A Choice of Gods

by Clifford D. Simak

A handful of humans and a multitude of robots create a new society on a mysteriously abandoned Earth in this breathtaking science fiction classic from one of the genre’s acknowledged masters

What if you woke up one morning on Earth . . . and no one else was there? That is the reality that greeted a handful of humans, including Jason Whitney, his wife Martha, and the remnants of a tribe of Native Americans in the year 2135. Their inexplicable abandonment had unexpected the eventual development of mental telepathy and other extrasensory powers, inner peace, and best of all, near-immortality. Now, five thousand years later, most of the remaining humans live a tranquil, pastoral life, leaving technological and religious exploration to the masses of robot servants who no longer have humans to serve. But the unexpected reappearance of Jason’s brother, who had teleported to the stars many years before, threatens to change everything yet again—for John Whitney is the bearer of startling information about where Earth’s population went and why—and the most disturbing news of They may finally be coming home again.
 
Nominated for the Hugo Award when it first appeared in print more than forty years ago, Clifford D. Simak’s brilliant and thought-provoking A Choice of Gods has lost nothing of its power to astonish and intrigue. A masterwork of speculative fiction, intelligent and ingenious, it is classic Simak, standing tall among the very best science fiction that has ever been written.

 

Genres: Science Fiction, Fiction, Speculative Fiction, Science Fiction Fantasy, Robots, Fantasy, Religion

196 pages, Kindle Edition

First published January 1, 1972

About the author

"He was honored by fans with three Hugo awards and by colleagues with one Nebula award and was named the third Grand Master by the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America (SFWA) in 1977." (Wikipedia)

See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clifford...

Reviews

[mark monday · Rating 5 out of 5]

It has been funny reading the irritated, disgusted, sometimes outraged reactions towards this anti-science & technology novel - reviews written mainly by my fellow science fiction nerds. I guess I can understand the sour reactions, as Simak is pretty much saying that technology is for dumb-asses who don't want to grow as human beings. That must really rankle anyone who loves technology LOL! I guess for me it would be like reading a book that is all about how reading books is for simpletons.

But really, c'mon! Science Fiction is not just about science and tech. Don't get so pressed about this, my nerd brothers and sisters. The genre is often seen as being all about the sagas, those amazing and usually multi-part adventures. Sometimes those sagas focus on hard science, and all the science-fixated can delight in that. But the genre is also speculative. Indeed, it was once referred to as "Speculative Fiction". Sometimes the speculation taking place is one that is all about a particular invention or piece of technology taken that next step, and how that would impact mankind; sometimes it is about a Big Dumb Object mysteriously appearing and ready for our study. Many classic scifi novels have such things as their foundation; time again for the science and technology lovers to rejoice. But speculative novels can speculate on many things. As any fan of Ursula K. Le Guin or Isaac Asimov or Samuel R. Delany understands, speculative fiction can also be about sociology or psychology or sexuality - all the aspects of culture and personality. That's my kind of scifi. A Choice of Gods is one such novel.

Synopsis: The vast majority of humanity on Earth have vanished, leaving small groups behind. Thousands of years later, these groups have evolved in their own unique ways. One group develops psychic powers allowing them telepathy and teleportation to the stars beyond. Another group bonds to the land, developing less easily described powers that connect them to nature on an intimate level. A third group does little evolving and much fleeing in ignorance at strange things - but one individual from this clan has evolved in his own unique way. Also left on earth: robots! And they evolve as well: some into perfect servants, how boring (but useful? sorry), others carrying the torch of religion that humanity has left behind, others working to get to the next level of purpose and intelligence. All of these groups receive troubling news: (1) something coldly omniscient has been discovered at the center of the universe, and (2) the vanished majority have not only been found, they have found the path back to Earth - much to all of these small groups' chagrin.

That's a lot! Simak has an incredibly fertile imagination, layering idea upon idea, hinting at one and then the other, eventually unfurling each for all to contemplate. The effect of so many ideas could be dizzying, and the multiplicity of perspectives could confuse things, but fortunately Simak is also blessed with a very easy-going, almost folksy style. A comforting style, and a cozy one. Reading Simak is like snuggling up by a fire and lazily free-associating ideas, or like relaxing in a park on a sunny day, letting all sorts of thoughts flit and flutter in and out of your mind.

This is my fourth novel by the author, following City and Way Station and Cosmic Engineers. It was written after those three as well. I loved seeing many of his themes and many of his favorite ideas from all three of those books come to a certain sort of fruition in this book. In particular:

- Simak's commitment to portraying human disgust at the "alien". His realization that not only is this an understandable response, it is also a block to true empathy. Just as it is with humans dealing with other humans who look different. One of my favorite bits: a character being comforted by the tentacle formed by an alien - an alien described as looking like a bucket of worms. That was an incredibly endearing moment. The book makes it clear that "a person" can be so many different things.

- A rejection of technology as a path or means for man to get to a higher place. Sorry science nerds, but I'm on Simak's team with this idea. 100%! Simak recognizes the barriers that technology creates in our striving for more ease, more convenience, less heavy lifting and less delay. He sees evolution as occurring on not just an intellectual level, but on an emotional level as well. Evolution as an increase in understanding - an understanding of not simply science and technology, but an understanding of life and all of its differences and all of its commonalities and all of its potentials. An understanding of who we are and how we can break free of physical limitations. An emotional evolving, a psychic evolution. Of course, I'm a big hypocrite because I would have an aneurysm if I permanently lost the internet or spreadsheets or, I suppose, tv. But still: technology is often a barrier to empathy. True, it has helped us so much in getting to understand different people and viewpoints and cultures that we would otherwise never be able to engage with. I certainly get that and so that's the love in my love-hate relationship with technology. But our over-reliance on it means that our thoughtfulness is reduced (hello Twitter). Our tendency to immediately react in a toxic sort of group-think is increased (hello reddit and every single political website). Our ability to connect slowly, personally, and therefore more deeply is diminished as we rely on pithy snark and easy labels and images to define who we are (hello Facebook, Instagram, and so many dating sites). My God, our humor replaced by... memes! Ok now I'm being intensely old man-ish, so I'll stop. I don't hate you, social media, or you, technology in general, I promise. I just wish your easy shortcuts didn't so frequently replace true meaning or understanding. Some things shouldn't be so easy.

- The question of God: in a universe full of so many moving parts and yet so little potential for life... what that God would look like, how they would act, what their purpose and goals could be. Obviously the title makes it clear that this is the central concept behind the story. It is a concept and theme that is treated, at times, quite broadly: "a choice of gods" could mean a choice of what an individual - be they human, robot, or alien - decides is their own purpose for being. That purpose could be religion. It could be creating a higher intelligence. It could be caretaking a newly fecund Earth. There are many choices. But Simak also specifically addresses the nature of a more singular God. I loved his vision. It may not have been a comforting portrait of a bearded, elderly gent looking out for us all, but there was still much about his idea of a Higher Power that comforted - if only because it felt logical and fresh while still being challenging, even disturbing. A cold sort of comfort, but it made a lot of sense to me. Just like this entire book.

[Велислав Върбанов · Rating 5 out of 5]

„Денят е подходящ, каза си тя, светъл, мек и топъл. Един от последните истински прекрасни есенни дни, които човек трябва да скъта в сърцето си.“


Много хубава и мъдра фантастика! В „Избор на богове“ Саймък обръща внимание на темите за смисъла на вярата, какво представлява душата, мястото на роботите в обществото... Историята също така съдържа прекрасни природни описания, както и е изпълнена с любов към книгите!

В бъдещето почти цялото население на Земята мистериозно изчезва, като на нея остават едва няколкостотин човека... Животът на планетата се променя в течение на времето, а пък хората вече нямат предишният тип технологии, но по необясним начин животът им е станал много по-дълъг, а и са развили парапсихични способности. Част от роботите пък са станали вярващи и си направили манастир... След хиляди години на Земята се завръща междузвездният пътешественик Джон, който разказва какво се е случило с изчезналите хора, а и други любопитни истории...





„Скитането по звездите не е нещо необичайно, разбира се, макар че в началото мислехме точно така. Въобразявахме си, че сме направили велико откритие, когато първият от нас започна да развива парапсихични способности. Но не се оказа чак толкова гениално откритие. Беше просто нещо, за което ние, твърде заети като технологична раса, не си бяхме направили труда да помислим. А дори и някой да бе мислил или отворил дума за това, щяха да го вземат на присмех.“


„Но за неговите хора и за хората, които се намираха в голямата къща над реките в онази съдбовна нощ, вярата вече се бе изродила, превръщайки се в една цивилизована условност, на която те робуваха равнодушно. Разбира се, имало е време, когато вярата е била изпълнена със смисъл. През вековете след бляскавия й възход тя е била оставена да закрее и да се превърне в сянка на старата си сила и власт. Станала е жертва на лошото управление на човека, на неговата смазваща концепция за собствеността и ползата. Въплътила се във величествени храмове, изпълнени повече с помпозност и блясък, вместо да бъде съхранена в човешкото сърце и душа.“


„Тя седна и се заслуша в гласовете на книгите — или по-скоро в гласовете на хората, написали книгите, странни, мъдри гласове от далечното минало, които говореха от дълбините на времето, в шепота на безгласния далечен хор, наситен със значение и смисъл. Никога не съм допускала подобно нещо, помисли си тя. Дърветата имаха език, на който разговаряха, и цветята — също. Както и малките хора от горите, които често и говореха. Реките и бързите поточета и пееха и я омайваха по начин, непонятен за човешкия разум. Но това беше така, защото те бяха живи — да, дори и реките, и ручейчетата бликаха от живот и тя ги възприемаше като живи същества. Възможно ли е и книгите да са живи?“


„Когато се опитам да открия другите възможни причини обаче, не се сещам за нито една. Прекалено сме ограничени, разбира се, от нашия опит и история, за да вникнем в смисъла на другите форми на живот в галактиката.“

[Denis · Rating 4 out of 5]

Aside from a rather good tale called "The Visitor" published in 1980, I'd only read a few early works from Simak - 1940's and early sixties. "A Choice of Gods" was published in 1972 and was nominated for a Hugo - it lost to Asimov's "The Gods Themselves" ("Damnation!" Simak must have thought when he saw that he was in competition with the 'Good Doctor' of all writers, and with a book with a similar title!) What it also has in common with Asimov's work is, in part, the 'is a self-aware robot a sentient being?' issue, one that Asimov often contemplated with many of his robot stories.

Naturally, I love Asimov's robot stories but I have to say that Simak's "A Choice of Gods" is a worthy companion. Well beyond what I thought Simak was capable of. It is more complex and sophisticated than his earlier efforts, which tend to be charming, tightly written and well told - and dare I say, simple in tone, mostly rural set stories. "A Choice of Gods" does have some of that, but is laced with a tightly written wide-scope tale with properly developed characters and that true sense of wonder atmosphere that only a golden age master can conjure. I felt it was, by far, his greatest achievement - that said, I still have much to discover from his vast cannon of work.

[Bradley · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book from 1972 is an interesting outing from Simak. He's always been one to write about the impact on humanity, or specifically its individuals' reactions to huge ideas. Often it's about loneliness or existential dread or the longing to make sense of the vast weirdness of the universe, but it's almost always about competing understandings.

That's a pretty awesome stance for anything that calls itself SF.

It gets even better when we find a book that exemplifies speculative fiction while reading an anti-technology book with religious robots, trying to figure out where the missing humans went, and the nature of god, itself.

That's just the premise. Later on, we get a lot of interesting plot twists and new explorations of ideas.

As for the experience itself, it's a lot of great dialogue and twists, each of which deepens the greater SFnal discussion.

It may not be my choice for a Hugo nominee back then, but it was certainly worth the read.

[Craig · Rating 4 out of 5]

A Choice of Gods is one of Simak's best big-cosmic-mystery/sense-of-wonder novels. It has the theme of AI robots struggling with the concept of religion and self, with introspection similar to Special Deliverance, A Heritage of Stars, Project Pope, and, of course, Jenkins from City. The story is set by the overnight disappearance of most of the human race, save for a small tribe of American Indians (the book is from 1972, remember), a group of family and friends gathered for a party, and few others. The robots are left to their own devices, and you know where idle hands lead. Then, quite unexpectedly, word comes from far in the stars that humanity has been found and is planning to come back. Simak examines the vices of high-tech life versus a friendly, simple, rural atmosphere, something quite rare for the sf of the day, and ties it all together with a rather hopeful conclusion. It's a fast yet thought-provoking read; Simak near his best. Putnam released the novel in 1972, and it was nominated for a Hugo Award as the best of the year. (It lost to the curiously similarly titled The Gods Themselves by Isaac Asimov; 1972 was a big year for Gods.) (What do I know... had I been a voter that year I would have cast my ballot for Robert Silverberg's The Book of Skulls.) The book appeared with a very striking cover by Michael Hinge, an artist from New Zealand who did a bunch of great science fiction covers in the early '70s and then seemed to disappear from the field as swiftly as he arrived. It has a rolling-skating robot rendered with comic-book like lines filled with colors that look like neon pastels. It captures Simak's prose with a delightful slant.

[Ira (SF Words of Wonder) · Rating 4 out of 5]

Check out my full, spoiler free, video review HERE. Very interesting and thought-provoking premise. In the future 8 billion people vanish from the earth with only a few hundred people left behind, and many robots. The book covers thousands of years as these events get explained. The plot was good but it seems like this novel is really about exploring some deep themes like; philosophy, religion, aging, the idea of ownership, what is a soul, AI/robots and how they fit in. I loved the first half of the book but the second half wasn’t quite as good IMO, mostly due to the difficulty in wrapping up such grand ideas. Overall, another solid novel from Simak.

[Jim · Rating 3 out of 5]

Not one of the better stories by Wisconsin native Clifford D. Simak (1904-1988), this one from 1972 is really not much of a story and is driven by too much dialog. But the situation that Simak sets up is intriguing. In 2135, most of the humans disappear from the Earth, a planet which had become increasingly polluted and overcrowded with 8 billion people (aren't we getting close to that now?). All that remains of humanity on Earth are a few handfuls of people including a group of the Ojibwe tribe in Minnesota. Interestingly, the Native Americans return to the ways of their ancestors, but, of course, keep the horse (which had been brought with the Europeans). The whites return to a simple 19th C. agrarian life, being unable to sustain an industrial way of life. There are also numbers of robots roaming about, often serving people, but for the most part having nothing much to do ( the "Indians" want nothing to do with them!). Of course, some of the people have to wonder what happened to the majority of the human race. Is there an advanced intelligence somewhere that caused the mass disappearance--and, if so, why? I give it only *** as a lot more could have been done with this story!

[Jim · Rating 5 out of 5]

I have liked the novels of Clifford D. Simak ever since I read Way Station and City. A Choice of Gods is in many ways similar to the former book, being set in a rural area with a threat of invasion -- not by aliens -- but by the descendants of the technologically-leaning Earthlings who left Earth thousands of years ago.

Remaining on Earth are a few humans who have never left for other star systems, including a few American Indians and a highly developed society of robots. The Indians avoid the robots, but some of the humans interact extensively with them.

This is one of those books which grow on you as you read it.

RE-READ NOTES: Five years later, I think the same.

[Oleksandr Zholud · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is a strange mix of SF ideas and 70s attitudes: one day almost all mankind vanishes from Earth, leaving only Native Americans plus a few whites. The once who remained are blessed (?) with long lives, absence of diseases and even paranormal abilities. I read it as a part of monthly reading for December 2021 at Hugo & Nebula Awards: Best Novels group. The book was nominated for Hugo in 1973 but lost to The Gods Themselves.

So, the story starts with a kind of rupture and remaining people adjusting to their new lives: Indians moving to their old ways, being one with nature, a few whites, who are meek and unaggressive are mostly interested in gathering old books and passively observing and recording changes. There is also a third group, sentient robots, who after losing their masters but not their built-in desire to serve, rebuilt monasteries or started other projects. There are too few people to restore a tech civilization (and they don’t breed and multiply, for they saw where it led), but it appears they don’t need to – instead they get paranormal abilities from mind-reading to walking between worlds (actually FTL and safe travel across galaxy). Thousands of years pass, and close to a galaxy core a strange god-like hyperintellect is observed as well as the vanished people are discovered…

The book is a critique of our technological civilization and its effect on environment and people not in line with what that civilization. There are definitely some hippie vibes as well as interesting religious questions, like what if the god exist but doesn’t care or even notice us.

While the setting is interesting, the pacing in uneven and some story paths are underdeveloped, like visiting aliens or powers to communicate with plants. Overall, interesting but not wow.

[spikeINflorida · Rating 2 out of 5]

The "People" and their high-tech are very eeevil. Earth's indigenous natives have been raped and decimated. A mysterious UBER Intelligence who presides at The University of Central Universe (UCU) is forced to step in and, uh, remove said eeevil People and resettle them to unexplainable triplet exoplanets. Well, except for the nature and library loving types...who are BFFs with the natives...and mysteriously live longer and look better than Robert Redford and Jane Fonda. Oh... And there's first contact with a...can of worms. Really? Written in 1972 and nominated for a Hugo, this ludicrous-speed story has me wondering if Cliff hooked up with Lucy in the Sky With Diamonds. Meh

[Nate · Rating 3 out of 5]

A foundational text in robot theology!

When most of the humans on earth suddenly disappear, what do their robot servants do? Create a religion of course.
I’m always slightly baffled when a science fiction author, even one as philosophical as Simak, writes a book with a strong anti technological theme. If we just get rid of all the tech we’ll almost certainly develop telepathy and the ability to teleport around the universe at a whim. So enjoy your social media time because it’s costing you the ability to get out of the rat race through teleportation.

[Jamie · Rating 5 out of 5]

"A technological civilization is never satisfied. It is based on profit and progress, its own brand of progress. It must expand or die."

Scathing rebuke of the devastating effects of human civilization on the Earth and all that it comes within its dominion, told in the rich yet economic style of one of the great golden age grand masters. And yet, Simak imparts a message of hope, that under the right circumstances mankind might evolve to live in harmony with his surroundings.

[Emily · Rating 4 out of 5]

Most of the people of Earth have disappeared leaving only a rich, white family, a tribe of Native Americans, and another small group of people who are not really introduced. And, the robots. Of course, the robots who were only ever made to serve humans. The remaining whites, the Whitneys, have developed parapsychic abilities and now travel among the stars without the aid of any machinery. The Natives have returned to the old way of nomadic communion with the Earth. Of the robots, some serve the Whitneys, some are trying to figure out Christianity, and the rest are engaged in the Project. All of the humans now live about 8,000 years and never get sick.
The book is mostly philosophical discussion of the how and why of the universe. Why are we still here? Where's everyone else? How come we no longer suffer from illness? Where did our new abilities come from and what's the next evolutionary step? What are the robots building? Is a robot who worships God a blasphemy? Sometimes this can seem heavy, but it is so steeped in narrative, that it's mostly digestible (although, I spent a lot of time with the book open in my hands, staring off into space, considering just these questions).
The conflict comes when the People who disappeared are located and are threatening to come back. What does that mean for those still on Earth?
All I know is, I'd like to have 8,000 years to live with an abandoned library at my disposal and a fleet of robots to serve my basic needs. (Though, I'm quite sure, this is not the impression the author meant to leave with the reader...)

[Cookie M. · Rating 3 out of 5]

I have to say this story defeated me. I thought I knew what was going on until just near the end when the whole thing blew up in my face. Too metaphysical for me, I guess.

[Doug Armstrong · Rating 1 out of 5]

Boring, with absolutely no payoff, and mildly insulting actually. It boils down to basically the dual cliches of technophobia and the old classic trope "Native Americans lived in harmony with the earth until the evil white man ruined everything." I kept reading hoping for something beyond those two themes, but that's all there is. The first one is galling enough as he doesn't present one unique idea as to why technology is a bad thing, it's just the same shit you've heard a billion times before, and the Native American thing seems just thrown in there because it's an easy and lazy way of emphasizing the "evils" of technology. The Native Americans never do anything, they exist purely so that the main character can reference them in his inane thoughts about technology.

The characters are also incredibly weak and allow the author to not have to explain anything scientific because none of them give a shit how anything actually works, they're all content just sittin' on the porch whittlin' away the days of their 5000 year life spans. That works perfectly for the author because the stuff he wants the reader to accept is ridiculous; telepathy, teleportation (simply by thinking about teleporting), healing-- these are all the psychic powers that apparently humans can develop if they'd just forget about technology and science and live in harmony with the earth. I mean it's not like that's how humans spent every day of their lives up until the last couple centuries, it's totally plausible that turning your back on tech would result in humans evolving to live 5000 years and have ultra powerful psychic abilities, just like the Amish.

Anyway, the more I think about this book, the more I hate it. I should have bailed in the first 30 pages when it was so excruciatingly boring that I couldn't get through 2 or 3 sentences without my mind wandering, but I thought "he's just getting the boring setup out of the way before all the interesting stuff starts happening". About 140 pages later, one single fucking thing had happened, barely anything was explained, and what was explained was retarded.

[Jerry · Rating 3 out of 5]

Reading Simak is often like reading an alien author; his writing is strangely different from everything that has gone before. There are no villains; his planet Earth is very much an idyllic forest, at least the part that the main characters know, and completely prosaic… except that every time you get caught up in the normalness of it, he mentions the music trees gearing up for a concert.

Except for that, this is very much just another entry in the post-apocalyptic socialist paradise genre; that is, the entire human race has left in an unknown way, leaving behind a great plenty that those who remain can live off of practically forever (in this case, robots who farm for them), while at the same time philosophizing about how great it is that they can no longer create such a surplus for others—and even getting in the way of providing for others.

A Choice of Gods has very similar ideas to City, and in fact may be in the same world or an alternate reality related to it, right down to robots building a special, unknown project.

Having recently read Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, I got a sense of Douglass’s disappointment from the narrator, except that the narrator hasn’t yet learned that living under slavery rather than freedom means that even the slaveowner’s life is held back.

The narration is all over the place; the narrator rages against property, and considers all of the earth his property. As a caretaker for the rest of humanity, or at least the rest of humanity he cares about, but they don’t actually care about the earth any more. He speaks not just for himself as owner of the earth, but for the American Indians as if they were his charges who need his protection. He recognizes his arrogance in one breath, and then goes back to speaking as if he owned the earth in the next.

He thinks he knows everything, at one point telling someone that he can’t teach psychic powers, not because he doesn’t know how but because it’s impossible. It can’t be taught. Except that as reader we know that he knows practically nothing about psychic powers. He doesn’t know where they come from or how they’re used. But he’s adamant that they can only exist in the absence of technology.

He is a very annoying narrator.

That said, there are very neat ideas here, just as there were in City. The basic starting point is that almost all of humanity has just disappeared; a few people remain and are super-long-lived, but as their technology fades they develop incredibly powerful psychic powers. The narrator thinks that the two are related, although there’s a strong indication that the two events—the disappearance of most of humanity and the development of super-long life and psychic powers—are both caused by the same force.

Everything important in the book is seen obliquely, from the super psychic powers to the robot search for God. We don’t actually see any of this happening, only that it has and is happening while the main characters go about their very prolonged daily lives.

And occasionally listen to music trees.

[Ram · Rating 3 out of 5]

Earth in 2135 has over 8 billion people (wishful thinking). One day, all but a few are gone, apparently left to find other worlds to live in (as earth is overpopulated).
Left behind with the few people are many robots.

The humans don't have the knowledge to maintain and develop the existing technology and actually don't have a need either. The robots are still there to serve them and there are plenty of them to spare.
In addition, the humans left behind seem to age very slowly.

The native Americans (or Indians as referred to in the book) return to their traditional tribal ways and the rest of the humans live easy pastoral lives.

The robots do weird things like building weird structures. These activities seem to be some kind of religious practice….or something.

The story is told from the point of view of the a person who is chronicling the events of the world and his grandson who continues his work. People live long and peaceful lives.

At some stage, a human returns to earth from wandering the universe and brings news of something intelligent or similar that exists in the center of the universe.
In addition, the people of earth are planning on returning and there is a threat that they will destroy the harmony of the small remaining population.

I enjoyed reading the book but I admit that I did not really understand it. It seems to have an opinion about technology and has some references to religion and social structure in it too but I am not sure what the actual point is in reference to these subjects.

I assume that I can read about it more, but I am not interested. My general assumption is that the ideas are probably outdated and if not, I can find more modern thinkers who can express them in a more accessible way for the modern reader. Therefore, the interest in these ideas is mostly philosophical/historical.

This is the first book I have read of this well acclaimed author and I have yet to decide if I want to read more.

[Deb Omnivorous Reader · Rating 4 out of 5]

Another masterful story from one of the greats (in my opinion) of classic science fiction, probably more properly classified today as 'speculative fiction'.

In A Choice Of Gods, Simak starts the reader off with a future world scenario where,when Earths population was more than eight billion, suddenly one day, most of them were gone. Not dead, no wars or catastrophes, just most people vanished. Slowly, over time it became obvious that in addition to the reduced population a major change had occurred in that disease had virtually vanished and lifespans were increased - incredibly increased.

Technology slowly degraded since there was not the know-how to keep it going, quite a few people of first nations background (this book was written long ago enough that they are called American Indians - don't be offended, it is from 1973 and I don't think the phrase 'first nations'even existed) went back to a lifestyle similar to that their ancestors had lived. But the remaining people lived a comfortable life in the large family home due to the fact that the robots had not vanished, and more kept flocking to their home to serve the remaining humans.

The point of view shifts from the first person to keep a chronicle, starting 50 years after the disappearance to his grandson, keeping it still, sporadically,thousands of years later -lifespans increased to biblical proportions- when most of the family had developed the spontaneous ability to travel to the stars, so Earth is practically empty.

But then, one star traveler returns, with worrying news about what lies in the center of the universe, where all the people might have gone, and what might happen of they return.

I have a long seated addiction to the old, classic science fiction novels, outdated as they are ( only 8 billion in 2130?how cute...). The speculation side of it, what the future might hold, how things could happen, what responses would be, these were so fresh, new and exciting. Sci-fi today, which I still adore, is often exciting, frequently technically creative with top notch science and logistically well thought out. In other words the solid literary background and amazingly open minded "What if" attitude that the early sci-fi writers has evolved into something very good - but I still love the old anything goes style of the early adventurers in the genera. Antiquated (almost none of them for saw computers as they have come to be) misogynistic and racist as some of them are (let's not even start on that), but still exploring a world of literature and speculation that was brand new, boundless and exciting.

Thoroughly loving Simak's writing in general as I do, I think this is one of the better ones, posing questions, as it does, about what social evolution really is, and how society would change under unusual circumstances.

[Dan · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.5 stars

This was my fourth Simak novel, the first was Way Station. I read Way Station for a sci-fi class in college and it was my professor's favorite sci-fi novel.

A Choice of Gods has similar themes of loneliness and distant mysterious aliens like his other books. Mankind contemplates its future in the universe is the other common thread.

The vibe of hopelessness and uncertainty was well done here. So thought provoking but there was very little drama or vivid imagery relative to Simak's other books. This made for a more mundane read.

[Alex Sarll]

I'd already said that Pratchett & Baxter's Long Earth series was starting to remind me of Simak's pastoral, elegiac futures - and then I read this Simak. In which humans step from world to world by simple mental effort, a vast inhuman intelligence lurks far out there and disturbs by mere proximity, and old home Earth is almost wholly depopulated. There are even robot monks - though less playful ones here, instead a natural meeting between humanity's most abject pursuit and beings who are servants in their very fabric, apologetic for their pride each time they dare to think they might possibly be saved, or even that they might merit damnation. But while Pratchett & Baxter likewise show divergences in the separated human strands, they don't share this book's outright revulsion at technological society - pronounced even by Simak's standards, and something he really has to stack the deck to get away with. Normally it's an attitude that winds me right up (this is the second consecutive review in which I've had cause to reference the godawful conclusion of Battlestar Galactica), yet somehow I forgive it in Simak, perhaps just because he paints his restful, empty worlds so temptingly.

Also, I'm not sure I've ever read such an economical, appalling description of an alien as here: "a can of worms".

Like all Simak books of like vintage, my 1973 copy is of course graced with an utterly irrelevant cover illustration of a spaceship.

[Tomislav · Rating 3 out of 5]

A Choice of Gods was nominated for Hugo in 1973, but did not win. In the early 80s, I was reading through the backlog of Clifford Simak novels.

[Justine · Rating 3 out of 5]

Three stars only because this isn’t totally my style of book.

An existential and philosophical rumination on the nature of humanity, intelligence, and technology. 5000 years ago most of the human race instantly disappeared, leaving a handful of humans, including a native tribe, and all the robots to inherit the Earth. Separated from technological infrastructure, and in the case of the humans, granted incredible longevity and health, each of these groups are left to develop in ways previously unimagined while the Earth returns to its natural state.

Most of the book explores the social and parapsychological changes that have emerged in the absence of technology. It was an interesting read right after Sisterhood of Dune, with the fanatical anti-technological Butlarians and the various schools all attempting to evolve humanity to a higher state in the absence of “thinking machines.”

It is well written and interesting, but more idea than story or character driven. If that’s your jam, you will love it!

The ability seems to be inherent. Man probably had it for a long time before he began to use it. For it to develop time was needed and the longer life gave us time. Perhaps it would have developed even without the longer life if we'd not been so concerned, so fouled up, with our technology. Somewhere we may have taken the wrong turning, accepted the wrong values and permitted our concern with technology to mask our real and valid purpose. The concern with technology may have kept us from knowing what we had. These abilities of ours could not struggle up into our consciousness through the thick layers of machines and cost estimates and all the rest of it.

…
”They are [frightening] to me,” said John. “Not perhaps because of any single facet of their culture, for some of these facets can be very pleasant, but because of a sense of the irresistible arrogance implicit in it. Not the power so much, although the power is there, but the naked arrogance of a species that sees everything as property to be manipulated and used.”

[Alex Bright · Rating 3 out of 5]

3 grumpy, frustrated stars

RTC

[Dalibor Dado Ivanovic · Rating 5 out of 5]

Nakon par godina sam ponovo procitao ovu knjigu i opet uzivao citajuci. Ovo je stvarno sto bih volio dozivjet ili barem da mi djeca dozive, ovakvu Zemlju, predivnu, gdje je sve prijateljsko, drvece stvara glazbu, roboti su prekrasni i pomazu kome god treba, neki se bave i filozofijom, neki zele postati ljudi...no prekrasno.
Robot Jezekilj koji proucava Vjeru zeleci postati Covjekom mi je odlican lik (kao i svi roboti), Indijanci su odlicni, toliko su ostali vjerni Zemlji i svemu sto ona daje, Vecernja Zvijezda mi je prekrasan lik sa svojim razgovorima sa Prirodom i kada upozna Tudjinca...
Ma bla bla, meni je ova knjiga, eto medju najljepsima koje sam citao, mogu komotno reci da mi je ispred Grada.
Tko zeli mirno citati, uzivati u prirodi i svemu sto ova divna knjiga pruza, topla preporuka

[Patrick Scheele · Rating 1 out of 5]

I can't write a coherent review, so here's a summary instead:

"Humans bad, Indians good.
Technology evil, robots fulfilling your every need good.
As long as you call your magic telepathy and teleportation, it's still SF! Really!
As so often happens in life, it turns out all the strange events are caused by a distant, scary deity. And all your problems are solved by that same deity. Also, deities are bad, so let's just call it a "principle" (or whatever word was used in the english text)."

[Joachim Boaz · Rating 3 out of 5]

Full review: https://sciencefictionruminations.com...

"Nominated for the 1972 Hugo Award for Best Novel

Clifford D. Simak’s A Choice of Gods (1971) is a flawed but intriguing novel. Simak’s renowned for his original anti-technology pastoral visions. His science fiction (replete with unusual aliens) is more likely to intersect our future world in the environs of the rural farm, the depopulated/gutted earth covered [...]"

[Ralph McEwen · Rating 4 out of 5]

The Rapture without the Apocalypse. Sometimes being left behind ain't so bad. Somebody call a do over and really ment it.

[Iliyan · Rating 5 out of 5]

What is humanity? Who is human and who is allowed to be human?

I actually enjoyed reading this book, having in mind that it’s more on the technophobic side, with me being on the completely opposite end of the spectrum.

But I didn’t perceive it as just that. The story is about something grander. It’s about how the modern human has completely removed themselves from the environment they’re living in, purging and destroying everything in their path only for the sake of progress with no end point. It’s about the fact that while machines and technology can add comfort to your life, you’re left blind to so much more that’s out there in the universe.

In this book, once the majority of humans are purged off Earth and only a handful are left, once society crumbles down and and they’re back to basics, they discover that they have abilities they’ve never expected to possess, them being “parapsychic” (ability to feel, read and talk to surrounding life) and ability to travel in space only by thinking about the destination, something that the humans dispersed on other planets never achieved due to their highly technological societies.

The robots that were humanity’s trusted servants are also left on Earth with a small group of people and they encounter a paradox of their own - if they’re made to serve, and there’s no one left they can serve, what is the purpose to their life? Can they turn to religion? Is this blasphemy as they’re pretending to be human?

The story in itself is nothing special - a bit mundane dare I say. The beauty of it appears only when you read behind the borderline magical and paranormal scenes. While it may be perceived as an anti technology work, it includes a main character who, although society has fallen and he’s the only one, among a few others, left on Earth, is still bookkeeping and has gone out of their way to collect all written works of art and document the events happening so as future societies not to develop myths based on their misunderstanding. This fact on its own disintegrates the whole rhetoric of the author being anti-technological as he rather clearly stipulates that knowledge is important, however it’s how you wield it that makes the difference.

There is also a very cleverly written Native American tribe that’s only trying to preserve their way of life that they’ve gone back to after the “Disappearance”. It’s quite interesting to ponder the fact that historically the Natjve American tribes were forcibly indoctrinated by the western mindset “for their own good”, however given the chance, they will revert to their customs and traditions. They never gave nor were they asked of their consent.

All of this, along with the characters with parapsychic abilities, the robots that are only now finding their way of life, and the humans from other planets finally finding and going back to Earth and trying to reclaim it, creates an astonishing dynamic which is actually not too far behind us - slavery, forced assimilation, end stage capitalism.

This is one of those stories that gets told in your head only after you have finished the book. Highly recommend.

[Jan vanTilburg · Rating 4 out of 5]

A quest for the soul? Dismissed by humankind. But robots and aliens are searching for it. Nature or Technology? Intriguing premises. The Measure of Man (revisited). And maybe so much more… Simak does it again. See also Time and Again from him. Very good!

Also a search for mankind’s place in the universe. The realization that it’s impossible for a human brain to grasp even a sliver of what is out there.

And a constant reminder of how humankind abused their planet. Ripping it apart in their constant greed for more. Never satisfied with what they have. ”the old profit motive which had been the obsession and the mainstay of the ancient human race. You didn’t do a thing unless there was some material return.”

about humankind’s reckless behaviour, p.75: “the naked arrogance of a species that sees everything as property to be manipulated and used.”

A gentle story. Hardly any people left on Earth. They all vanished. All at once. The ones that were left behind live a pastoral live. One with nature. Content and happy.

They did not know why the people disappeared. It poses many questions. Extinction is normally a gradual process, but p.50: “An instantaneous extinction postulates the machination of an intelligence rather than a natural process.”
In the meantime Earth abides, flourishes. The devastating effects of mankind gone. I liked that part very much.

And now they threatened to be back. And all devastation would start again. For mankind never learns. The human plague…

The millions of robots that once served the people are now roaming free around the earth. Some of them are searching for the deeper meaning of life. A meaning people are not interested in: a soul. The robots search for truth, but question if truth and faith can co- exist, p.52: “the willingness and ability to believe in the face of a lack of evidence.”

When a travelling alien visits Earth, also searching for a soul, it seems very coincidental…

People could now live very long. 5000 years and more. Also mankind can travel to the stars without technology? It seems technology only held them back and thus they were not attuned what their mind and bodies could do. (p.24)
They developed abilities. Galactic telepathy. Teleporting: travel. Parapsychic powers. And in due course found intelligence far away. From the core of the universe. They caught a “whiff” of it. It made them apprehensive.

The wandering alien travellers that visited Earth reminded me of Roadside Picnic from the Strugatsky brothers.

What does that all mean. What will become of it? They are not alone…

A search for mankind’s place in the universe. A realization what is important in life. Living with nature. Being part of it instead of exploiting it.

Clifford D. Simak 1904-1988.

[prcardi · Rating 4 out of 5]

Storyline: 3/5
Characters: 3/5
Writing Style: 4/5
World: 3/5

When one thinks of leftist science fiction, it is Ursula K. Le Guin that comes to mind or perhaps Kim Stanley Robinson or newer Hugo award winners or some from that turn of the century British space opera clique. 1904-born, rural Wisconsin raised, and Midwestern public school and newspaper employed Clifford D. Simak seems an unlikely candidate. At its core, A Choice of Gods gives us a fundamental juxtaposition - a choice of our gods, as it were - between life philosophies. Simak brings to this no new ideas; he doesn't even give the ideas depth and complexity. In fact, what Simak does so well is to strip the broader ideologies down to a simple and easy-to-understand choice. The consequences of that choice are colossal; the alternative Simak is presenting is comprehensively radical. And this is a trick he manages repeatedly throughout the book: taking something big and complicated, distilling it down and revealing its essence. Thus this future vastly differs from our present with robots and evolutionary abilities and of which we learn about not as developments but as history. Against this transformative background we're then thrown into an idyllic, almost sleepy life with few dramas. From an imaginative interstellar backdrop we witness a simple show with a small cast and little by the way of excitement. The climactic scene comes in a short dialogue, the participants hardly eloquent. No great speeches, no definitive arguments, no rhetorical traps or trickery. After a short back and forth, the climax comes: "The candles guttered in a wind that came out of nowhere and a silence fell—a silence, Jason thought, because all had been said that could be said and there was no use of saying further." That statement, out of context, can't convey what was at stake, the significance, or what had been decided. But Simak takes sentences like that and puts them to a half dozen different uses. One must pause with those kind of statements and somberly reflect on what just occurred and what it all means.

I've been on the lookout for something like Simak's Way Station ever since I read it. This was it. I liked this better (and I enjoyed Way Station greatly). I don't think this one was quite as beautifully written as the other, but it still a treasure to read. At times he didn't perfect the balance between the exotic and the simple. Thus there were several pieces of this story that were intriguing for their inclusion but disappointing for their lack of development. A number of lines of thought could have been left out of this one, and the core of the book would have been better for it. So perhaps it is not a great book, but it is a remarkable one, and I would be delighted to find something else like it out there amidst the thousands and thousands of science fiction possibilities. I'm afraid, though, there's only one Clifford D. Simak.