- Paperback
- Publisher: Gollancz (July 8 1999)
- Language: English
- ISBN-10: 1857988221
- ISBN-13: 978-1857988222
- Product Dimensions: 12.9 x 1.8 x 19.8 cm
- Shipping Weight: 259 g
- Average Customer Review: 4.4 out of 5 stars See all reviews (62 customer reviews)
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Most helpful customer reviews
5.0 out of 5 stars
A Wonderful Sci-fi Classic,
By "dhowenstine" (Seattle, WA USA) - See all my reviews
This review is from: The Demolished Man (Paperback)
Alfred Bester's The Demolished Man remains an engaging, well-written novel even long after it was first published. Bester's principal characters are intelligent, resourceful, and wonderful to watch in their game of wits; the society he envisions is believable and fascinating; and the writing sparse yet sophisticated. I highly recommend The Demolished Man, as well as Mr. Bester's other works.
5.0 out of 5 stars
Tension, Apprehension, and Dissension Have Begun...,
By
This review is from: The Demolished Man (Paperback)
Bester was a writer of the 50s, the brute-force, high-tension 50s of film noir, cool jazz, Brando, Tennesee Williams, and "Sweet Smell of Success". Nowhere is the essential nature of the decade better depicted than in his two novels of the period, "The Demolished Man" and "The Stars My Destination". The premise of "The Demolished Man" is simplicity itself: how do you go about committing murder in a society where the cops can read minds, and alternately, how does the telepathic cop nail his man when he knows damn well he's guilty but has no evidence? A not unusual SF premise, more compelling than most, perhaps. But what makes "Demolished Man" worth reading a half-century on is its milieu and style. Bester was that rarity in SF, a writer of true sophistication. There is not a page of this novel that does not glow with that sense of knowledge of the world beyond the pulps. Some of us, alas, grew up thinking that this was what SF should be. (William Gibson learned from this novel--though not enough.) There was scarcely room for this kind of thing in the 50s. There is no room for it now, nor any sign that there ever will be again.
5.0 out of 5 stars
One of the science fiction greats,
By Claude Avary "West Coast Reader" (Los Angeles, CA USA) - See all my reviews
This review is from: The Demolished Man (Paperback)
(First, just to make something clear: this book has no connection to the Snipes/Stallone stinker movie _Demolition Man_.)Bester's first novel (after years of short stories, comics, and radio) also won the first Hugo Award, and deserved it. This is cyberpunk mayhem thirty years before anyone invented the term, a lightning ride through language, deception, and murder. The book I find it most closely resembles is Paul Cain's crime thriller _Fast One_, duplicating its speed and moral relativism. In Bester's imagined future, Espers (telepaths) make murder impossible to commit, so mad industrialist Ben Reich just has to find a way to get away with it. The plot follows policeman Lincoln Powell, a powerful esper, in his quest to nail Reich, and Reich's delirious evasions. At stake may be the whole of society. I have only one negative thing to say for this book: it still isn't as good as Bester's other great novel, _The Stars My Destination_. Buy both of them today and plunge into the best of science fiction.
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