Imperial Earth (original 1976; edition 1976)

Clarke might as well have written an essay called, "What I Think Earth Will Be Like In the Year 2276". There's hardly any plot; the characters are wooden. Even when somebody dies, there's no drama.

I picked this up for a quick escapist read, but I could barely finish it. Every once in a while, I thought to myself, "I'm not nerd enough for this book."
( )

This isn't one of Clarke's more strongly plotted novels, and at over thirty-five years old, well, it's inevitably already quite dated in lots of details. But Clarke's imaginative vision of humanity's future, his descriptions of the wonders of Titan (one of Saturn's moons) and Earth both, makes for good reading nevertheless, and actually I think Duncan Makenzie is one of his most strongly written and memorable characters. Makenzie, who had never seen Earth, but was born there, is one of a line of clones that virtually rules the key hydrogen industry of Titan. He journeys to 23rd century Earth to continue his line--just in time to be a guest speaker at the Washington celebration for America's quincentennial (The book was published in 1975, just before America's bicentennial). Surprisingly, through Duncan's perspective what comes through most strongly is not the wonders of Titan, but of Earth--from a Percheron horse to a butterfly. I like how it's casually revealed half-way through the book that MaKenzie is black. A better way of revealing what a non-issue race is in Clarke's vision of the future than any lengthy sermon on the bad old days. Not what I'd recommend for an introduction to Clarke, and it's not as memorable to me as The City and the Stars, Childhood's End or Deep Range, but if you like the author this shouldn't disappoint. ( )

Arthur C Clarke at his best. Written in the run up to the American bicentenary celebrations in 1976, this novel promulgates a 500th anniversary of the Union in 2276, and the main character, Duncan Makenzie fro Titan, one of the moons of Saturn being invited to address the whole of Earth.
This context gives Clarke the opportunity to give his own vision of the technological advances that might be evident in the latter half of the twenty third century. To this end he gives an alarmingly accurate description of what could easily be a smart-phone from 2011!
Clarke's imagination always runs riot but, as this novel ably demonstrates, he had more than adequate literary skills to do his apocalypses justice.
I first read this novel while I was still at school: I loved it then, and found it even more rewarding now! ( )

Although this is a novel, it begins with what was origninally a short story entitled "A Shriek In The Night", one of my favorite short stories. The memory of that 4 page story has stuck with me for over 30 years. ( )

A weird and wonderful story. There's a _lot_ of scientific thought in here, but it mostly doesn't obscure the interactions between the well-developed characters. I was surprised when the full story of Karl's intentions came out - it seemed rather minor after the buildup of possible conspiracies and secrets - but the ideas are interesting. So is the secret drive. Oh, and there was one moment of realizations - Clarke goes on for a couple paragraphs about the wonders of the comsole, through which a person can read anything and everything ever written or produced - or could, if he wouldn't die of old age before making a serious dent in the volume of records available through the comsole. It was only after I finished that bit, and was feeling puzzled at his insistence, that I realized this was written in 1975, before the Internet existed. :). The end is a neat twist - it both surprised me and didn't, it had been nicely and subtly foreshadowed. I'd be very interested to read a story about the next generation out on Titan. Good story. Not a favorite, but I'm glad I read it and may well do so again. ( )