Earth Abides by George R. Stewart
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Book Reviews of Earth Abides
Book Review: Earth Abides
Summary: 4 Stars
Good story, but a bit unbelievable. Characters reasonably developed.
Mostly clean, no gratuitous sex or violence, but some crude language.
Book Review: This book is insulting
Summary: 1 Stars
It's been awhile since I read this book, but what I remember about this book is that it insults you and basically says that if you haven't gone to college and grad school that you cannot be intelligent or sire intelligent children. The author writes this book about the one truly intellegent person left alive. He portrays the rest of the survivors, who are average non-college educated, blue collar types, as little more than simpletons. The main character and the author doesn't even try to have the survivors learn to use the left over technology to help better their situation because they are too dumb. When they reproduce only Ish sires an intellegent child. The rest of the chilren are all dumb like their parents. Bah, that's it. My hatred for this book is off my chest. I don't reccommend it.Book Review: Decent but not that good...
Summary: 2 Stars
I read some of the rave reviews by others which made me decide to order this book. Of the end of the world genre, I would say this rates near the bottom.
I guess what annoyed me the most was how far off the author was to guessing how the world would decay... I'll list a few examples and let you decide for yourselves.
1. The rate of decay of everything was grossly exagerated. Rail lines reduced to nothing but a pile of rusty chips in only 30-40 years? Entire houses rotting away and completely gone in just 10-15 years? Huge dams rotting and breaking after only 5 years? Very silly scientific assumptions.
2. The lack of doing anything worthwhile for a so called smart man. He can only teach just one child to read? Doing basically nothing to improve his life over the course of 40 years?
3. He comletely underestimated human will. The children in the tribe lacked any kind of basic intelligence. The author probably never had kids and assumed they are stupid without a formal education.
You know what, this isn't even worth my time to continue listing all the flaws. Trust me, spend your time watching one of the recent Discovery Channel episodes on the end of the world without man, it would be much more compelling then this book.
Book Review: Simple, quiet book but you'll never forget it
Summary: 5 Stars
I did a comparison of this book with Childhood's End for A-level English. Two more different sci-fi books would be difficult to come by and that was the point. Earth Abides is a quiet story, full of the thoughts of Ish and the story of the community he helps found after a plague wipes out most of humanity. There is no scientific details as none of the characters have the expertise to know them. It a human story - not a science one. Some details are given of how the impact of humanity is gradually wiped from the planet and how the survivors - well survive.
Don't expect explosive action or tales of daring-do. What you will get is an insightful book - even after all this time - what you will want to read a second and third time. Definitely one to keep - close!!
Book Review: Thought Provoking and Relevant
Summary: 5 Stars
This was by far the best book I've read in a long time, in terms of pure quality. Coming off a run of John Grisham books before it (and after, I'm reading another Grisham story now), it was amazing how different the quality of the story was, and how much more thought-provoking. Grisham tries for some philosophical stuff in his books, but didn't come close to what you find here.
The story itself was Ok...not fascinating alone, though surprising. A few things I certainly didn't expect to happen transpired. But what made it worthwhile was the "what if" factor. Imagine living through the apocalypse. Ponder the questions it raises:
- What would I do? Seek other people? Focus on survival? How to judge others, and how easily to settle in with them?
- How strong are the author's, and lead character's biases in the story? We get their perspective so strongly it's not clear sometimes what the reality is?
- What about Charlie? There's no way I'd make the same vote as the characters in the book - so I think. But if I had lived as they had for 22 years, would that change my opinion? How can I know? (answer to that last question - I can't).
Is there some deeper answer in the book about what the meaning of life really is? If we strip everything we have today away, we go back to a more primal state where the search for food, water, shelter and safety are paramount in our minds. So how much of what we experience now is a product of civilization and society, rather than our true nature? The memorable line which was something like (I don't have the book for a direct quote) "I'm happy. Things are as they are and I'm a part of them." says a lot doesn't it? Goes back to Buddhist philosophy really - focus on the present. When there's no guarantee of the next meal, when there's no shelter because a fire can burn it all down, when wild animals lurk, how much time do we have to ponder, to worry, to debate? And does that make us happier - meeting our primal drive to just...be?
I'd highly recommend this book, my "top" recommendation whatever that means. It covers ecology, philosophy, sociaology and so much more...
I waited almost two years to read it. It's a shame I waited that long.