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Customer Reviews

62 Reviews

5 star:		(34)
4 star:		(15)
3 star:		(7)
2 star:		(4)
1 star:		(2)

Average Customer Review

4.2 out of 5 stars (62 customer reviews)

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2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars This is a Sci Fi title that really rended my heart, Sep 4 2003

By

James Henry (Rochester NY) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Gateway (Mass Market Paperback)

Today I finished GATEWAY at 4am after staying up most of the night engrossed in Pohl's masterpiece. Yes, it's that good in my opinion. And quite frankly it devasted me. If you like your SF with emotion, feeling and fully 3 dimensionally characters, You will love this book. It will break your heart. Pohl leads you up to a point where you think things will be OK, then leads you careening over the edge. It really hit me hard, emotionally. Some people would say that this is melodrama, but I don't think so.

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1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars An outstanding story, May 7 2004

By

Alex Frantz (San Leandro, ca USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)

This review is from: Gateway (Mass Market Paperback)

"Gateway" tells the story of the ultimate futuristic gold rush. In the 21st century, an asteroid known as Gateway is discovered containing hundreds of ancient space ships, all of them with pre-programmed courses already set. The builders of the ships are referred to as Heechees, but very little is known of who they were, why they built the asteroid, or why the Heechee disappeared. Since no human knows how to steer the ships or predict the destinations, explorers have to get in the ships, activate the program, and then go where it takes them. Some discover vast wealth; many never return or come back dead because they have run out of food or air.

Robinette Broadhead becomes a Gateway prospector as one of the few avenues of advancement open to a poor person on Earth. This book tells of his trips interspersed with his conversations with a computerized therapist.

The setting is interesting, and the story is very effective. I would recommend this book highly.

This is the opener of a series which suffers from what might be called the "Dune" Effect: a terrific first book, with diminishing returns in subsequent volumes. Pohl ultimately does resolve the mystery of the Heechees, along with other questions not introduced in this book; unfortunately the answers are less interesting than the questions, and the story loses momentum well before the end of the series. I would recommend the sequel, "Beyond the Blue Event Horizon", but the final two volumes aren't up to snuff.

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5.0 out of 5 stars Gateway, Sep 16 2011

By

Joe Boudreault (Hanover, Ontario, Canada) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Gateway (Paperback)

In 1976 Frederik Pohl, a New York author born in 1919, began a five-novel series about a fictional culture called the Heechee Saga. This novel, Gateway, is the first in the series, and like Walter Miller or Frank Herbert, he plunges us into a mysterious and exciting world of galactic adventure.

Once upon a time, Earth explorers reach Venus and discover tunnels beneath the planet's surface, vestiges of an alien technology and presence. No aliens, just those tunnels and some artifacts. One explorer finds a spaceship and manages to operate it, not realizing that it is automatically programmed to go to a specific destiny. That destiny turns out to be an asteroid in the Oort cloud and it is riddled with more tunnels and in fact is a space port made by aliens they are calling the Heechees. Hundreds of spaceships are waiting in the abandoned asteroid world of the Heechee. What to do?

An Earth consortium called the Gateway Corporation is formed and anybody wanting to pay a large fee and be trained are sent out on any one of the ships to see what happens. It's a big interstellar lottery because the ships, though they always automatically return to the Gateway station, don't always succeed and the interstellar "prospectors" sometimes perish or go crazy. Yet the rewards, if something is found to be of use (alien technology and artifacts, new worlds, new resources) are tremendous. Such is the world of Gateway, for starters.

One of these prospectors is Robinette Broadhead. He makes three voyages and survives, but apparently at a great mental cost. The novel cuts between the outward voyages and the station and Bob's psychological sessions with a computer counsellor. The idea of lost civilizations so alien and unknown is intriguing, especially when human adventurers grab hold of some of the opportunities that are offered. Practically nothing is offered in explanation of who the Heechee are or why they are no longer found or what are the workings of their spaceships. The Gateway daredevils (as the prospectors are thought of) simply make desperate bargains on each and every excursion on the mysterious voyages in each ship, either alone or with as many as five travelers going together. It makes for a great deal of expectation and tension.

This novel is a great page-turner and moves along nicely and as it is told in the first person (by Bob Broadhead) it is appealing in it's dramatic force. I liked it very much, and maybe will consider the rest of the novels in the Heechee saga: (Beyond the Blue Event Horizon (1980) Heechee rendezvous (1985) Annals of the Heechee (1987) The Gateway Trip (1990) The Boy Who Would Live Forever: A Novel of Gateway (2004).

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Most recent customer reviews

3.0 out of 5 stars Not exactly what I expected...
I had read about this novel on many "best of" lists, and had looked for it in bookstores for a long time. Read more

Published on Jan 12 2010 by R. J. Hellewell

4.0 out of 5 stars Despite structural flaws, a satisfying read
Frederik Pohl has always been one of my favourite SF authors. As a double Hugo/Nebula winner for 1997's best novel, that makes it (at least nominally) one of the best of the... Read more

Published on April 16 2004 by RansomOttawa

4.0 out of 5 stars A fine beginning.
I'm always reluctant to start a new series of Sci-fi novels because of the usual let-down that ensues after a fine beginning novel. Read more

Published on April 14 2004 by D. Knouse

3.0 out of 5 stars Eh
Rating: 2.5/5

I expected much better from a book that's touted as an SF classic. The background in which Gateway is set is brilliant, and the only reason why my rating's not... Read more

Published on Sep 20 2003 by hjsukthankar

3.0 out of 5 stars Ruined By Hollywood Angst
This book has some merits. Pohl paints a convincing miners' world by giving us a sense of its grit and stench. The lives of the miners are also handled well. Read more

Published on Jun 20 2003 by Barry C. Chow

5.0 out of 5 stars Evokes fascination and terror.
Gateway evokes the fascination and terror of the unknown universe better than any other science fiction book I know. Read more

Published on April 23 2003 by Richard S. Ellis

5.0 out of 5 stars fantastic
Let's see what I can remember...
There were a lot of good things about this book. The narrator, Robinette Broadhead, was fun to read about. Read more

Published on Mar 28 2003 by R. Sundquist

4.0 out of 5 stars Hard science fiction combined with character study
The premise of Gateway is simple enough - humankind has discovered a space station abandoned 500 000 years ago by a technologically superior race (the "Heechee"). Read more

Published on Mar 9 2003 by Craig MACKINNON

2.0 out of 5 stars Yawn, sex and drugs in outer space
This book is your basic teen fare from the '70s. Outer space is a place with lots of sex (alas, presented in a manner with little entertainment value), occasional pot, a... Read more

Published on Dec 2 2002 by RaDadIndy

5.0 out of 5 stars A Satisfying Read
Gateway is the first book in Pohl's wonderful Heechee Saga. It details the adventures of Robinette Broadhead, told in flashback. Read more