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A review by leosmile
Of Time and Stars by Arthur C. Clarke
4.25
Woo!! What a great collection of short stories. The fact I managed to read this whole thing while on such a crazy holiday is genuinely insane to me. Most of these stories were written in the 50s with the outliers being one in 1949 and one in 1960, so they were written post world war two and pre moon landing, and I think it shows? There's a bit of discussion around the atomic bomb (still relevant) and speculation around the moon (less so). The fact that Clarke was a scientist himself definitely gave the stories an air of reality, especially in a story like 'the fires within' when they were talking about cathode ray tubes and I was like omg!! I did physics!! I get what you're on about!!
The atmosphere of the stories was well balanced I think! There were some more serious (if I forget thee o earth...) and some more humorous (who's there?). Overall it led to a good mix with many having a level of importance to them while still not taking themselves too seriously. In retrospect Clarke had a consistently successful storytelling method, each story would begin with a strong opening hook eg.
The atmosphere of the stories was well balanced I think! There were some more serious (if I forget thee o earth...) and some more humorous (who's there?). Overall it led to a good mix with many having a level of importance to them while still not taking themselves too seriously. In retrospect Clarke had a consistently successful storytelling method, each story would begin with a strong opening hook eg.
I am very sorry, now that it's too late, that I never got to know Vladimir Surov.
or
'This is a slightly unusual request' said Dr Wagner, with what he hoped was commendable restraint. 'As far as I know, it's the first time anyone's been asked to supply a Tibetan Monastery with an Automatic Sequence Computer.'
(and that's just the first two stories of the book).
After the strong opening hook the story will unpack an interesting Sci-fi idea eg. Using sonar to descover exactly what's inside our earth. And then the story will end with a plot twist or a satisfying realisation that ties the whole story together. Eg. After discovering a city hidden inside the earth, it is revealed that the inside the earth dwellers are reading this report hundreds of years after the demise of humans, and they suddenly begin to wonder what could be further inside the earth below them....
Each of these stories is told with heart and consistently manages to get you invested in whatever is going on, the ideas that Clarke explores are always interesting, a few may be cliché now, but possibly they weren't while he was writing them? I had a bit of a hard time when I started the book as I didn't like having to leave all these stories that I'd just gotten invested in behind, but since each of the stories is so distinct from the next, I started to view the whole collection as almost parts of a whole, either stories from all corners of the same universe (even with all the world ending events, you could say they were actually the same event from different perspectives) or just different possibilities of the future etc. Whatever the case, I got into the story style in the end and it was just really done very well, the whole book was enjoyable, some stories were more memorable than others but I don't think there were any true duds, nothing that didn't give me a bit of something. The descriptions were consistently beautiful and believable, even if they were things nobody had ever experienced at the time.
Personal favourite stories were... "The Fires Within" "Encounter at Dawn" "All the Time in the World" and "Into the Comet". The Sentinal was interesting but I am a little shocked that it inspired 2001: A Space Odyssey because that's supposed to be like one of the best movies ever, I'm like super intruiged to watch the movie now to see how it interprets the story.
Also last thing tiny side note but the introduction by J.B. Priestley is maybe the best introduction I've ever read, it actually didn't spoil the story which is by far my biggest issue with introductions because why the fuck are you telling me the plot of the book I'm about to read, put it at the end if that's what you're gonna do!! Instead he just detailed why we should care about the book in the first place and it definitely made me more likely to care! So good job! Achieved purpose! More like this please! Now like don't get me wrong I adore a good analysis and am very greatful for them, but I just hate when they're billed as an introduction because they seem far more like the type of thing you should be reading afterwards!
Edit- was researching afterwards and discovered that little shop of horrors was based on 'the reluctant orchid' which is sick! I was thinking it as I read it but dismissed it as being far to random of a connection, it wasn't one of my favourite of the stories as the characters weren't particularly engaging or likeable and the twist felt a little tame, but it was a grand story and like all others had an interesting concept to explore!
Each of these stories is told with heart and consistently manages to get you invested in whatever is going on, the ideas that Clarke explores are always interesting, a few may be cliché now, but possibly they weren't while he was writing them? I had a bit of a hard time when I started the book as I didn't like having to leave all these stories that I'd just gotten invested in behind, but since each of the stories is so distinct from the next, I started to view the whole collection as almost parts of a whole, either stories from all corners of the same universe (even with all the world ending events, you could say they were actually the same event from different perspectives) or just different possibilities of the future etc. Whatever the case, I got into the story style in the end and it was just really done very well, the whole book was enjoyable, some stories were more memorable than others but I don't think there were any true duds, nothing that didn't give me a bit of something. The descriptions were consistently beautiful and believable, even if they were things nobody had ever experienced at the time.
Personal favourite stories were... "The Fires Within" "Encounter at Dawn" "All the Time in the World" and "Into the Comet". The Sentinal was interesting but I am a little shocked that it inspired 2001: A Space Odyssey because that's supposed to be like one of the best movies ever, I'm like super intruiged to watch the movie now to see how it interprets the story.
Also last thing tiny side note but the introduction by J.B. Priestley is maybe the best introduction I've ever read, it actually didn't spoil the story which is by far my biggest issue with introductions because why the fuck are you telling me the plot of the book I'm about to read, put it at the end if that's what you're gonna do!! Instead he just detailed why we should care about the book in the first place and it definitely made me more likely to care! So good job! Achieved purpose! More like this please! Now like don't get me wrong I adore a good analysis and am very greatful for them, but I just hate when they're billed as an introduction because they seem far more like the type of thing you should be reading afterwards!
Edit- was researching afterwards and discovered that little shop of horrors was based on 'the reluctant orchid' which is sick! I was thinking it as I read it but dismissed it as being far to random of a connection, it wasn't one of my favourite of the stories as the characters weren't particularly engaging or likeable and the twist felt a little tame, but it was a grand story and like all others had an interesting concept to explore!