The Sword and Laser discussion

I know a lot of people on these boards have been pretty critical of the Demolished Man and the "so-called-SF-classics" and I just wanted to come out and say that I loved this book. And I don't love it in spite of its flaws I love it for its flaws.

This is a rip-roaring pulp story. It's relentless in its forward momentum, it's got an interesting premise with some really big ideas woven in, and it manages to continually surprise and entertain.

What I really love about this book is the way it feels totally and completely of the 50s (disclaimer: I am only 27 and thus didn't experience the 50s firsthand). It's a little bit quaint. There are moments of naivety and silliness that bring to mind I Love Lucy reruns or Leave it to Beaver. That's part of the charm. And I can enjoy that while maintaining feminist beliefs the same way I can enjoy Huck Finn while believing in racial equality.

I love the Freudian elemtents for the same pseudonostalgic reasons. Sure Freud isn't in vogue anymore but this is a novel not a psych text. These ideas were heavily debated then and are still quite prevalent today. That doesn't mean they're accurate but what's more important than their accuracy is the fact that they are interesting. Bester takes these ideas and swings for the fences touching on enduring political and social themes. That to me is one quality of a SF classic.

tl;dr: It's a fun, pulpy story straight out of the 50s. Enjoyable simultaneously as an interesting relic from a culture 6o years removed from us and as a great example of a quick light story with heavy ideas that speak to how we live together in a society.

Seconded.

I'd like to know if the pulpishness was intentional choosen by Bester. And if so, why.

Andreas wrote: "I'd like to know if the pulpishness was intentional choosen by Bester. And if so, why."

I think it was just part of the writing style predominant in sci-fi at the time.

Asimov and Bester were among the first Great writers to emerge from the pulp tradition. Rather than being influenced and shaped by the canonical Great Writers (Verne, Wells, Shelley) they were born out of the pulps which were characterized by unbridled enthusiasm more than any kind of literary refinement. It's in their literary DNA.

So you find stuff like in The Caves of Steel where Lije Bailey exclaims "Jehoshaphat!" every few pages. Yeah it can induce eye rolling but it's also part of the flavour of the time. You have to be able to embrace the cheese a bit with this stuff. Just like you have to with Indiana Jones or any Tarantino movie.

EMBRACE THE PULP!

This was a solid 3 for me through maybe 3/4 of the book then really picked things up and bumped to a 3.5/4.

It certainly shows it's age, but it was still a lot of fun.

I think the story has held up remarkably well. I gave it 4 of 5 stars.
As Rob pointed out, things really pick up in the final quarter of the book.

I just finished it last night, and while it was pretty good, I don't know if I'd call it "great". Most of it was fine, but the last 2-3 chapters really ruined it for me.

Powell can't prove that Reich did it? Well, we'll just pull out this thing that was neither mentioned nor foreshadowed to more or less torture Reich into confessing.

And the last chapter was especially egregious - particularly the reveal of Reich's parentage. That felt really out of nowhere. Barbra's latent telepathy was at least kinda foreshadowed.

But I guess the biggest thing that hurts the book for me was that, once I finished it, I started thinking about the book and the Babylon 5 episode "Passing Through Gethsemany", which deals with something similar to this book's Demolition, and whether or not it's a good thing. In the book, they just go "What? Death penalty? How barbaric!" and just leave it at that.

Still, up until that point, I enjoyed it. 3/5 stars.

Agreed. I've been reading more and more detective fiction recently, and while not really a technically boiled-genre story, it certainly felt like one. A really good one.

The book was pretty good, but not great. Mainly, the detective aspect of the book was a little thin, IMO. And I agree with Sean about Reich being revealed as D'Courtney's bastard son was extremely jarring. The author should at least provide breadcrumbs to that possibility, not pull it out of nowhere.

Despite some of the weaknesses, I still enjoyed the book but would have preferred at bit more world-building (which I guess is a more modern trope).

Ken wrote: " And I agree with Sean about Reich being revealed as D'Courtney's bastard son was extremely jarring. The author should at least provide breadcrumbs to that possibility, not pull it out of nowhere."
With hindsight it's rather obvious given the time and the Freudian background.
He provided some clues, for example D'Courtney's reactions to Reich's offer and his behaviour during their direct confrontation.
I was surprised that I fell for such an obvious twist, maybe because I was quite enthralled by the story and finished the audiobook within two days.
He doesn't do much world-building but I think his ideas how a world in which espers exist might look like was quite compelling.
The wide spread of audiobooks and the idea of asking a computer for information (via a phone booth) were nice touches.
The brevity was quite refreshing. (Modern fantasy authors could learn a thing or two from Alfred Bester. I am looking at you, GRRM and you, Patrick Rothfuss.)

Ken wrote: "The author should at least provide breadcrumbs to that possibility, not pull it out of nowhere."

Michael wrote: "He doesn't do much world-building but I think his ideas..."

One thing I've noticed with some of the older sci-fi is that sometimes you get an intellectual framework instead of world building as we see it in more contemporary works. Now, Mieville is someone who really blends the two really well. He has lush, beautifully detailed worlds that are built fundamentally out of ideas. Bester doesn't stand up very well next to Mieville but I can say that for a lot of writers.

Bester does go light on the physical worldbuilding but his intellectual framework is solid and intriguing. It's a world built on freudian concepts in which some people have the ability to see into the minds of others. Perhaps it's because of the interior nature of these concepts that the physical world is a little less developed or maybe it's just that Bester isn't Mieville. Either way, I think the bread crumbs are there.

There's really a double detective story here. There is the whole standard crime followed by the cat and mouse act but there's also the mystery of why Reich was compelled to commit the crime in the first place. Remember the story begins with Reich's dream about the faceless man and the mystery around that. Then there's the inexplicable reaction from D'Courtney during the murder. If you have even a minimal understanding of Freud (which is all I have) it's no surprise that D'Courtney is his father. I didn't see it coming but it all makes perfect sense within the framework Bester developed.

So while I can understand why some people might feel like it's tacked on, the relationship between D'Courtney and Reich is central to the framework developed by Bester.

I enjoyed the book and as I was reading it I could see how other stories “may” have been influenced by it.

Peep guild reminding me so much of the psi corps in the Babylon 5 series.

The talk about how long it had been since murder happened because peeps would pick them up before it happened reminded me of the future telling mutants in Minority Report.

As far as it being a classic, if I’m being told to read a book over 50 years old by a sci-fi book club that tells me the answer.

I have been on a mystery kick lately and I loved the book. I was constantly caught of guard by the twists and turns and found myself making wrong assumptions based on experience that didn't apply to the book I was reading. I also saw the connections to Minority Report and up until the end I was sure of it, but it was a fun ride and I can see why it is the first.

It was a solid three for me as well. Interesting enough to keep reading but not fantastic.

I'm surprised folk think the father thing came out of nowhere. I pretty much guessed at something like that from the murder, and there were so many hints which followed. I didn't notice any hints about Barbara being a peeper, though, and that seemed annoyingly planted to make for an instant happy ending out of nowhere, so I guess different people notice different things. Such is the trouble with foreshadowing.

Really enjoyed the book as a whole. Parts of it weirdly reminded me of Crime and Punishment, which I didn't expect for such a pulpy sci-fi novel. Really, it seemed more psychological detective novel than anything, but there were lots of cool details to enjoy.

I enjoyed it by the end but it was a tough beginning and just when I was about to lem it I started really enjoying it. The end confused me for a little while until I was starting to realize just what was happening. I enjoyed the made up slang though. I would probably give it a 3 1/2 stars if we could do half starts in Goodreads.

I really enjoyed this book. I definitely didn't read it critically, and I think that helped. Although the romantic relationship at the end was off-putting, I feel like I've read several books from that time period and earlier that have a similar vibe going, so I just chalked it up to that. I think that this was an entertaining light read, and I definitely dug the Colombo moments!

Michael wrote: "Peep guild reminding me so much of the psi corps in the Babylon 5 series."

The fact that the main psi corps agent is named Alfred Bester really drives the connection home.

Kristen wrote: "Although the romantic relationship at the end was off-putting,"

Yeah, that was kinda squicky. Guy serves as her surrogate father while she mentally develops from infancy to adulthood in fast-forward, and then gets in a relationship with her? Now that's Freudian.

I really enjoyed this up until the last few chapters, which completely annoyed me. I didn't mind the romance, because deep in her mind she was still an adult, but it sure was convenient that she had latent peeping abilities. But mostly I objected to how they resolved Reich's story, and what was all that nonsense about him being able to affect the nature of reality? (Or something like that. I finished this book a couple of weeks ago.) I just felt like Reich's parentage came out of the blue, and all the ambiguous reality/nonreality stuff made it seem even more so.

I enjoyed this book. Fun detective story and interesting to see the piecing together in the book of a mystery when the end was already known. And I loved the exploration of how a society with so many people with ESP could operate.

I wasn't surprised by the revelations about the "man with no face" or Reich's relationship to D'Courtney (I thought that there were clues), but did find the romance to be very uncomfortable.

I also quite enjoyed the writing style, especially the attempts to change the type to reflect the concept of numerous people with ESP thinking together.