Earthlight

Have 1963 Ballantine F698

In this early novel by Clarke, Bertram Sadler, a CIA operative, is sent to the Moon to investigate a suspected spy and prevent an interplanetary war. It's a short novel at 158 pages and straightforward plot, with imaginative descriptions of life on the moon, some of which still seem visionary, and some ludicrously dated. Punch card computers! Photographic film! Typewriters! It was published in 1955, well before the first unmanned probes explored the moon, let alone manned landings. Still enjoyable on the whole, and Clarke's optimism for the human future shines. Not what I'd recommend as an introduction for him. I'd recommend A Fall of Moondust, Childhood's End, The City and the Stars, 2001: A Space Odyssey (film or novel) or a collection of his short stories over this one. ( )

http://speculiction.blogspot.com/2012/10/review-of-earthlight-by-arthur-c-clarke... ( )

A decent read, though it does show its age in some ways. Clarke is very good in imagining in realistic fashion what life on a moon colony would be like and his intellectual curiosity and interest in science imbues the setting of an observatory on the moon with real tangibility. The plot unfolds in a stately fashion and the main character - a secret agent posing as an accountant sent to the observatory to uncover a spy is much more in the Smiley or even Father Brown mould than the James Bond one that is ubiquitous in contemporary science fiction. A 50s Oxford Don atmosphere hangs heavy over the whole thing and as is often the case there is nary a female character to be found (except as a minor presence off-page). ( )

An interesting story, but somehow it doesn't catch me. The science - the practical aspects of living on the Moon - are interesting, if slightly retro. Punch-card computers (run by the only women in the place, under a male supervisor, at that), manually-developed photographic plates...it gets amusing at times. Then the thrust of the story is the search for a spy, by a man not used to the task - so there's an awful lot of second-guessing and eyeing everyone and every act or comment with suspicion. The climactic battle is fascinating, for an odd reason - the description reminded me of a dozen battles in the Lensmen series, where a fixed fortress is struck so by beam-rays that the ground around it turns molten. But here, the description is not made by either side in the fighting, but by a man outside and at least mildly exposed to the effects...that's rather neat. The aftermath strikes me as a trifle ingenuous - or at least, overly hopeful. I don't see why "never again... would the human race be divided against itself." And the last sentence has a major problem, which may again be a product of when Clarke was writing - nowadays, we don't see natural resources as "inexhaustible" so much. I also have a problem with the science of the reveal - I'm no optics expert, but I don't see why an optical telescope, designed to draw in light from a wide expanse of sky and focus it down to the aperture, should send out a focused beam if a light is shined into the aperture. Maybe it does, at least for some types of telescopes - I know there are several different mirror arrangements that work, and I don't _think_ Clarke would have left such a gaping hole in the story if it totally didn't work. But it bothers me. So my overall conclusion is that I'm glad I read it and I don't think I'll reread. ( )