What do you think?
Rate this book
Im Limbus
Ein neuer Roman des Autors von »Capellas goldene Augen« und »Visionen eines Insiders«
Man hält ihn fest und hat ihm alle persönlichen Dinge weggenommen. Er weiß nicht, weshalb, und er weiß nicht, wie er in diese Situation geraten ist.
Hat man seine Erinnerungen gelöscht? Seine Bewacher benutzen Gestapo-Methoden, um seinen Willen zu brechen und ihn daran zu hindern, mit der Außenwelt in Kontakt zu treten, von der man ihn systematisch abschottet.
Seine Fragen nach dem Grund dieser Behandlung stoßen auf taube Ohren; man verweigert ihm jede Auskunft. Nur eine Psychologin, die ab und zu auftaucht, scheint zugänglicher. Er vertraut sich ihr an, doch auch sie gibt ihm keine Antwort auf seine Fragen.
Während seine Mit-Häftlinge ebenso bizarre wie undurchführbare Pläne aushecken, um diesem Limbus, dieser Vorhölle, zu entfliehen, tritt Carpenter den Weg nach innen an und versucht Stück für Stück seine Erinnerungen der Dunkelheit zu entreißen, um seine Vergangenheit zu rekonstruieren.
Es ist der einzige Weg, der nach draußen führt.
Deutsche Erstausgabe Science Fiction
ISBN 3-453-03934-3
Man hält ihn fest und hat ihm alle persönlichen Dinge weggenommen. Er weiß nicht, weshalb, und er weiß nicht, wie er in diese Situation geraten ist.
Hat man seine Erinnerungen gelöscht? Seine Bewacher benutzen Gestapo-Methoden, um seinen Willen zu brechen und ihn daran zu hindern, mit der Außenwelt in Kontakt zu treten, von der man ihn systematisch abschottet.
Seine Fragen nach dem Grund dieser Behandlung stoßen auf taube Ohren; man verweigert ihm jede Auskunft. Nur eine Psychologin, die ab und zu auftaucht, scheint zugänglicher. Er vertraut sich ihr an, doch auch sie gibt ihm keine Antwort auf seine Fragen.
Während seine Mit-Häftlinge ebenso bizarre wie undurchführbare Pläne aushecken, um diesem Limbus, dieser Vorhölle, zu entfliehen, tritt Carpenter den Weg nach innen an und versucht Stück für Stück seine Erinnerungen der Dunkelheit zu entreißen, um seine Vergangenheit zu rekonstruieren.
Es ist der einzige Weg, der nach draußen führt.
Deutsche Erstausgabe Science Fiction
ISBN 3-453-03934-3
396 pages, Mass Market Paperback
First published August 22, 1985
15 people want to read
About the author
Christopher Evans
121 books13 followersChristopher D. Evans also writes as Christopher Carpenter, Nathan Elliott, Robert Knight and John Lyon.
See authors with similar names.
Christopher D. Evans was born in 1951 in Tredegar and educated at Cardiff University between 1969–1972, and Swansea University 1973–4. He now lives in South London, where he teaches science full-time at a secondary school. His first novel, Capella’s Golden Eyes, was published in 1980. With Robert Holdstock, he co-edited the Other Edens Series of original science fiction and fantasy anthologies which appeared in the late 1980s. Aztec Century (Gollancz, 1993) won the BSFA Award for Best Novel of 1993 and was runner-up for the Wales Book of the Year Award. Christopher also writes as Christopher Carpenter, Nathan Elliott, Robert Knight and John Lyon.
See authors with similar names.
Christopher D. Evans was born in 1951 in Tredegar and educated at Cardiff University between 1969–1972, and Swansea University 1973–4. He now lives in South London, where he teaches science full-time at a secondary school. His first novel, Capella’s Golden Eyes, was published in 1980. With Robert Holdstock, he co-edited the Other Edens Series of original science fiction and fantasy anthologies which appeared in the late 1980s. Aztec Century (Gollancz, 1993) won the BSFA Award for Best Novel of 1993 and was runner-up for the Wales Book of the Year Award. Christopher also writes as Christopher Carpenter, Nathan Elliott, Robert Knight and John Lyon.
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 of 1 review
June 10, 2021
Along with four companions - only ever described as Riley, Treadwell, Sinnott and Wright - Mike Carpenter has been confined to Limbo, a soulless, windowless (the cover image is wrong in this respect) prison of sorts, where they are under constant surveillance. None of the five has any idea why they are being held in this way as, to their knowledge, they have not committed a crime. Under the more or less constant scrutiny of the guards/attendants their days are spent in PT exercises, games such as snooker or chess, reading newspapers and watching TV. The food is bland but not unwholesome (though at one point they suspect it is being adulterated by laxatives.) Occasionally they will be hauled before the person in charge, a man named Naughton, who will berate them for any misdemeanours they have committed. Some relief for Carpenter is provided by interviews with Dr Dempster, a female medic who looks after the inmates’ welfare. In the nature of such an unresolved existence a couple of the five try to form an escape committee but Carpenter sees this as futile. His reflections on the constrained life and his comparitive boredom lead to him trying to invent slogans for his companions but also one for himself, It doesn’t help.
The author’s history as a Science Fiction writer (his previous novels had been The Insider and Capella’s Golden Eyes and he went on to write Aztec Century and Mortal remains) might incline the reader to the view that the incarceration is part of a psychological experiment of some sort and that the experiences in Limbo are real. Against that the realistic tone of the narrative and the mundane nature of the confinement argues for something a bit less exotic. This is heightened by the slow morphing of the storyline into a recounting of Carpenter’s memories of his life before Limbo, memories which gradually begin to take up more of the narrative space. These deal with his drifting from school to University and then from job to job but more particularly with his relationships with the sexual interests in his life, from his unrequited passion for schoolmate Gail through his experiences with his women lovers, Veronica, Karen, Eleanor and Penny (not to mention one night spent with the enthusiastic Cicely,) all of which were unsatisfactory in one way or another. In this reading his four companions in Limbo may be aspects of Carpenter’s own personality.
It would be thoughtless of a reviewer to reveal which – if either – of these two possibilities is borne out but In Limbo is very well written. Evans has a flair for depicting character and circumstance and the novel’s resolution does follow the logic of what has gone before. I’ve read a lot worse. A lot worse.
The author’s history as a Science Fiction writer (his previous novels had been The Insider and Capella’s Golden Eyes and he went on to write Aztec Century and Mortal remains) might incline the reader to the view that the incarceration is part of a psychological experiment of some sort and that the experiences in Limbo are real. Against that the realistic tone of the narrative and the mundane nature of the confinement argues for something a bit less exotic. This is heightened by the slow morphing of the storyline into a recounting of Carpenter’s memories of his life before Limbo, memories which gradually begin to take up more of the narrative space. These deal with his drifting from school to University and then from job to job but more particularly with his relationships with the sexual interests in his life, from his unrequited passion for schoolmate Gail through his experiences with his women lovers, Veronica, Karen, Eleanor and Penny (not to mention one night spent with the enthusiastic Cicely,) all of which were unsatisfactory in one way or another. In this reading his four companions in Limbo may be aspects of Carpenter’s own personality.
It would be thoughtless of a reviewer to reveal which – if either – of these two possibilities is borne out but In Limbo is very well written. Evans has a flair for depicting character and circumstance and the novel’s resolution does follow the logic of what has gone before. I’ve read a lot worse. A lot worse.
Displaying 1 of 1 review