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The Mountains of the Sun
After the catastrophic death of civilization, human colonists of Mars return to "the mother planet" to discover a primitive society operating in bloody conflict with nature. The planetwide adventures of this group of colonists—grown soft and decadent in the artificial, low-gravity colonies on Mars—is one of the most exciting adventures of today's international world of science fiction.
- GenresScience Fiction
176 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1971
25 people want to read
About the author
Christian Léourier
83 books10 followersChristian Léourier (b. 1948, Paris) is French writer of science fiction and young adult novels.
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Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews
April 24, 2024
Since I love Berkeley Science Fiction books and have been trying to read more non-English fiction as of late, my girlfriend thought this would make a good Christmas present when she saw it at a used bookshop. She wasn't wrong - I love the iconography and enjoy what it adds to my collection - but I must admit that the work of literature itself leaves some to be desired. While *The Mountains of the Sun* does ultimately deliver a fun read, its purpose and themes tended to morph somewhat jarringly and not altogether satisfactorily. As usual, a not-as-quick-as-you'd-like synopsis-turned-summary of the book, and then the thoughts of this amateur critic.
*The Mountains of the Sun* starts with a man named Cal returning to his village, which he left over three years ago in order to cross the mountains separating their village and territory from legendary Hell-rivers; he says he's returned to request the chief's daughter's hand in marriage. The ceremony involves Cal listing off all these reasons why he's a great hunter and provider and is seen through the lens of third-person omnipresent prose which lets us in on how the chief had killed Cal's father years ago and that he fears this bid for his daughter is part of some plan of Cal's to gain power. He assumes that Cal was expecting him to refuse his daughter's hand and ends up encouraging his daughter to disarm those plans. Meanwhile, we meet a man from a different tribe, this time a nomadic one instead of an agricultural village; his name is An-Yang, and he's an outcast because his legs are deformed and he can't hunt. He spies Cal one day and he tries to follow him because of his metal weaponry. Cal had caught a glimpse of An-Yang's horse-riding companions, and he tells the chief that these horse-riders could be a grave threat, so shortly after his marriage he leaves the village (with his newlywed in tow) in order to obtain a specimen to convince the chief of the threat to their shared people...
Meanwhile, civilized humans with spacefaring technology and the like who've been living on Mars ever since a huge tsunami wiped out non-mountainous humans 350 years ago are reseeding the Earth in an effort branded the "Reconquest." The leader of the European base that we actually get to witness welcomes the first frigate-load of women to the planet. They're set to serve as both breeding stock and as professional field researchers... thankfully, we only see Leourier explore the latter function, seen when a man named Griffin leaves the base to search for "retrogrades" (survivors like Cal and Al-Yang) with several other scientists like Lena the anthropologist woman and an arrogant doctor in tow. Meanwhile, it's nonetheless a rather nice and thoughtful, if forgettable, ending.
That being said, I'm not sure that the ending falls in line with the themes of the rest of the book, if I can narrow down what they were supposed to be. I mean, on one hand, the story is a pretty cool example of nested first contact where three groups of varying technological levels (nomadic, agrarian, and spacefaring) of the same species meet each other, not unlike Hal Clement novels like *Mission of Gravity* and *Close to Critical*. Leourier is able to look past the pulpy implications of that and see how these different movements might impact humanity as a whole, but I was also never convinced that the book had a real thematic throughline, especially in retrospect. I'm not saying that a book has to be hugely thematic in order to be worth your time, but when a book starts without one ends with one crammed in at a wonky angle in the last third of the book, it lowers my enjoyment of it.
I did enjoy what worldbuilding was on display, though. The state of the savages and the Reconquesting Martians aren't really infodumped and instead subtly laid out in the exposition chapters. It's not amazing and evocative worldbuilding like that of, say, M. John Harrison, but it's better than your average pulp. The story does have flavors of pulp due its regressed humans, but it also has that hellbent-on-NASA feel that feels like, say, Allen Steele or something (I did not expect to be namedropping so many other authors and works in this review...). It's just more understated and therefore better than expected, and as one more aside into the canon of science fiction, I enjoyed imagining that the mountain range where Cal's people live being the same as in the Tripods trilogy, a childhood favorite of mine which has strong ties to Switzerland.
I don't have much more to say, but I want to mention the prose. While it is always tricky to rate translated prose, I must admit I didn't find anything special about this. In fact, it didn't feel exotic or worthy of that "translated" label at all. Now, French literature isn't my area of expertise (I don't think that lacking expertise goes beyond Jules Verne and *The Anomaly*, really), but I didn't get that feeling of slight literary alienation that I have when reading Andreas Eschbach or the Strugatsky Brothers or the like. It's fine, just... a bit underwhelming. The book as a whole is underwhelming, really; it starts as a fun post-post-apocalyptic adventures, but ends up muddled and anticlimatic and without much clever writing to hang one's hat on. My rating of the book got smaller as the story zoomed out on itself; I guess it's a natural effect of what Leourier was doing with it.
At the end of the day, *The Mountains of the Sun* warrants a 6.5/10. It's good enough for what it is, and I enjoyed it, but I can't really recommend it to someone who's not already a fan of the genre. If you do want to read this author and can only read English, this is your only way to read him, so I'd encourage you to on that front. Otherwise, a nice enough story with a rather flat effect. I did just buy a different French SF novel, *The Overlords of War* by Gerald Klein, so I look forward to reading that and whatever other foreign SF I find in my travels; and since I'm signing off, here's hoping your travels are even more fruitful and exciting than mine...
*The Mountains of the Sun* starts with a man named Cal returning to his village, which he left over three years ago in order to cross the mountains separating their village and territory from legendary Hell-rivers; he says he's returned to request the chief's daughter's hand in marriage. The ceremony involves Cal listing off all these reasons why he's a great hunter and provider and is seen through the lens of third-person omnipresent prose which lets us in on how the chief had killed Cal's father years ago and that he fears this bid for his daughter is part of some plan of Cal's to gain power. He assumes that Cal was expecting him to refuse his daughter's hand and ends up encouraging his daughter to disarm those plans. Meanwhile, we meet a man from a different tribe, this time a nomadic one instead of an agricultural village; his name is An-Yang, and he's an outcast because his legs are deformed and he can't hunt. He spies Cal one day and he tries to follow him because of his metal weaponry. Cal had caught a glimpse of An-Yang's horse-riding companions, and he tells the chief that these horse-riders could be a grave threat, so shortly after his marriage he leaves the village (with his newlywed in tow) in order to obtain a specimen to convince the chief of the threat to their shared people...
Meanwhile, civilized humans with spacefaring technology and the like who've been living on Mars ever since a huge tsunami wiped out non-mountainous humans 350 years ago are reseeding the Earth in an effort branded the "Reconquest." The leader of the European base that we actually get to witness welcomes the first frigate-load of women to the planet. They're set to serve as both breeding stock and as professional field researchers... thankfully, we only see Leourier explore the latter function, seen when a man named Griffin leaves the base to search for "retrogrades" (survivors like Cal and Al-Yang) with several other scientists like Lena the anthropologist woman and an arrogant doctor in tow. Meanwhile, it's nonetheless a rather nice and thoughtful, if forgettable, ending.
That being said, I'm not sure that the ending falls in line with the themes of the rest of the book, if I can narrow down what they were supposed to be. I mean, on one hand, the story is a pretty cool example of nested first contact where three groups of varying technological levels (nomadic, agrarian, and spacefaring) of the same species meet each other, not unlike Hal Clement novels like *Mission of Gravity* and *Close to Critical*. Leourier is able to look past the pulpy implications of that and see how these different movements might impact humanity as a whole, but I was also never convinced that the book had a real thematic throughline, especially in retrospect. I'm not saying that a book has to be hugely thematic in order to be worth your time, but when a book starts without one ends with one crammed in at a wonky angle in the last third of the book, it lowers my enjoyment of it.
I did enjoy what worldbuilding was on display, though. The state of the savages and the Reconquesting Martians aren't really infodumped and instead subtly laid out in the exposition chapters. It's not amazing and evocative worldbuilding like that of, say, M. John Harrison, but it's better than your average pulp. The story does have flavors of pulp due its regressed humans, but it also has that hellbent-on-NASA feel that feels like, say, Allen Steele or something (I did not expect to be namedropping so many other authors and works in this review...). It's just more understated and therefore better than expected, and as one more aside into the canon of science fiction, I enjoyed imagining that the mountain range where Cal's people live being the same as in the Tripods trilogy, a childhood favorite of mine which has strong ties to Switzerland.
I don't have much more to say, but I want to mention the prose. While it is always tricky to rate translated prose, I must admit I didn't find anything special about this. In fact, it didn't feel exotic or worthy of that "translated" label at all. Now, French literature isn't my area of expertise (I don't think that lacking expertise goes beyond Jules Verne and *The Anomaly*, really), but I didn't get that feeling of slight literary alienation that I have when reading Andreas Eschbach or the Strugatsky Brothers or the like. It's fine, just... a bit underwhelming. The book as a whole is underwhelming, really; it starts as a fun post-post-apocalyptic adventures, but ends up muddled and anticlimatic and without much clever writing to hang one's hat on. My rating of the book got smaller as the story zoomed out on itself; I guess it's a natural effect of what Leourier was doing with it.
At the end of the day, *The Mountains of the Sun* warrants a 6.5/10. It's good enough for what it is, and I enjoyed it, but I can't really recommend it to someone who's not already a fan of the genre. If you do want to read this author and can only read English, this is your only way to read him, so I'd encourage you to on that front. Otherwise, a nice enough story with a rather flat effect. I did just buy a different French SF novel, *The Overlords of War* by Gerald Klein, so I look forward to reading that and whatever other foreign SF I find in my travels; and since I'm signing off, here's hoping your travels are even more fruitful and exciting than mine...
December 21, 2009
Got the book at a used bookstore for $2.50, sold by the cover and the name; I had gone in search of Logan's Run.
A quick read. The author (the book was originally a French one, translated into English) runs three narratives, blending them by the end of the novel. I was engaged to the end, partly because I like post-apocalyptic settings, and partly because I connected with the characters.
A quick read. The author (the book was originally a French one, translated into English) runs three narratives, blending them by the end of the novel. I was engaged to the end, partly because I like post-apocalyptic settings, and partly because I connected with the characters.
April 26, 2023
Reasonably engaging book that has a more interesting storyline, and more complex characters and setting than you'd expect from a 170 page mass market paperback from the 70s.
June 3, 2016
Fantastic but obscure novel which upends the trope of the noble savage and civilizing white man, which was so common among its contemporaries. Instead it delivers a much more complex and rewarding story which "shows" rather than "tells" its point, avoiding preachiness except a little bit near the end. Would recommend to anyone interested in social science fiction/speculative fiction, anthropology, and sociology. Definitely not your typical post-apocalyptic novel.
Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews