While
perusing the bookstore this weekend, I noticed that Orbit has released a new
edition of David Brin’s The Postman. Since I have been meaning to read the book for years, I figured this was
a good excuse to pick it up.
While I
enjoyed the book, it fell far short of the classic for which I was hoping. The first half of the book is a fun, tense
story of survival, discovery, and the dawning of hope for new future, but the
second half bogs down in a mish-mash of different themes and ideas that don’t completely
seem to fit together. I got the
impression that the author didn’t fully know where the book was going, and
perhaps forced it to its conclusion instead of letting it fully develop.
Still, I
read the book in less than three days, so it certainly pulled me along and kept
me entertained. In the rather thin
sub-genre of post-apocalyptic works, it probably stands as one of the better
ones, but in the larger world of science-fiction and fantasy, it certainly
doesn’t crack the top 100.
Is this the one that the film with Kevin Costner in, is based on then?
ReplyDeleteThat's the one. I saw it years and years ago. I think the plot of the book and the plot of the movie diverge about halfway through.
ReplyDeleteThere are better books by David Brin out there. My favorite is Startide Rising, which deservedly won both a Hugo and Nebula. It's part of the "Uplift Saga" which starts with Sundiver, but Startide Rising was written first and stands on its own pretty well.
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