ETERNITY: A Novel

by Mack Reynolds, Dean Ing

What was the secret of San Raphael? It held too many faces from the past. Alex Germain recognized a former lover..then a noted intellectual..and a handsome, courtly Italian. All as young, as vital, as when Alex had first met them--decades earlier. Alex demanded the truth..but he had nothing to do with the murders that began to strike San Raphael. Suddenly the little Mexican village crackled with violence. Battle had been joined. To the losers: nothing but death. To the winners: eternity

Genres: Science Fiction

254 pages, Paperback

First published October 1, 1984

About the author

Dallas McCord "Mack" Reynolds was an American science fiction writer. His pen names included Clark Collins, Mark Mallory, Guy McCord, Dallas Ross and Maxine Reynolds. Many of his stories were published in "Galaxy Magazine" and "Worlds of If Magazine". He was quite popular in the 1960s, but most of his work subsequently went out of print.

He was an active supporter of the Socialist Labor Party; his father, Verne Reynolds, was twice the SLP's Presidential candidate, in 1928 and 1932. Many of MR's stories use SLP jargon such as 'Industrial Feudalism' and most deal with economic issues in some way

Many of Reynolds' stories took place in Utopian societies, and many of which fulfilled L. L. Zamenhof's dream of Esperanto used worldwide as a universal second language. His novels predicted much that has come to pass, including pocket computers and a world-wide computer network with information available at one's fingertips.

Many of his novels were written within the context of a highly mobile society in which few people maintained a fixed residence, leading to "mobile voting" laws which allowed someone living out of the equivalent of a motor home to vote when and where they chose.

Reviews

[Till Noever · Rating 5 out of 5]

It's not literature, but it's a novel close to my heart and disposition.

The notion that there are 'hidden' emortals—people who naturally live potentially very long lives, but are not strictly immortal, because they can die—is worthy exploring at some length. It's been done before of course. How could it not. Some tales date back thousands of years. But Reynolds puts a cool contemporary paranoia spin on it. Still 'contemporary', even though the novel was completed in 1984 by Dean Ing, following Reynolds's death.

My copy of the novel is a much cherished, rather tattered, 1984 Baen First Edition. On my bookshelves it sits right next to an almost equally tattered 1974 copy of Alan Harrington's non-fiction anti-death polemic 'The Immortalist'. Two inspirational works for everybody pondering the possibility of life extended beyond our current limitations.

[Kevin Phyland · Rating 3 out of 5]

While poking around the high plains of Mexico on holiday freelance journalist Alex Germain comes across the town of San Raphael where the inhabitants, although mostly old, are secretive and vigorous, and determined to discourage Alex from staying. He has been made aware that an
enclave of very old people, possible even mortal, has been set up in the mountains of Mexico and he suspects that San Raphael is the place. As he meets the inhabitants and feels them out his own motives for seeking this place become more apparent and when the leaders of the enclave start
getting murdered and their bodies disappear it seems that an assassin squad has arrived in town to dispose of any and all mortals. Dean Ing has polished a rough draft Mack Reynolds manuscript to give us a nice little pot boiling away merrily. Not Hugo stuff but entertaining enough. :)

[James]

Upon his arrival in San Raphael, a remote Mexican village, writer Alex Germain recognizes a variety of people from his past, none of whom have aged in twenty years

[Ian · Rating 4 out of 5]

A group of secret immortals and a cabal of wealthy using troops as muscle develop their own immortality treatment, and want to eliminate the naturals. The usual, enjoyable Reynolds style.