The Stars My Destination...Was Bester a Time Traveller?

Author's Rating:

Pros: Timeless, fun to read, intelligent.

Cons: Can get a little deep for the recreational reader.

Author's Review
The Stars My Destination is a remarkable story. I work in the state capitol building in Texas and I am regularly amazed at the detail and ornate workings of the building - especially considering that it was made
without modern construction machinery and is much more complex and amazing than most buildings built today.

Alfred Bester wrote this book that is a wonder of the same order in 1956. The story is timeless and being science fiction, that is quite an accomplishment. Oh, there are a few moments in the book that hint at the time it was written, but they are no worse than the bystander response to a person's epileptic seizure that would be different today than it was in the fifties, but your average person probably still thinks the '50s reaction is the one to use, so no harm done to the readability of the story.

This is the kind of book you could read several times to catch all its meaning, implication and symbolism. And it is a book I found myself taking a little while to read because of the "imagination breaks" I had to take while reading it to ponder the scenarios the story presents.

The story deals specifically - among other things - with human teleportation soon after its discovery and treats it not in the Star Trek way where its just a fun and useful thing to do, the story deals with the effect the phenomena has on society once discovered. For instance, locks on the doors of your house aren't too useful if someone can just teleport right in.

But on a much broader level, the book deals with the progress of humanity, or perhaps evolution is a better word than progress considering that all advancement of humanity might not be in its own best interest.

And the book deals with freedom of will and responsibility. The book makes you think.

Technically, it is very well and imaginatively written. The characters, particularly the main character, are unforgettable. The author must have been taking some chance with his writing of this because several of the scientific theories he draws from are just becoming accepted in the latest generation of science, so if nothing else this book is an interesting read to see where science has come since the '50s.

Alfred Bester won the first Hugo Award for his novel The Demolished Man which I have not read yet, but intend to soon. I regret that I haven't read his work before now, and it would have been very interesting to see the characters written about in The Stars... carried on to other stories because I really gained a concern for what would happen to them and what they would do next.

The Stars My Destination is a book all science fiction fans should feel compelled to read, and I do not believe that the book is inaccessible to readers who aren't science fiction oriented. Bester does a great job in this book of making the science of this fiction apply to the world we know as opposed to some far distant generation of space dwelling frontiersmen. His conclusions and extrapolations of our future are entirely plausible.