Scan barcode
A review by minimalmike
Forward the Foundation by Isaac Asimov
4.0
Writing: 4.7
Story: 3.83
Overall: 4.2
After around two months I've finally finished reading the foundation series. Fantastic series, so far only surpassed by Tolkien's middle earth stories.
Asimov was truly a brilliant and wildly imaginative man. I'll be surprised if I ever read a sci-fi novel that rivals anything from this series. All that being said, although this was a great book, it received the lowest rating from me out of the rest of the books in the series.
It seems like at some point, he ran out of ways to make things fit as seamlessly as he did in his previous novels. There were a few points in the book, some of them very major in importance, that made me think "Eh, that was a pretty big stretch."
The desperance chemical that had been continuously put into Raych's food in order to make him lose his will/autonomy
Mandel Gruber, who had been shown to be a very peaceful, kind, and loyal man, suddenly turning insane and somehow being able to infiltrate security and kill the emperor.
Manela being part of some covert security team looking for people who were a threat to the empire.
These were 3 huge deus ex machinas/plot contriveses that just did not sit well with me.
An improvement that this book managed over the others though was the characters showing themselves to be a bit more realistic and human in terms of emotional fallibility. Ironically, the one character that showed the most human susceptibility to brash actions fueled by emotion was Dors, a character who actually isn't human.
Story: 3.83
Overall: 4.2
After around two months I've finally finished reading the foundation series. Fantastic series, so far only surpassed by Tolkien's middle earth stories.
Asimov was truly a brilliant and wildly imaginative man. I'll be surprised if I ever read a sci-fi novel that rivals anything from this series. All that being said, although this was a great book, it received the lowest rating from me out of the rest of the books in the series.
It seems like at some point, he ran out of ways to make things fit as seamlessly as he did in his previous novels. There were a few points in the book, some of them very major in importance, that made me think "Eh, that was a pretty big stretch."
The desperance chemical that had been continuously put into Raych's food in order to make him lose his will/autonomy
Mandel Gruber, who had been shown to be a very peaceful, kind, and loyal man, suddenly turning insane and somehow being able to infiltrate security and kill the emperor.
Manela being part of some covert security team looking for people who were a threat to the empire.
These were 3 huge deus ex machinas/plot contriveses that just did not sit well with me.
An improvement that this book managed over the others though was the characters showing themselves to be a bit more realistic and human in terms of emotional fallibility. Ironically, the one character that showed the most human susceptibility to brash actions fueled by emotion was Dors, a character who actually isn't human.