I, The Machine

by Paul W. Fairman

One Against the Ultimate

Imagine a perfect world. A world in which no one has to work, no one has to struggle, no one is deprived of anything he needs or wants. A world in which every man can indulge his most trivial whim at the push of a button. Or a world in which every man's whim is anticipated for him - so that even the button becomes unnecessary...

A Dream World?

Perhaps. But even in a perfect world, there will always be men who dream of other worlds, better things. And in the wonderful world in which the Machine made all decisions, and protected men from all dangers, one man - Lee Penway - dreamed. He dreamed of barbaric worlds, exotic adventures. He was only one man - but slowly, his dreams began to change the world of the Machine...

Pub No: 73-735 5

Genres: Science Fiction

205 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1968

About the author

Paul Warren Fairman (1909-1977) was an editor and writer in a variety of genres under his own name and under pseudonyms.

In 1952, he was the founding editor of If, but only edited four issues. In 1955, he became the editor of Amazing Stories and Fantastic. He held that dual position until 1958. His science fiction short stories "Deadly City" and "The Cosmic Frame" were made into motion pictures.

Wrote the "Man from S.T.U.D." series of espionage spoofs under the pseudonym of F.W. Paul.

He also wrote under the pseudonym Ivar Jorgensen

Reviews

[Craig · Rating 2 out of 5]

Well, this is an odd and curious book! (...spoilers...spoilers...) A dome has been built around America, and a computer rules the populace. It's a Utopian society, but after many hundreds of years the computer goes insane. The Machine is explained on page 47: "The Machine reaches forty-seven two point nine five three miles into the Earth at its greatest depth its nuclear core is a circle with a diameter of one hundred four point two miles at the diameter fourteen billion seven hundred eighteen million two hundred fifty-four circuit breakers alone are needed to keep it functioning safely one billion seven hundred eleven million eight hundred three thousand four hundred twenty-two feet of electro-hydrate channeling are required to carry power..." and after that it gets hard to follow. The Machine becomes infatuated with Penway because of his unique brain waves. It sends squads of killer robots out at random to cause entertaining mayhem and randomly rip some people apart. Penway goes underground where the Aliens (apparently European refugees) live and leads a rebellion. Is the instability of The Machine caused by the thought patterns of the wife of the man who perfected The Machine? Does this ghost in the machine have a crush on Penway or vice versa? Well, that's not the main question, because the author keeps emphasizing that the characters are naked. Everybody's naked most of the time, and it seems to be important that you understand that even when they've got clothes sprayed on, all of the people are naked underneath those clothes, women and men both. Nudity for everybody, that's the motto. I could go on, but... I've read several books by Fairman that are pretty good... this one's something different. If you decide to read it, I suggest wearing extra clothes.

[Shannon Schonegevel · Rating 2 out of 5]

This book was a strange read. The text was confusing, the storyline felt weak, and there was an abundance of unnecessary nudity throughout. Weird.

[Michael Hambleton]

this was a delightful dystopian/sci fi masterpiece (in my opinion), one if my all time favorite reads, i find it grossly underrated and flat out unheard of amongst friends who typically enjoy this style of writing. perhaps if they had ran more than one print more people could/would enjoy the styling of mr Paul W. Fairman, reads like Isaac Asimov or Frank Herbert writing through the eyes of George Orwell, Yevgeny Zamyatin and/or Aldeous Huxley, quite enjoyable.

[John Peel · Rating 1 out of 5]

After a great disaster, the remnants of humanity depend on The Machine to provide them with everything. But one man discovers that the Machine is mad - so what is going to happen to the human race now? An appallingly bad book, with a story that makes little sense and is populated by characters that are completely unlikable and unbelievable. One definitely to avoid.

[Stephen Rowland · Rating 1 out of 5]

I could have written a better science fiction novel with my ass.

[CraftyCat · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book started out with a lot of promise, but became trite towards the end. Lee Penway lives in a perfect world, controlled by robots to such an extent that the main aim of most humans is to simply enjoy themselves. They do not work or toil, and everything they need is provided for them by the machines. Predictably, for anyone who has read this type of genre, Lee finds himself listless and unsatisfied for reasons he cannot understand or articulate. Soon after, he begins receiving visions from the machine, telling him that the machine loves him, cackling madly like a crazy person. This leads him far underground to the bowels of the vast machine, where he meets a group of humans (who call themselves “aliens”) who reject Lee’s society and live in fear of being hunted. I found it interesting to see the way in which humanity had become complacent and lived differently, and the author’s disregard for his character’s lives kept me on the edge of my seat--there’s a lot of violence in this one. But the ending seemed too predictable. Of course the machine must be destroyed, and there must be two humans left to continue the race, yadda yadda. I guess at this point I’ve just read “that story” too many times not to wish that maybe they had found a third option, or at least not ended with “the machine falls, fade to black.” I suppose I did enjoy most of the book, though, but sadly I will not be able to re-read it anytime soon, because my copy was in very poor shape and disintegrated as I read my way through it. Ah, well.

[Ethan · Rating 1 out of 5]

[Bill Meehan · Rating 3 out of 5]

A good sci-fi world turns dystopian as the giant machine/computer supplying all the basic needs of the people begins to go mad.
An easy read, classic sci-fi, which stands up to the test of time.