time and Again is super messy, and possibly one of Simak's least satisfying novels; on the other hand, it can be very satisfying... It's packed with ideas, it has some of his finest prose and it wraps things up much more neatly than many of his other outings. It's probably a bit too big for its boots, touching on concepts it doesn't really know how to explore; but the attempt to explore these themes is still pretty interesting, even if the whole destiny angle is little more than a vague Mcguffin.
Still, Time and Again is pretty readable, pretty fun at points and (as with many Simak stories) just plain pretty. It's charming in its quaint ambition, and difficult not to admire.
A delightful tale, if inconsistent. Probably not a stretch to call it one of his best (take that how you will).
And that ending... Considerably more brutal than I remember it being.
nicholasbobbitt1997's review against another edition
3.0
As I tend to enjoy Simak's stories, I feel slightly disappointed in this book. It just doesn't seem to have the style his short stories had.
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