Okay, I review this and head back to work. This will be short. But what an absolutely auspicious start! I'd read Williamson's The Metal Man in Tom Shippey's Oxford anthology and had been immediately hooked by his storyteller's voice. With Folded Hands is no different. The story itself is pure Golden Age goodness. What is ironical is how honest the message felt, and yet it's entirely possible to enjoy this for the images it evokes rather than the message at hand. The story—about benevolent robots taking over the world, is nothing you haven't seen before; however, I really enjoyed the character of the scientist and the everyman caught in the midst of it all, two stereotypes that never seem to get old when you're dealing with Golden Age science fiction. I loved this most of all for the writing, however. Williamson had a far defter hand at penning tales than Asimov, and while The Caves of Steel kept flashing in my head throughout the story, it never once felt derivative. Had a very Philip K. Dick-like feel to it too, not to mention Pohl's classic Tunnel at the End of the World.
A classic, through and through.
Next Up: Surface Tension by James Blish.
No comments:
Post a Comment