Customer Reviews

Nemesis

5 star:		(10)
4 star:		(11)
3 star:		(7)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(5)

 

 

Nemisis is another masterpiece of Asmoivian Sciene fiction. The settings are as grandiose and inspiring as any of Asimov's creations are: the Solar System is awash with metal colonies that tend to look down on Earth, even though they are psychologically dependant on it. One colony, Rotor, decides to leave the Solar System in order to pursue a social experiment of its own. It uses proprietary technology to find and transport to a star much nearer than Alpha Centauri, a star that no one else in the Solar System knows exists. But in finding the star Nemisis, the Rotorians also discover that Earth's days are numbered.

This is NOT an action novel, nor will you encounter some mythical "Dark Force" of the universe guiding Nemisis against humanity. As fans of Asimov know, the Grand Master of Science Fiction does not dwell on the fantastic to create his stories. The real story here is a speculation into human nature. The book explores what migration patterns into the stars might be like, and expressly demonstrates the futility of powerful individuals to create homogenous, uptopian societies by hiding away from the rest of mankind. The science is good, but merely a backdrop.

The book is mostly dialouge, another Asimov standard. For those who like lazer fights in space, Nemisis is not a good book. The conversations are eloquent and deliberate, however, always advancing the plot and posing interesting ideas while developing the characters.

The only complaint I have with this book is the introduction. Asimov makes it very clear this book is NOT part of the Robot/Empire/Foundation universe... and yet the book makes MANY references to these series' ideas, proper names, and themes. If the hyperdrive invented in I, Robot was a precursor to the hyperassistance they use in Nemisis, I would put this book immediately prior to The Caves of Steel in the Asimov universe. It seems like Asimov wrote a book in a different universe, but was unable to leave the one he had already created.

Out of all the works of Isaac Asimov that I have read, my favorites are undoubtedly The Foundation Trilogy, and Nemesis. Nemesis is an interesting book. Its not really an adventure like so much science-fiction writte today. No, it's more of a social commentary on the types of changes we could likely expect when humanity reaches out for unknown territory. And it's also the story of a girl who is blessed with an uncanny ability to read people like an open book. Needless to say, it's quite interesting to observe what happens when a person simply cannot be lied to in any way, shape or form. And it's also about her mother and father and how they adapt to and deal with their environment.

But the real meat of this book is three-fold. First, it's about a planet in peril. The earth is going to be wiped out when the Sun's closest star approaches it, and no seems to belive the girl who knows. Second, this book is about the alien intelligence living on an inhospitable planet and it's desire to communicate with humans. And thirdly, this book is about the development of super-luminal (faster than light-speed) travel. Asimov explains the science of this like it's an actual phenomena that's really possible (which of course it is not as far as we know). I really enjoyed the science part of this novel. And I found the characters and their actions interesting too...

But the real kicker comes at the end of the book, when the man who's dreams of isolation and subsequent experimentation on a small group of humans are destroyed. To say much more would spoil it. But let's just say that the word Nemesis has several meanings, and the plot twist on the last page (as we realize what's REALLY going to happen in the years to come) is awesome. Perhaps the greatest ending plot twist I have ever seen (and a darn cool tie-in to the Foundation Series to boot).

If you love Asimov's sci-fi writing, definitely check this one out. Especially if you love the Foundation Trilogy. Highly recommended.

The plot of this book is not what grabbed me, but the way that Asimov maps the future of civilization. As humans spread into space will they really segregate themselves based on human culture and then seperate themselves from that same culture. The story is entertaining and the character interaction is very good. This book is worth a read.

In the past year I have read all 11 of the novels from the Foundation and Robot series and have enjoyed all of them immensely (4 to 5 star range). I was eagerly anticipating Nemesis, as another book written later in Mr. Asimov's career, and a book extolled by one of my favorite authors, Orson Scott Card, as "...almost certainly one of the finest novels in science fiction." Notice the hedge in the word 'almost'. In my view, it is almost certainly one of the weakest sci-fi books in Mr. Asimov's extraordinary collection. The story follows the initial explorations out of the solar system after the development of hyperspatial technology. There is an interesting teenage girl, Marlene, with an unusually astute capacity to read people's true motivations through perception of non-verbal cues. Unfortunately, she is kind of a brat. The rest of the characters are almost entirely enslaved by their narcissistic drives for power, control, and place in the history books. There are excruciatingly long and repetitious harangues between Marlene and her mother, Eugenia. The female adult leads, Eugenia and Tessa, have relationship issues that drag the story to the level of a soap opera. The men are either pathologically power hungry and sociopathic (e.g.,Janus) or confused (e.g., Crile) or naive (Siever). mild spoiler alert: The alien intelligence, which you suspect early, does not emerge until near the end of the book, and then it is sadly under-developed. And after such a tedious build-up, the book ends rather too quickly. If you're an Asimov fan like I am, I suppose you will have to read it; just make sure you have one of his other novels cued up right behind so you can rid yourself of the sour taste (I've got Currents of Space going, it's great!)

...Nietzsche's "ubermenschen" (master race) complex. The inhabitants of space habitat Rotor, like the Spacers from Asimov's "Robots" series, are more highly-evolved than the lowlifes here on Earth. Which is why they don't live in this lousy sinkhole anymore. It seems that Earthlings 700 years from now personify that old song by War; "The World Is a Ghetto". The problem is that some 21st Century readers come from my trailer trash demographic and don't respond well to elitism. Now the Rotorians have spotted a dwarf star that's on its way to a collision with Earth, and you can tell by the way the act that they consider their discovery as involving a dilemma. Is this old ball of mud--known during the primieval 20th Century as the Big Blue Marble--worth saving? So they spend most of the book in windy philosophizing over it. Among the worst is the teenage Marlene, daughter of the astronomer who made the discovery, whose great obsession is that she thinks her talents as an instinctive behavioralist is an ability to read people's minds. Were it not for the fact that she's so arrogant about it, she might grow up to be a pretty decent shrink. She reminds me of the supporting character Mary Anne, daughter of Conroy's "The Great Santini", whose mother warns her that her intellect, too frequently expressed, makes her come across a know-it-all. If only Marlene's mom would tell her that! Don't get me wrong--a bit of philosophy is great in a sci-fi book or it's nothing but pulp space opera. The book then becomes more about people than rocket ships and rises above junior high level to reach us grownups. Asimov proves that in his other works. But when you let that aspect take over, as Asimov does here, and combine it with smug elitism, you end up with a yarn that's not only tedious--it's annoying.

I give "Nemesis" three stars for originality and suspense, but none for the writing or the characters. It is an easily readable book with a decent ending, but it's not nearly as good as some of Asimov's earlier works.

"Nemesis" is set several hundred years in the future, when small numbers of humans have moved away from the planet Earth, which is in decay, and started to live on settlements in space. Janis Pitt, the leader of one of these settlements, decides to move it to a hidden star system nearby, where he hopes to establish a Utopia and prevent any outsiders from entering. The settlement, known as Rotor, is set in orbit around a planet called Erythro. However, a plague apparently caused by sinister forces on Erythro complicates the settlers' plans. Meanwhile, back on Earth, scientists are struggling to discover the secret to faster-than-light travel so that they can find Rotor. The story starts off pretty slowly, but it becomes pretty suspenseful once the main character, a girl named Marlene, starts being pulled by mysterious forces on the planet of Erythro.

For some reason, Asimov always chooses to write about ninety-five percent of each novel in dialogue format. In "Nemesis", this style becomes annoying because all of the characters sound almost exactly the same. There's no attempt to give any of them a unique and original voice. Also, despite the fact that most of the characters are supposed to be brilliant scientists, they're all fairly stupid. They prattle on for pages before suddenly realizing facts that have been obvious to the reader for several chapters. The worst character of all is the archvillian, who's supposed to be a big evil dictator but instead comes across as more of an annoying loser.

Anyway, "Nemesis" is a decent quick read, but it doesn't have the same imagination and character development as Asimov's better works. I recommend "Foundation" and "Foundation and Empire", "Nightfall", and "Fantastic Voyage" instead.

The S.F. scenario is Asimovianly plausible...up to a point.The overpolluted Earth theme is also sadly plausible,and not at all new (compare Silverberg's Hot Sky at Midnight and Constantine's Hermetech)Oh.but what took to my heart was the intertwining of human loves and passions,and the particular attention on those of us who are disinherited,deprived, the proletaries and emarginated of love: poor Marlene and clumsy Siever Genarr(anyway,whit a name like this, anyone could have had social problems).I've loved this book exactly for this,and also for the fascinating futuristic view of lfe in a space environment. Plus,Asimov had a special touch in describing space scenes: you can SEE them as you read. Nemesis is one of the best examples of that.

Asimov begins Nemesis with a note to the effect that this isn't part of the Foundation, Empire, or Robots series, but he might at some point write a novel to try and join them. But as readers of those series will tell you, he's going to have a tough job marrying a story about how a group of arrogant but highly intelligent Earth-hating humans leave the Solar System in the early part of the third millennium to colonize new worlds with, say, the Robots series, which concerns a bunch of colonized worlds inhabited by Earth-hating highly intelligent humans at the end of the third millennium.

Ok, I'm being a smartarse, but then, when discussing Asimov, that almost seems appropriate. Asimov was asked by his editor to write something that wasn't "A Foundation novel, or a Robot novel, or an Empire novel", and he, technically, did as she wished, but I doubt many Robots/Empire/Foundation fans will care much, and will, as I did, wallow in another masterful fantasy, which stands on its own in its own right, but will immediately be recognizable to fans of the great Robots/Foundation universe nonetheless.

Asimov describes a world 200-300 years from now, where the first steps towards extra-terrestrial habitation are being made. One colony decides to make a jump to a nearby hither-to undiscovered star, only to discover that the star is likely to put Earth in peril. All of which would lead to a simple resolution if only the colonists didn't hate Earthmen, and the people of Earth didn't hate the colonists.

Enter Marlene, a highly intelligent 15 year old colonist who is, by far, probably the best character I've seen Asimov paint. Can she save Earth? Does she want to?

To go into more detail would probably spoil the plot, but Asimov builds a convincing second solar system with an unfamiliar and original arrangement of planets and worlds, and as usual Asimov doesn't ever feel tempted to spoil the science for the plot, instead working it in and making the beauty of worlds light-years away real and solid. Indeed, in this respect it does differ from the other R/E/F novels: There's a "real" solar system here, not some copy of our own, but one where Asimov has clearly done the calculations and could probably have told you the position of each asteroid in the system if only you'd asked him.

As always, human failings come to the surface, and Asimov shows passionate concern about human prejudice, pride, and hatred.

The novel has faults: it does not exactly grab the reader by the throat, feels too long, and too much of it has been done before. Indeed, towards the end Nemesis begins to feel like a low-budget Star Trek episode. If Asimov had shown his usual tendencies towards cardboard characterization, this might have been not much better.

Fortunately, Nemesis is better: It is easily read, the characters are often wonderful, the science is at once both believable and interesting, and even Asimov's trademark conversations have a different degree of humour to them. It's certainly worth putting up with the lacking-something ending for what is otherwise a great read.

The first story by Asimov I have ever read
was surprising to me in its political correctness.
I pictured him as being from the good old days,
since, were he alive, he would be probably in
his 80's; but no: all the virtuous characters were female; the heroin
being a little girl. Women 1: men 0 (yet again!).
I enjoyed the story itself though,
which Asimov spins much in the same manner as do
young modern-day TV writers (who are even more
PC than he -- at least they have an excuse...)
with Star Trek, et al. In fact
the book would easily appeal to Trek fans, assuming
they could pull themselves away from the TV screen. It makes me wonder
if in fact the writers of television SF don't get
their ideas from masters like Asimov. If he were
25 years old I'd say "Hey he stole that idea from
Star Trek." But since he has been around a lot
longer than any TV show, well the opposite is
more likely the case. It's almost
impossible to believe otherwise after reading his
work. Cut the PC (stuff) out and this would have
got at least one full star more.

Nemesis is a fascinating piece of work in which Isaac Asimov shows true talent through science fiction. Asimov is able to show the great struggle of many people to save the human race from total destruction through many scientific advances. Each character having very different views and personalities allows situations in the book to create great conflict and the need for critical decisions. For example, Eugenia Insigna, the discoverer of the star Nemesis posing the threat to Earth, wanted to warn the people on Earth and to inform them of new travel techniques in order to understand how to travel elsewhere. The commissioner of her satellite was selfish and would not allow her to reveal this discovery to anyone and wanted to leave the solar system behind. This is just one of the many conflicts that cause the reader to wonder what lies ahead. This suspense is what makes the story interesting. It was very intriguing to see the many different scientific issues Asimov brought up as his characters dealt with everyday survival in new places. Even though much of it was fictional and strange, he made it seem very possible which shows his great ability to manipulate one's mind. The ending to the novel was well done due to the fact that it steers the reader toward a solution, yet it is not definitive. It allows for some imagination and the ability to create an ending that best suites the desires of the individual.