The Naked Sun (Mass Market Paperback)

Cop Elijah Baley isn't too fond of robots. Or Spacers. So he's less than pleased when he is sent to Solaria, a sparsely populated world where robots do all the work, and humans "toil not, neither do they spin." He's there to investigate a strange murder -- a scientist named Delmarre was murdered, and his widow Gladia is the only possible suspect. But she seems too ditzy and fluttery to crush a person's skull.

When an official is poisoned right in front of Baley, his suspicions are confirmed -- somebody is still murdering, and it may be linked to some touchy political subjects that Delmarre was working on. No human was close enough to kill either man, and no robot was capable of murder. With the assistance of his robot sidekick R. Daneel Olivaw, Lije Baley starts to unravel a mystery that seems to have no suspects...

Does a world full of languid, long-lived people waited on by robots sound like paradise? It won't after "Naked Sun," where such a civilization is enough to drive you nuts with boredom. Asimov did an excellent job with the Solarian civilization, where actually being in the same room as another person is considered an unspeakable intimacy and the world "children" is almost obscene.

Since this is all completely foreign to Lije Bailey (who comes from overcrowded Earth), it comes across as alien to the readers as well. It also adds an enticingly weird dimension to his detective work: Bailey has to solve a mystery entirely through communication equipment, and robots keep clearing away evidence. Add some agoraphobia and solid social commentary, and you have a story that is reminiscent of Agatha Christie writing Star Wars.

Bailey and Daneel make an excellent team -- there's Bailey's human gut feelings and intuitions into the human mind, coupled with Daneel's cool calm robot logic, and his lack of prejudices. The supporting characters are also nicely done, particularly the mildly neurotic Gladia and the nervous Gruer.

Asimov's "Naked Sun" is a tighter, tauter mystery than "Caves of Steel," with a bizarre civilization and a mystery that seems impossible to figure out. Immensely enjoyable and thought-provoking.

In this book, a murder occurs in a Spacer world and Elijah is specifically requested for. The murder, they say, is a logical imposibility, as it could only have been done by one person and even that person could not possibly have done it. Reluctantly, Elijah travels to the world of Solaria, where the murder occured and, reunited with Daneel, attempts to solve it in his already well-known style.

Considering the contempt of Spaces for all earthlings, his visit to the outer world of Solaria is unprecedented and he has no idea to expect from a culture which diverged from earth's 300 years ago. The result is staggering - a huge planet with only 20,000 inhabitants and several thousand robots per person means unprecedented luxury. Everyone has huge estates, isolated from everyone and life is automated and mechanised to the nth degree. This reflects in the social aspect of life, where *seeing* a person (in the flesh) has become a social taboo, to be avoided as much as humanly possible. Instead, social contact is done through the impersonal, though extremely sophisticated machinery and is called *viewing*. Even a husband and wife (allocated roles in Solaria) rarely see each other, most of the contact done by viewing.

And so, without giving away the details of the mystery, Bailey is essentially faced with a thematic connundrum. On the one hand, the Solarians don't have the almost psychotic fear of open spaces and nature that Bailey and other earthlings possess due to existing all their lives in boxes within boxes. But Solarians have lost the other essential aspect of humanity, as Bailey sees what a pathetically isolated, lolly-pop world Solaria is, where most of what we consider meaningful (real interactions, children, family) are either taboo or nonexistent.

The book represents a step up from the Caves of Steel which outlined the way people live on earth. For the first time, we can see Asimov's robot-filled universe and the consequences on technology. On Earth, the crowding has ensured that social contact has remained but people have lost their communion with nature and the universe itself. On Solaria, the reverse is true, with plenty of sun and open spaces but no humanity. I really enjoyed this whole take on the world (especially as Bailey learns to see his fear of open spaces for what it is - an arbitrary, unnecessary hinderance).

The only problem is that Asimov hammers this thematic point with the subtlety of a Britney Spears outfit. Still, it's interesting. The mystery itself is what has been criticised in otehr reviews and I don't consider it as satisfactory/"perfect" as Caves of Steel, but it's relatively interesting and it just shows that the action was a vehicle towards what Asimov really wanted to say.

So, overall, a great book despite its flaws as it'll actually make you think about the values of our society and the direction we *might* be going - unlike many other sci-fi works (including some by Asimov), this one's both entertaining *and* meaningful.