"This was a golden age, a time of high adventure, rich living, and hard dying… but nobody thought so. This was a future of fortune and theft, pillage and rapine, culture and vice… but nobody admitted it. This was an age of extremes, a fascinating century of freaks… but nobody loved it."
Above is the opening paragraph of Alfred Bester's 1956 sci-fi novel, The Stars My Destination. It's one of my favorite books of all time. Neil Gaiman does the introduction, and he talks about how a lot of sci-fi becomes dated after awhile. This one hasn't become dated outside of a few, small nitpicks. Written in 1956 about a future that has yet to arrive, and yet the above quote still represents our time, right now.
I'm re-reading it again, for about the 10th time, and still wondering at how brilliant it is. And fun. Larger than life characters, and full of the things you learned in high school English like symbolism, foreshadowing, allusion, etc. (it is partially a sci-fi re-telling of The Count of Monte Cristo). It is the journey of a hugely selfish and terrible person, and their awakening, transformation and redemption as a hero. A revolutionary. A savior. You want kids to read? Give 'em this.
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