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Bio of a Space Tyrant #1
Refugee
CALIGULA OF THE STARS...
Later he was to be accused of every crime and sexual perversion in the galaxy, but Hope Hubris began as an innocent boy. For daring to defend his sister against the violent assault of a wealthy scion, Hope and his peasant family were forced to flee Callisto, one of Jupiter's moons. Pursued by bloodthirsty scions across the airless desert, they barely escaped with their lives.
Crammed into an illegal space bubble full of refugees hoping to gain asylum on jupiter, they had not reckoned on the barbaric space-pirates - who raped, robbed and murdered with no thought but to satisfy their bestial lusts. It would take all Hope's ingenuity to survive and the atrocities he was to witness would never die in his memory. There was only one way he could ever be rid of them...
REVENGE
Later he was to be accused of every crime and sexual perversion in the galaxy, but Hope Hubris began as an innocent boy. For daring to defend his sister against the violent assault of a wealthy scion, Hope and his peasant family were forced to flee Callisto, one of Jupiter's moons. Pursued by bloodthirsty scions across the airless desert, they barely escaped with their lives.
Crammed into an illegal space bubble full of refugees hoping to gain asylum on jupiter, they had not reckoned on the barbaric space-pirates - who raped, robbed and murdered with no thought but to satisfy their bestial lusts. It would take all Hope's ingenuity to survive and the atrocities he was to witness would never die in his memory. There was only one way he could ever be rid of them...
REVENGE
333 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1983
254 people are currently reading
2015 people want to read
About the author
Piers Anthony
438 books4,204 followersThough he spent the first four years of his life in England, Piers never returned to live in his country of birth after moving to Spain and immigrated to America at age six. After graduating with a B.A. from Goddard College, he married one of his fellow students and and spent fifteen years in an assortment of professions before he began writing fiction full-time.
Piers is a self-proclaimed environmentalist and lives on a tree farm in Florida with his wife. They have two grown daughters.
Piers is a self-proclaimed environmentalist and lives on a tree farm in Florida with his wife. They have two grown daughters.
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July 30, 2019Dust jacket by Jim Burns.
Gregg Press published all 3 volumes in this series.
Bio of A Space Tyrant 1: Refuge (1985)
Bio of A Space Tyrant 2: Mercenary (1985)
Bio of A Space Tyrant 3: Politician (1985)
Gregg Press published all 3 volumes in this series.
Bio of A Space Tyrant 1: Refuge (1985)
Bio of A Space Tyrant 2: Mercenary (1985)
Bio of A Space Tyrant 3: Politician (1985)
December 14, 2014
I actually liked a lot of Piers Anthony's books when I was younger. This one, however, was one of those that made me realize just what a foul, hack writer he is.
One of Anthony's many flaws is his sexual hangups, and rather like Heinlein, sometimes he lets them all hang out in an ugly, ruinous way. The ending to Heinlein's Friday is justifiably viewed with revulsion by many fans -- I can't describe it without spoiling that novel. However, in Bio of a Space Tyrant, Anthony's ugliness comes to the fore in the first part of the book, where the main character describes being turned on as he watches his sister being gang-raped by pirates.
It's not just that bit of ugliness (which, if handled with a defter writing hand, might have made us sympathize with such a twisted, damaged character). It's the fact that Anthony uses rape the way all writers nowadays are taught not to: need us to instantly sympathize with a character? Need to stir reader emotions? Need to show us how evil the villains are? Rape a few female characters, that's what they're there for! Although of course he treats rape as a Very Bad Thing, you can tell that he's taking a lascivious delight in writing about it.
I'll admit the one-star review is probably harsh, because this book was otherwise typical Piers Anthony; decent schlock sci-fi entertainment. However, the brother-turned-on-by-his-sister's-rape is just one of those things that makes me unable to remember much else about the story.
One of Anthony's many flaws is his sexual hangups, and rather like Heinlein, sometimes he lets them all hang out in an ugly, ruinous way. The ending to Heinlein's Friday is justifiably viewed with revulsion by many fans -- I can't describe it without spoiling that novel. However, in Bio of a Space Tyrant, Anthony's ugliness comes to the fore in the first part of the book, where the main character describes being turned on as he watches his sister being gang-raped by pirates.
It's not just that bit of ugliness (which, if handled with a defter writing hand, might have made us sympathize with such a twisted, damaged character). It's the fact that Anthony uses rape the way all writers nowadays are taught not to: need us to instantly sympathize with a character? Need to stir reader emotions? Need to show us how evil the villains are? Rape a few female characters, that's what they're there for! Although of course he treats rape as a Very Bad Thing, you can tell that he's taking a lascivious delight in writing about it.
I'll admit the one-star review is probably harsh, because this book was otherwise typical Piers Anthony; decent schlock sci-fi entertainment. However, the brother-turned-on-by-his-sister's-rape is just one of those things that makes me unable to remember much else about the story.
June 24, 2010
3.5 stars. A different and much darker tale than many of Piers Anthony's other novels but still a well written, interesting read. This is the first in the "Bio of a Space tyrant" series and is really the story of the early years of the "tyrant" and how his early suffering led to his becoming the man he would become. I would recommned this book to fans of darker, grittier SF.
December 30, 2014
I read this when I was 15 and it has haunted me ever since. I remember relating it to Upton Sinclair's The Jungle where every horrible thing that could happen to this person DID happen to this person. Like I said, haunting. And this is just the first book. It is also a look into survival and what the human mind and body is capable of overcoming. I have read this three times in my life and have taken away something different every time.
October 7, 2015
A Rather Disturbing Book
2 May 2012
Well, this is the last of the Piers Anthony series that I have read, though I have recently discovered that he has added a further book to this series which I have not read (and do not plan on reading simply because I have no interest in reading any more of these stories). In a way, this series also seems to demonstrate Anthony's perception of women in that the female characters in this book seem to be incapable of resisting what he considers to be a sexually virile man. Okay, it is true that power and sex do go hand in hand, but in another sense, creating a character that, even as a refugee and a mercenary, seems to have every woman that he meets want to have sex with him is, to me, quite unrealistic.
The series is about how a man goes from being a refugee to the ruler of the Solar System, and in turn brings all of the warring powers together to make peace with each other. I found this to be quite idealistic and in another sense very unrealistic. In fact, as I came to the end of the stories, I became quite annoyed with the idealism that it espoused. While I know a lot about history, I personally cannot say whether such an event has actually occurred on our world, and even then, Anthony is trying to paint the main character as a enlightened despot, in a way that is similar to Julius Ceaser. From what I can remember, he also seemed to end in the same way as Ceaser did.
While the story is set in the future where Earth has gone out to colonise the Solar System, he is making an attempt at allegory in that each of the planets represents a country or continent that existed in the 80s (and I say this because Saturn is representative of the Soviet Union, which did not exist at the time I read these books, which was the early naughties). Once again I found that very annoying, particularly since Earth is always consigned to the trash heap, despite the fact that it is the only planet in our system that is capable of supporting life without artificial means. While the Solar System has advanced technologically to a point where people can survive on all of the planets, and in space, I simply found that his attempt at allegory pitiful in the least.
In this story Hope Hubris (the main character) is fleeing his world, which is representative of Latin America, to find a new life on Jupiter (which is representative of the United States). He travels with his family on a small spaceship which is very similar to the leaky boats that attempt to make dangerous journies in our world. It is another attempt at allegory, using a science-fiction setting to attempt to portray the danger and the difficulties that refugees face when attempting to cross to a promised land. There have been many stories like these on the news - the one sitting in my mind being the perilous journey that refugees make from Camaroon in Africa to the Canary Islands. In many cases the smugglers don't even go on the boats, they just load them up and set them adrift. They already have their money so they don't care whether the refugees live or die.
This is a pretty shocking book and I won't go into the sexual deviances that Anthony dredges up. Personally, some of the scenes are so shocking that I myself wonder why I even decided to continue to read the series, but for some reason I did. Once again, as I have mentioned, like his other storie, he paints women as little more than sex objects, and this constant idea of Hope's, wondering what it is that attracts women to him, is, to me, simply pathetic. There is some truth about the state of our world in this book, but personally, I believe that there are much better books to read in that regard than this one.
2 May 2012
Well, this is the last of the Piers Anthony series that I have read, though I have recently discovered that he has added a further book to this series which I have not read (and do not plan on reading simply because I have no interest in reading any more of these stories). In a way, this series also seems to demonstrate Anthony's perception of women in that the female characters in this book seem to be incapable of resisting what he considers to be a sexually virile man. Okay, it is true that power and sex do go hand in hand, but in another sense, creating a character that, even as a refugee and a mercenary, seems to have every woman that he meets want to have sex with him is, to me, quite unrealistic.
The series is about how a man goes from being a refugee to the ruler of the Solar System, and in turn brings all of the warring powers together to make peace with each other. I found this to be quite idealistic and in another sense very unrealistic. In fact, as I came to the end of the stories, I became quite annoyed with the idealism that it espoused. While I know a lot about history, I personally cannot say whether such an event has actually occurred on our world, and even then, Anthony is trying to paint the main character as a enlightened despot, in a way that is similar to Julius Ceaser. From what I can remember, he also seemed to end in the same way as Ceaser did.
While the story is set in the future where Earth has gone out to colonise the Solar System, he is making an attempt at allegory in that each of the planets represents a country or continent that existed in the 80s (and I say this because Saturn is representative of the Soviet Union, which did not exist at the time I read these books, which was the early naughties). Once again I found that very annoying, particularly since Earth is always consigned to the trash heap, despite the fact that it is the only planet in our system that is capable of supporting life without artificial means. While the Solar System has advanced technologically to a point where people can survive on all of the planets, and in space, I simply found that his attempt at allegory pitiful in the least.
In this story Hope Hubris (the main character) is fleeing his world, which is representative of Latin America, to find a new life on Jupiter (which is representative of the United States). He travels with his family on a small spaceship which is very similar to the leaky boats that attempt to make dangerous journies in our world. It is another attempt at allegory, using a science-fiction setting to attempt to portray the danger and the difficulties that refugees face when attempting to cross to a promised land. There have been many stories like these on the news - the one sitting in my mind being the perilous journey that refugees make from Camaroon in Africa to the Canary Islands. In many cases the smugglers don't even go on the boats, they just load them up and set them adrift. They already have their money so they don't care whether the refugees live or die.
This is a pretty shocking book and I won't go into the sexual deviances that Anthony dredges up. Personally, some of the scenes are so shocking that I myself wonder why I even decided to continue to read the series, but for some reason I did. Once again, as I have mentioned, like his other storie, he paints women as little more than sex objects, and this constant idea of Hope's, wondering what it is that attracts women to him, is, to me, simply pathetic. There is some truth about the state of our world in this book, but personally, I believe that there are much better books to read in that regard than this one.
March 19, 2012
As I had read from another reviewer, this is not the typical Piers Anthony novel. I'd classify it as Sci-Fi only because of the setting. This is much more of a deep dive into the mind and motivations of what I assume is to come in the rest of the series. As they say, the devil is in the details and Piers didn't leave out any details as he followed the psychological development of his main character. Though a bit slow at times and very graphic it's an excellent read.
February 4, 2025
Tell me if you have heard this before…a group of poor Hispanic peasants flee an oppressive, feudalistic homeland in search of freedom. They aren’t tortured or killed, just treated badly with no hope of advancing their status. They just want a better life and join in a “caravan”, i.e., a space bubble, to flee to the Jupiter Republic, where there is a welcome sign, open borders and jobs for all. Along the way, the refugees are preyed upon by ruthless pirates and criminal gangs. Rape, murder, theft, ransom all ensue as the defenseless refugees can only float slowly toward their goal. And when they reach the “promised land” everything has changed, a new election has resulted in a government moratorium on immigration. The refugees are intercepted, provided with food and fuel to go somewhere else. More criminal gangs. A very dark story and not at all like his Xanth novels. Timely. 3 Stars
January 12, 2023
The main character in Piers Anthony’s Refugee is named Hope Hubris, something that doesn’t take as long to get used to as one might think. Hope is a refugee from one of Jupiter’s moons, forced to flee with his family toward Jupiter when an impulsive act of violence against a wealthy white boy leaves his Hispanic parents no reasonable alternative. With his parents and two sisters, he boards a space bubble, a crude transport designed for utility, not comfort or speed, and his family is mistreated before it even blasts off: the space bubble is overbooked, overloaded, and under-provisioned.
The passengers learn almost immediately how vulnerable their craft is when it is boarded by space pirates who do horrible violence to the refugees. The bubble is easy pickings, as it has no real defenses, and its occupants have nowhere to turn for help. The entire novel, except for one lengthy sequence on the surface of another moon, is a series of encounters with pirate ships, each taking its share of whatever the harried refugees have to offer. It’s not pretty, and it gets progressively uglier with each episode.
I’ve read about ten Anthony novels, which is a tiny dent in his bibliography—I count thirty-nine published books just in the 1980s—and his works have always had a strange, dark tint about sex and violence. Mostly sex. Most of it is hinted at in punny titles and the freedom that made-up worlds in fantasy and science fiction afford, but this novel is many shades darker, with such cynicism about sex that I’m not sure I’ll be able to finish this six-novel series. While it does not glorify violent sexual encounters, the cynical telling is nearly too much to endure, which I suspect is the point: these refugees have to confront some of the worst evil in others and the survivalist instincts in themselves just for the tiniest hope of a better life for their children, and of course not all of them will make it.
Still, the telling seems to cross a line from horrified to fascinated. I believe quite firmly that some time before they enter their teens, children need a close-up look at a dead dog at the side of a road. They have to hold their literally morbid curiosity up against their realization of death’s finality, and come away with some kind of vague sense of the value of life. It’s a terrible thing to ponder, this need to look right at death in order to understand life, and Anthony seems to feel this way also about rape vs. sex, sex vs. love, and even bodies vs. people. Is it an artistic statement, or chilling titillation? Or is Anthony making the case that, like children unable to look away from the dead dog, we are unable to confront our darkest truths without feeling the same thrill?
I could make a legitimate case for any of these possibilities, but I’m not sure I want to. It’s practically pornographic, the way Anthony engages our emotions in dealing with this stuff, and I just don’t have the heart for it anymore. I’ve already decided I will at least begin book two, Mercenary, but I’ve hit my threshold for cynicism. A dip below this line, and I think I’m done.
Refugee is an interesting story with a mostly compelling narrative arc and characters I really care about, but a person can handle only so much revulsion while rooting for characters to rise above this revulsion. For me, it’s this much.
The passengers learn almost immediately how vulnerable their craft is when it is boarded by space pirates who do horrible violence to the refugees. The bubble is easy pickings, as it has no real defenses, and its occupants have nowhere to turn for help. The entire novel, except for one lengthy sequence on the surface of another moon, is a series of encounters with pirate ships, each taking its share of whatever the harried refugees have to offer. It’s not pretty, and it gets progressively uglier with each episode.
I’ve read about ten Anthony novels, which is a tiny dent in his bibliography—I count thirty-nine published books just in the 1980s—and his works have always had a strange, dark tint about sex and violence. Mostly sex. Most of it is hinted at in punny titles and the freedom that made-up worlds in fantasy and science fiction afford, but this novel is many shades darker, with such cynicism about sex that I’m not sure I’ll be able to finish this six-novel series. While it does not glorify violent sexual encounters, the cynical telling is nearly too much to endure, which I suspect is the point: these refugees have to confront some of the worst evil in others and the survivalist instincts in themselves just for the tiniest hope of a better life for their children, and of course not all of them will make it.
Still, the telling seems to cross a line from horrified to fascinated. I believe quite firmly that some time before they enter their teens, children need a close-up look at a dead dog at the side of a road. They have to hold their literally morbid curiosity up against their realization of death’s finality, and come away with some kind of vague sense of the value of life. It’s a terrible thing to ponder, this need to look right at death in order to understand life, and Anthony seems to feel this way also about rape vs. sex, sex vs. love, and even bodies vs. people. Is it an artistic statement, or chilling titillation? Or is Anthony making the case that, like children unable to look away from the dead dog, we are unable to confront our darkest truths without feeling the same thrill?
I could make a legitimate case for any of these possibilities, but I’m not sure I want to. It’s practically pornographic, the way Anthony engages our emotions in dealing with this stuff, and I just don’t have the heart for it anymore. I’ve already decided I will at least begin book two, Mercenary, but I’ve hit my threshold for cynicism. A dip below this line, and I think I’m done.
Refugee is an interesting story with a mostly compelling narrative arc and characters I really care about, but a person can handle only so much revulsion while rooting for characters to rise above this revulsion. For me, it’s this much.
September 16, 2013
I debated on giving this title a three or four star review. I liked it, but I didn't love it. If not for the fact that the author based this story on a real life events, I probably would have been content to leave the rating a three-star. But he did use real life events as a model for this space adventure, and that tipped the scales for me. Basing his "space opera" on the plight of the Vietnamese boat people was a bold move as a lot of really horrific things happened to the refugees fleeing their homelands.
Of course, I had to wait until the end of the novel to find out the book was inspired by the story of the Vietnamese boat people. (Yes, I read the author's note at the back of the book.) I wish this note would have been in the beginning of the book instead of the back. It would have served as an explanation for the seemingly endless parade of atrocities Hope and his family endure as they flee their home planet. It also would have been fair warning that dark and troubling events were about to unfold; that the story I was about to read had absolutely no resemblance to the author's pun-stastic Xanth fantasy novels that I had devoured in my late teens/early twenties.
Of course, I had to wait until the end of the novel to find out the book was inspired by the story of the Vietnamese boat people. (Yes, I read the author's note at the back of the book.) I wish this note would have been in the beginning of the book instead of the back. It would have served as an explanation for the seemingly endless parade of atrocities Hope and his family endure as they flee their home planet. It also would have been fair warning that dark and troubling events were about to unfold; that the story I was about to read had absolutely no resemblance to the author's pun-stastic Xanth fantasy novels that I had devoured in my late teens/early twenties.
September 1, 2012
This is the first book in Piers Anthony’s Bio of a Space Tyrant. It details Hope Hubris the eventual Tyrant of Jupiter in his younger days.
Hope and his sister are exiled from their home world and travel through the solar system on their way to Jupiter. Along the way they encounter pirates, again and again, who unleash violent horror on the travelers, again and again. The basic storyline is that people who have power over others will perpetrate horrific torture, rape, and murder upon those they control, again and again.
I was a big Anthony fan as a young boy but I had couldn’t read this one all the way through even back then. It is extremely repetitive and gratuitously violent well past the stage of making a point. I eventually began to skim the repetitive scenes and managed to get to the end of the book although I was never tempted to pick up the second volume.
Perhaps as an adult I might find something more interesting in the book but I’m skeptical. I would not recommend this book to anyone.
November 4, 2017
I'm quite disappointed in this book. I read the entire series many years ago when I was at school, and had loved it. Reading it again now I was horrified at how.... rapey it was throughout. I could even forgive that if it wasn't for the fact that 1. In the first chapter our main character gets turned on by the public gang rape of his sister, 2. He carries on and on an on about how beautiful elder his sister is to the point of tedium, 3. Towards the end he has sex with someone that is just.. ewww, and there does not seem to be any real need to include that scene, it does not change or contribute to the storyline at all.
I'm hoping that the rest of the series gets better because I don't want to continue being disappointed.
I'm hoping that the rest of the series gets better because I don't want to continue being disappointed.
July 27, 2021
Whoever thought rape would be so boring! The point of the story is to set up how our protagonist (with the improbable, but justified name of Hope Hubris) became the Tyrant of Jupiter, so he had to explain how him and his family got shifted into a refugee band and... They get attacked by pirates. A lot.
By the end, I do care about the characters, and I'm somewhat interested to find out what happens in book two, but I think the author could have completely skipped this and just mentioned it in five pages. It's VERY repetitive and you get bored if the atrocities that happen to him. So in the end, like the writing, hate the story.
By the end, I do care about the characters, and I'm somewhat interested to find out what happens in book two, but I think the author could have completely skipped this and just mentioned it in five pages. It's VERY repetitive and you get bored if the atrocities that happen to him. So in the end, like the writing, hate the story.
March 6, 2012
The series gets off to a bit of a rough start as the reader is beaten over the head with the message thatthe main character has had a rough life/much trauma. Yes everyone DIES!!!!!!
The series does greatly improve after book one but I am concerned that many readers will bail after this volume.
The series does greatly improve after book one but I am concerned that many readers will bail after this volume.
September 19, 2017
I was cleaning out some old boxes and found a copy of this book that I had apparently never returned to my High School library. I remembered reading the first 2 books in this series in 10-11th grade, and could only remember bits and pieces, but remembered loving it back then. Somehow my memory had conveniently forgotten all the rape. By the middle of the book after the 28th instance of rape, I thought "how could I have read this when I was 16 and not remember this was a major part of this book? and how could I have turned out to be such a cool not totally disturbed and creepy dude". I mean I'm cringing a little just writing the word "rape' this many times in one paragraph. I would not recommend anyone as young as I was read this. In any case now as I read it, all the parts I did remember were nostalgic and wonderful, but I can't help feeling the author went a bit over the top to the point of this story just being unbelievable. I don't expect I'll try another book from this series anytime soon.
May 30, 2022
I read this 30something years ago in my teens. I couldn't recall much except that I liked it so when I found the first four of five books in a used store I figured I would try and finish the series. After rereading this one, I'm not sure why I remember liking it so much. I did give it 3 stars but that was rounding up. Mainly because I'm curious to see what happens to the main character in his future. The actual book is so depressing that it made my head hurt. The numerous misfortunes and abuses suffered by the protagonist's family and friends is spiritually draining but I realize it is all setting the stage and motivations for his future life. Even so, it was a struggle to get through. Couple that with mind numbing explanations of space travel throughout and you've got a difficult read. Hopefully the rest get better.
June 9, 2013
Not only is this an offensive novel, but the writing, the dialogue, the language is stupid and unbelievable. I had read plenty of criticisms of this novel for its rape scenes and the murders and the like, and I thought I could deal with that -- if it were still a good story. But in the first chapter, the protagonist -- Hope Hubris, a 15 year old Hispanic male -- is sexually turned on by seeing his virginal older sister raped by space pirates, up close and personal. It is a bit shocking, let me tell you. But that's not why I'm refusing to finish this book. It's the damn writing. Let me write a few examples of Hope's diary entries (on which the book is based) and you tell me if it sounds like a 15 year old Hispanic male!
"Faith, eighteen years old, resented this; she claimed her social life was inhibited by the presence of a skinny fifteen-year-old little sibling. The vernacular term she was wont to employ was less kind, and I think not completely fair, and does not become her, so I shall not render it here."
She was wont to employ? I shall not render it here? Seriously? Do you know ANY teen who talks like this, particularly a teen of the future who's first language is not English? It literally makes no sense and it detracts mightily from the novel.
Again -- "Faith was not really intelligent, as I define the concept, though she did well enough in scholastics. It was said that a single look at her was enough to raise her grade before any given class commenced, and that may not have been entirely in jest."
Really? Piers Anthony -- what kind of dumb shit are you to write in this manner??? No one talks like this; they haven't for decades and probably centuries. Are we to believe that people of the future -- Spanish speakers -- will be using centuries' old antiquated language in their space ventures??? It boggles the mind.
I can't finish this book. I can't stomach unrealistic dialogue in novels. Roger Zelazny does this too and it's why I can't or won't finish his books either. What is it with some of these sci fi hacks? Did they not take enough English classes in school? Who taught them to write this way? My favorite sci fi writer is Philip K Dick, with Frederik Pohl running behind at second, and while some of their notions from the 1950s are a bit outdated, their dialogue never seems to be. Why can't people write normally, with normal voices? It was bad enough that I was going to have to endure numerous rape and murder scenes to work my way through this book, but the language won't let me do it. Now I know why it was less than a dollar at the used bookstore. Not recommended.
"Faith, eighteen years old, resented this; she claimed her social life was inhibited by the presence of a skinny fifteen-year-old little sibling. The vernacular term she was wont to employ was less kind, and I think not completely fair, and does not become her, so I shall not render it here."
She was wont to employ? I shall not render it here? Seriously? Do you know ANY teen who talks like this, particularly a teen of the future who's first language is not English? It literally makes no sense and it detracts mightily from the novel.
Again -- "Faith was not really intelligent, as I define the concept, though she did well enough in scholastics. It was said that a single look at her was enough to raise her grade before any given class commenced, and that may not have been entirely in jest."
Really? Piers Anthony -- what kind of dumb shit are you to write in this manner??? No one talks like this; they haven't for decades and probably centuries. Are we to believe that people of the future -- Spanish speakers -- will be using centuries' old antiquated language in their space ventures??? It boggles the mind.
I can't finish this book. I can't stomach unrealistic dialogue in novels. Roger Zelazny does this too and it's why I can't or won't finish his books either. What is it with some of these sci fi hacks? Did they not take enough English classes in school? Who taught them to write this way? My favorite sci fi writer is Philip K Dick, with Frederik Pohl running behind at second, and while some of their notions from the 1950s are a bit outdated, their dialogue never seems to be. Why can't people write normally, with normal voices? It was bad enough that I was going to have to endure numerous rape and murder scenes to work my way through this book, but the language won't let me do it. Now I know why it was less than a dollar at the used bookstore. Not recommended.
July 16, 2012
Many who have read this have had to make the obligatory "This is not your Xanthianish Piers Anthony type of novel" comment. You should know that by now, so I won't bore you with that. With that out of the way, I will say that this is not your Xanthianish Piers Anthony type of novel. Certainly a bit darker, but in its darkness is it's weakness.
I have read a number of other "dark" sci-fi stories -- Donaldson's "Gap" series among the best -- and "Refugee" compares somewhat ill-favorably. Now, I am fully aware that "Refugee" is but the first of this series, and I will say that it is certainly good enough to continue reading onward, but I will say that it was somewhat predictable and (dare I say) repetitive. Imagine the worst possible thing to happen at the worst possible moment. You may get it wrong the first couple of times, but Mr. Anthony will graciously show you the way by the time you're mid-way through, and you'll be able to safely navigate the waters of this novel with a healthy dose of: "Oh yeah, and here's where (insert appropriate bad person reference here) will (insert appropriately bad thing for aforementioned bad person to do here) and (concoct entirely unrealistic outcome here)."
You are supposed to be able to suspend your disbelief in novels, yes. But in order to do that, there must be some semblance of "reality" for you to lull your disbelief into suspension. This novel was leading me to that promised land, but it never got me there. The final straw for me came at the end, when it is revealed "when" the pages you've just read where composed. That was just a bit too much, and wholly inconsistent with the tone and tenor of the work itself. It was the catalyst that kept my disbelief epoxied in the fore, as it were.
All of that said, it was a good read, actually. And given that it only cost me a couple of bucks on my Kindle, and was done in three sittings, I have already picked up the second book and added it to my queue.
I'm looking forward to seeing the transformation of a "Refugee" to a Space Tyrant. I just hope I can disbelieve my way through it...
...don't we all?
I have read a number of other "dark" sci-fi stories -- Donaldson's "Gap" series among the best -- and "Refugee" compares somewhat ill-favorably. Now, I am fully aware that "Refugee" is but the first of this series, and I will say that it is certainly good enough to continue reading onward, but I will say that it was somewhat predictable and (dare I say) repetitive. Imagine the worst possible thing to happen at the worst possible moment. You may get it wrong the first couple of times, but Mr. Anthony will graciously show you the way by the time you're mid-way through, and you'll be able to safely navigate the waters of this novel with a healthy dose of: "Oh yeah, and here's where (insert appropriate bad person reference here) will (insert appropriately bad thing for aforementioned bad person to do here) and (concoct entirely unrealistic outcome here)."
You are supposed to be able to suspend your disbelief in novels, yes. But in order to do that, there must be some semblance of "reality" for you to lull your disbelief into suspension. This novel was leading me to that promised land, but it never got me there. The final straw for me came at the end, when it is revealed "when" the pages you've just read where composed. That was just a bit too much, and wholly inconsistent with the tone and tenor of the work itself. It was the catalyst that kept my disbelief epoxied in the fore, as it were.
All of that said, it was a good read, actually. And given that it only cost me a couple of bucks on my Kindle, and was done in three sittings, I have already picked up the second book and added it to my queue.
I'm looking forward to seeing the transformation of a "Refugee" to a Space Tyrant. I just hope I can disbelieve my way through it...
...don't we all?
June 3, 2021
This book should have been called "Rape: The Novel". I am never offended by anything I read in fiction (the people aren't real, after all, and an author's differing opinion from mine isn't going to make me write my congressman), but you have to at least have a plot besides:
Our journey started because of rape.
Then we went here and everyone was raped.
After that we went over there and everyone was raped.
Then we went back there and everyone was raped.
We finally met some nice people but guess what? They turned out to be rapists and everyone was raped.
Throw in some incest and pedophilia for good measure and you begin to see why a lot of people are put off by dirty old Piers Anthony, and why I haven't read him myself since some Xanth
novels in my teens. I can only imagine that Anthony typed this one out with one hand while drooling all over his typewriter.
Nasty Piers Anthony bonus points for the scene where a little girl that has been groomed and repeatedly raped by a pedophile calmly explains that her rapist is a genuinely good person and that she kind of likes it and wants to be with him.
That is really all the review I can give of this book because that is literally all that happens in it.
Our journey started because of rape.
Then we went here and everyone was raped.
After that we went over there and everyone was raped.
Then we went back there and everyone was raped.
We finally met some nice people but guess what? They turned out to be rapists and everyone was raped.
Throw in some incest and pedophilia for good measure and you begin to see why a lot of people are put off by dirty old Piers Anthony, and why I haven't read him myself since some Xanth
novels in my teens. I can only imagine that Anthony typed this one out with one hand while drooling all over his typewriter.
Nasty Piers Anthony bonus points for the scene where a little girl that has been groomed and repeatedly raped by a pedophile calmly explains that her rapist is a genuinely good person and that she kind of likes it and wants to be with him.
That is really all the review I can give of this book because that is literally all that happens in it.
June 6, 2012
I am trying to add books to my list that are on my bookshelves and that I've read years ago. This is one of them.
What I remember was that it held my interest through the first two books and then became a little repetative in the third.
I first picked this up because I found the idea intriguing as well as loving the character's conflicting name; "Hope Hubris." Piers Anthony also took the political, geographical and resource divisions on Earth and expanded them throughout the universe.
Hope and his family are refugees of Hispanic descent and this book is written as if it were his autobiography. He and his family are on their way to Callisto, one of Jupiter's moons. They are attacked by space pirates and many in the party are either robbed, raped or killed, causing (if I remember correctly) Hubris to join the Space Navy and seek revenge.
My notes say it was an engaging read (as I am a former Navy guy myself). I'm going to mark it as a "re-read" here in the future.
What I remember was that it held my interest through the first two books and then became a little repetative in the third.
I first picked this up because I found the idea intriguing as well as loving the character's conflicting name; "Hope Hubris." Piers Anthony also took the political, geographical and resource divisions on Earth and expanded them throughout the universe.
Hope and his family are refugees of Hispanic descent and this book is written as if it were his autobiography. He and his family are on their way to Callisto, one of Jupiter's moons. They are attacked by space pirates and many in the party are either robbed, raped or killed, causing (if I remember correctly) Hubris to join the Space Navy and seek revenge.
My notes say it was an engaging read (as I am a former Navy guy myself). I'm going to mark it as a "re-read" here in the future.
April 19, 2016
I'm addicted to this series. Yes, there is a good deal of controversy surrounding some of the imagery and subject matter. There is rape. In fact, the book starts with rape. Rape, in fact, becomes a key component in the series itself, although saying so makes it sound much worse than it really is. These books are violent and shocking, although most people would not expect that of such an old series, especially one from the science fiction genre.
Yet, somehow, I still find myself obsessed. Admittedly, I almost abandoned it, as I too was put off by the brutality in the first few chapters. And yet...it drew me in, little by little, until I tore through it and began the next one. I won't delve into the story and won't touch upon any more of the controversy. I'll simply say that if you can make it through your initial shock you'll find a highly entertaining, brutally honest series that has quickly become one of my favorites.
Yet, somehow, I still find myself obsessed. Admittedly, I almost abandoned it, as I too was put off by the brutality in the first few chapters. And yet...it drew me in, little by little, until I tore through it and began the next one. I won't delve into the story and won't touch upon any more of the controversy. I'll simply say that if you can make it through your initial shock you'll find a highly entertaining, brutally honest series that has quickly become one of my favorites.
May 2, 2017
Having read almost every other thing written by Piers Anthony, I plowed into this. It proved quite spicy and inappropriate, and I recall reading it with a mixture of horror and hunger. Fingers cut off! Sexual perversion! By far the raciest, most violent and thrilling book I'd read to that point. Around this time, though, I also got into Anne McCaffrey's Dragon Drums series — complete with dragon lusts and dragon-linked matings and all kinds of crazy. And, soon I'd get deep into Clan of the Cave Bear and beyond — those in the know will know what bom-chicka-bom-bom that means. Let's just say this lifelong sci-fi fan found many diverting reasons to love the genre in these tender years. #MapMyReadingLife
October 7, 2012
I started collecting the books in this series about 20 years ago and yesterday finally found book 1 in a second hand bookshop and so, finally, have started to read them.
This is act one of a classic space opera. Our (anti?)hero is a boy. He loses everything and is tested repeatedly. He suffers horribly as does pretty much everyone he encounters. The brutal rape of his sister at the very start sets the scene for the horrors that unfold.
It's interesting to read this book, written as it was in the late 70s and published on the early 80s. The plight of the refugees, while set in hostile space, may as well be the plight of modern day refugees that risk life and more to come to counties like my own.
I'm looking forward to getting home to start the second book.
This is act one of a classic space opera. Our (anti?)hero is a boy. He loses everything and is tested repeatedly. He suffers horribly as does pretty much everyone he encounters. The brutal rape of his sister at the very start sets the scene for the horrors that unfold.
It's interesting to read this book, written as it was in the late 70s and published on the early 80s. The plight of the refugees, while set in hostile space, may as well be the plight of modern day refugees that risk life and more to come to counties like my own.
I'm looking forward to getting home to start the second book.
May 9, 2017
Very disturbing, but captivating book. Don't read it for fun, for it is not fun, but it is worth reading.
November 21, 2020
Not for the squeamish, rape, violence and lots of death. Also true love, family and hope. A mixture that exposes the vagaries of humanity. Looking forward to volume 2
July 2, 2021
A bit dark but a good delve into the plight of refugees
July 9, 2021
An excellent read for someone with a young open mind.
January 20, 2025
This is a difficult book, yet sufficiently compelling that I want to read the second book. This is in no way a funny or even optimistic book. With chapter names like "Betrayal," "Massacre" and "Hell", you know right away that we're not in Xanth anymore, Toto.
I had figured out that the book is really an allegory for refugees in general, but the Author's note at the story's end confirmed it. Anthony wrote the note in 1999, when he got a bit more cynical, and could see why America kicks out most refugees. This book was written in conjunction with On a Pale Horse and Dragon on a Pedestal.
Anthony began his career writing science fiction, although his various fantasy series is much more popular with the reading public. This book keeps in the best sci-fi tradition of using a future metaphor to discuss a current problem, such as refugees. It also has some very imaginative future tech, such as gravity shields and bubbles (a kind of space ship.)
Anthony also wrote for soft porn mags for much of his career (imagine my surprise finding one such magazine with an Anthony story in it in my then-boyfriend's bedroom.) For all I know, he still does it. It does pay. And I've got a feeling that Anthony always was a bit of a perv. Pretty much every human female gets raped in this book. Our Protagonist winds up getting a hard-on while watching his eldest sister get raped by space pirates. But, he has the decency to be disgusted with himself.
If you can't handle multiple murders and tons of rape in a book, including rape of children, do not pick this up. Despite what I've already written, the rapes were not gone into detail, or anything pornographic. Since this has been described as "Caligula in space", I thought of Malcolm McDowell as our future Space Tyrant. Yes, he's supposed to be Latino, but Malcolm could pull it off. He's a good enough actor.
Our Protagonist writes a few times that he's included a chart or rough sketch of something, but I didn't see anything like that in my edition. I don't think the charts would've added anything, really. I could've done without some of the heavy-handed dialogue, which seemed a little too insightful for a bunch of kids no older than sixteen.
Anthony has what I feel is an undeserved reputation for being a misogynist. This book has one of the strongest female characters he's ever written -- Our Protagonist's younger sister. He is also constantly surprised when women wind up being smarter or craftier than he realized. And, finally, he even says point blank, "Women are stronger than men."
I had figured out that the book is really an allegory for refugees in general, but the Author's note at the story's end confirmed it. Anthony wrote the note in 1999, when he got a bit more cynical, and could see why America kicks out most refugees. This book was written in conjunction with On a Pale Horse and Dragon on a Pedestal.
Anthony began his career writing science fiction, although his various fantasy series is much more popular with the reading public. This book keeps in the best sci-fi tradition of using a future metaphor to discuss a current problem, such as refugees. It also has some very imaginative future tech, such as gravity shields and bubbles (a kind of space ship.)
Anthony also wrote for soft porn mags for much of his career (imagine my surprise finding one such magazine with an Anthony story in it in my then-boyfriend's bedroom.) For all I know, he still does it. It does pay. And I've got a feeling that Anthony always was a bit of a perv. Pretty much every human female gets raped in this book. Our Protagonist winds up getting a hard-on while watching his eldest sister get raped by space pirates. But, he has the decency to be disgusted with himself.
If you can't handle multiple murders and tons of rape in a book, including rape of children, do not pick this up. Despite what I've already written, the rapes were not gone into detail, or anything pornographic. Since this has been described as "Caligula in space", I thought of Malcolm McDowell as our future Space Tyrant. Yes, he's supposed to be Latino, but Malcolm could pull it off. He's a good enough actor.
Our Protagonist writes a few times that he's included a chart or rough sketch of something, but I didn't see anything like that in my edition. I don't think the charts would've added anything, really. I could've done without some of the heavy-handed dialogue, which seemed a little too insightful for a bunch of kids no older than sixteen.
Anthony has what I feel is an undeserved reputation for being a misogynist. This book has one of the strongest female characters he's ever written -- Our Protagonist's younger sister. He is also constantly surprised when women wind up being smarter or craftier than he realized. And, finally, he even says point blank, "Women are stronger than men."
January 29, 2023
What an awful slog. The book starts out w/a gang rape of the narrator's sister and goes down from there. The misery is so relentless that I suspect Piers Anthony meant this book as one long insult against the reader. I enjoyed reading Anthony's Incarnations of Immortality books over the last couple of years but all his worst instincts as a moral voice only hinted at in those books comes out in full blast in this book. Pedophilia, murder of children and babies, more gang rapes (Anthony seems to think that rape has something to do w/the attractive qualities of the female victims - a view that was odd even in 1983), cannibalism, incest - this book has it all and it's presented in a matter-of-fact tone w/out surcease of any sort of humanistic feeling. (Plus Anthony paints the pedophilia sequence benignly, either out blithe ignorance of it's horrific aspects or, even worse, actual favor on his part.) Hard for me to believe there were five books written in this series, let alone one. It will definitely be a long time before I pick up another of his books. I give it one star only because giving it no stars is seen as a neutral score, it doesn't even deserve the one. I read it all the way through because of my own neurotic complete-ism compulsion. I really got to do something about that.
July 12, 2023
I like the premise of this book; a war lord back tracking his life to explain the source of the rumors that surround him.
Didn't actually enjoy reading it that much.
Just like nearly every other review on here I have to harp on about the rape element.
This is the rapiest book I have ever read!
Hardly a page goes by when some one is either raped, worried about getting raped, worrying they will rape someone else, reminiscing about their first rape or musing about rape in general.
"As Bob prepared his breakfast it suddenly struck him that eating cornflakes is a bit like being raped". Ok that didn't actually happen - but not far off.
I didn't think the rape was gratuitous of unsettling, it just got - sorry to say this - boring.
Also after a while it gets hard to feel sorry for the refugees, they are without a doubt the most hapless spacefarers in the history of sci-fi.
Littrtaly a crew of monkeys would have done better than these guys.
The only effective defence plan they can come up with kills half the people on board - yet they stick with it.
Characters are pretty intriguing, I would like to stick with the series but I doubt I will as this book was a bit too long and far to rapey.
Reading the reviews on the second book it sounds like the series continues in the same vein.
Didn't actually enjoy reading it that much.
Just like nearly every other review on here I have to harp on about the rape element.
This is the rapiest book I have ever read!
Hardly a page goes by when some one is either raped, worried about getting raped, worrying they will rape someone else, reminiscing about their first rape or musing about rape in general.
"As Bob prepared his breakfast it suddenly struck him that eating cornflakes is a bit like being raped". Ok that didn't actually happen - but not far off.
I didn't think the rape was gratuitous of unsettling, it just got - sorry to say this - boring.
Also after a while it gets hard to feel sorry for the refugees, they are without a doubt the most hapless spacefarers in the history of sci-fi.
Littrtaly a crew of monkeys would have done better than these guys.
The only effective defence plan they can come up with kills half the people on board - yet they stick with it.
Characters are pretty intriguing, I would like to stick with the series but I doubt I will as this book was a bit too long and far to rapey.
Reading the reviews on the second book it sounds like the series continues in the same vein.
January 8, 2024
This is hard to put into words. The one thing that keeps coming to me is that Anthony writes similarly to Stephen King. There are long lengthy descriptions, some grotesque scenes, and children in sexual situations (like IT). This book has many trigger warnings like death, grief, gore, and rape. Almost every chapter something horrendous happens. As I was getting sick of it, I was also thinking about the importance of these events to Hope’s character development. This series is a documentation of his life, and this horrible beginning was the fuel for his future. In reality, most of these horrible scenes didn’t go too far in detail and didn’t seem glorified. Now, there are definitely times the book feels dated, but it really was just the showing of how Hope comes to be. He faces so many horrible things and has to grow up so quickly. He also has to deal with becoming a man and deciding what kind of man he wants to be when he is surrounded by men doing horrible acts. That created some very fascinating thinking and interesting topic. Overall, I’m excited to continue the series and see what happens to Hope after that traumatic beginning.
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