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The Steps of the Sun
On energy-poor Earth of the twenty-first century, all Ben Belsen has to do to realize his dream of finding cheap fuel in outer space is to acquire a spaceship and crew, escape from Earth, locate the fuel, and make it back.
256 pages, Mass Market Paperback
First published January 1, 1983
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931 people want to read
About the author
Walter Tevis
63 books1,302 followersWalter Stone Tevis was an American novelist and short story writer. Three of his six novels were adapted into major films: The Hustler, The Color of Money, and The Man Who Fell to Earth. The Queen's Gambit has also been adapted in 2020 into a 7-episode mini-series. His books have been translated into at least 18 languages.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 114 reviews
January 11, 2023
Needless to say this was a DNF and for good reason. The author sets us up with a story of Belson, an impotent billionaire in the year 2063 who buys a Chinese space craft to hunt for uranium. Months later they land on a distant planet of obsidian he names after himself and are unable to find what they seek. Having researched other planets they go into hyper sleep and land on another and 'strike gold'. Bored with the entire process, Belson has the crew take him back to the first planet saying he plans to live there indefinitely.
From here the plot shifts to constant back story as he reminisces of lost love, yada, yada which kills any momentum if there was any. When a story bogs down like this, I can't justify continuing. Having thoroughly enjoyed The Man Who Fell to Earth this was an epic disappointment and would not recommend it to anyone nor is it worthy of being called Science fiction.
From here the plot shifts to constant back story as he reminisces of lost love, yada, yada which kills any momentum if there was any. When a story bogs down like this, I can't justify continuing. Having thoroughly enjoyed The Man Who Fell to Earth this was an epic disappointment and would not recommend it to anyone nor is it worthy of being called Science fiction.
March 11, 2023
La prima domanda che mi sorge spontanea a fine lettura, ma anche durante, è: l'autore di questo romanzo è lo stesso che ha scritto il sublime "Solo il mimo canta al limitare del bosco"?
Per tutte le 200 pagine circa, questa domanda mi balena per la mente, perchè "A pochi passi dal sole" è tutto quello che non mi sarei mai aspettato da Tevis. Che poi il titolo mi aveva portato su un universo onirico ed immaginifico e di aspettative varie, che poi, dopo la lettura, si sono frantumate in miliardi di pezzi.
Comunque, partiamo dall'inizio: il racconto parla di Ben Belson, un magnate americano, il nostro simpatico e virtuoso protagonista, che dopo aver gabbato l'intera Terra e dopo aver fatto un'infinita sequela di denaro, si annoia ed allora parte per... Beh, questo è niente di che, alla fine trattasi di un magnate, quindi non può fare altro che questo, fregare le masse per i propri introiti. E quindi seguiamo le sue disavventure di tutti i tipi e di tutti i generi fino ad arrivare a...
La scrittura è esageratamente scorrevole, si fa leggere eccome, altrimenti lo avrei buttato dalla finestra alla fine del primo capitolo, ma quello che mi ha scioccato è trovare, durante tutto lo svolgimento della storia, uno continuo cambio di registro: da romanzetto al limite del porno di bassa lega, ad un'infinità di escursioni nelle cucine di tutto l'universo, a passaggi simil filosofici spicci, fino ad una sbrodolata di totale buonismo da quattro soldi. Ecco qui servito un bel minestrone rancido sul destino degli USA ed esteso di tutto il nostro fottuto pianeta?
Boh!!!
Supermegagiga bocciato.
Per tutte le 200 pagine circa, questa domanda mi balena per la mente, perchè "A pochi passi dal sole" è tutto quello che non mi sarei mai aspettato da Tevis. Che poi il titolo mi aveva portato su un universo onirico ed immaginifico e di aspettative varie, che poi, dopo la lettura, si sono frantumate in miliardi di pezzi.
Comunque, partiamo dall'inizio: il racconto parla di Ben Belson, un magnate americano, il nostro simpatico e virtuoso protagonista, che dopo aver gabbato l'intera Terra e dopo aver fatto un'infinita sequela di denaro, si annoia ed allora parte per... Beh, questo è niente di che, alla fine trattasi di un magnate, quindi non può fare altro che questo, fregare le masse per i propri introiti. E quindi seguiamo le sue disavventure di tutti i tipi e di tutti i generi fino ad arrivare a...
La scrittura è esageratamente scorrevole, si fa leggere eccome, altrimenti lo avrei buttato dalla finestra alla fine del primo capitolo, ma quello che mi ha scioccato è trovare, durante tutto lo svolgimento della storia, uno continuo cambio di registro: da romanzetto al limite del porno di bassa lega, ad un'infinità di escursioni nelle cucine di tutto l'universo, a passaggi simil filosofici spicci, fino ad una sbrodolata di totale buonismo da quattro soldi. Ecco qui servito un bel minestrone rancido sul destino degli USA ed esteso di tutto il nostro fottuto pianeta?
Boh!!!
Supermegagiga bocciato.
November 12, 2012
I'M A BILLIONAIRE SPACE PIRATE WHOSE PENIS DOESN'T WORK. THIS MAKES ME FURIOUSLY SUCCESSFUL AT EVERYTHING ELSE. HAVE I TALKED ABOUT MY IMPOTENCE YET? WEINERS MONEY WEINERS MONEY INTERGALACTIC SPACE TRAVEL WEINERS MONEY. AND WEINERS. ALSO CHINA. WEIN--MONEY?
But seriously, this book is its own reason for being OOP.
But seriously, this book is its own reason for being OOP.
January 26, 2021
"The Steps of the Sun" is Walter Tevis's final science fiction novel. This is not at all the Clarke influenced hard scifi that was in vogue at the time this was published back in 1983. It is, however, a sure Tevis novel – one of the four he published after a decade long hiatus, during which he worked as a creative writing professor at the Ohio University in Athens. All the usual themes are here: Loneliness, probs with parents, spouses, and such, yet here are added new disturbing psychosomatic dilemmas. As always, the focus is on the human condition. The novel reads really well, straight quick paced narrative and dynamic, like that of golden age late fifties, early pre-"new wave" sixties styling. Actually reminiscent of Vonnegut in some places (while very much van Vogt in others). It was cool to see that he used elements from short stories he had published before this novel found in his 1981 "Far from Home" collection".
I was really engaged for the most part until the last section, which for me, the whole thing, unfortunately, fell apart.
I wish he would have had the opportunity to write more.
I was really engaged for the most part until the last section, which for me, the whole thing, unfortunately, fell apart.
I wish he would have had the opportunity to write more.
December 24, 2024
Este libro NO es de ciencia ficción, es un libro sobre un señoro narcisista y su pene flácido, literalmente.
Me ha resultado repugnante esta lectura. La sinopsis planteaba un argumento muy interesante: en una tierra sin recursos energéticos, un magnate millonario decide robar la última reserva de uranio para embarcarse en un viaje intergaláctico en busca de planetas que contengan uranio.
Pero nada más lejos de la realidad. El viaje espacial es totalmente secundario, y el principal tema orbita en torno a la impotencia de un tío repulsivo que encima manipula y usa a las mujeres, llegando al maltrato psicológico.
Lleno de descripciones explícitas y tremendamente incómodas de leer, al punto de que me he saltado trozos porque no podía del asco, y que te hacen odiar al personaje.
No perdáis el tiempo con este libro a menos que os apetezca vomitar 🤮.
Me ha resultado repugnante esta lectura. La sinopsis planteaba un argumento muy interesante: en una tierra sin recursos energéticos, un magnate millonario decide robar la última reserva de uranio para embarcarse en un viaje intergaláctico en busca de planetas que contengan uranio.
Pero nada más lejos de la realidad. El viaje espacial es totalmente secundario, y el principal tema orbita en torno a la impotencia de un tío repulsivo que encima manipula y usa a las mujeres, llegando al maltrato psicológico.
Lleno de descripciones explícitas y tremendamente incómodas de leer, al punto de que me he saltado trozos porque no podía del asco, y que te hacen odiar al personaje.
No perdáis el tiempo con este libro a menos que os apetezca vomitar 🤮.
May 30, 2022
The May 2022 Tevis-a-thon ends as it did for him. This morning I listened to an interview Tevis did with Don Swain for his radio show Book Beat from January 1984. It was about seven months before his death from lung cancer. There are painful moments when he talks about going back to smoking every once in and awhile. He also speculates about what he wants to do with the books that we the listener now know he will never write. When I was reading this I was not aware that this was the final novel Tevis wrote, assuming that the Color of Money the last released would be the one he wrote before he died.
“But having done two novels in a row in which people smoke Marlboros and drive Buicks and turn on the Sonys and they inhabit the world, the real world that we all know and aren't slightly bored with, it's--it would be fun, I think, to do another fantasy novel, another speculative fiction novel in which I can invent my world. You know, when I invent a future as I did in "The Steps of the Sun," which takes place around in the 2060s, I'm not interested in predicting the future. I don't know what the future is going to be like. And, I'm not arrogant enough to pretend to be a futurologist. Most of which, I think, futurology, I think, its largely nonsense, anyway--extrapolating from curves. But, so, I don't know what the future will be like. But I like to invent my own version of the future for the fun, for the play.”
Tevis also called the novel a serial comic novel. The Steps of the Sun is in many ways the black sheep of the small Tevis catalog. There is a reason for that. There is no getting around the reality that it is the weakest of his work. That is not to say there is not value in this book, the reality is when every other book you’ve written is a masterpiece it is a bit unfair to judge against them. We have six Tevis novels and they are rare gemstones compared to the over forty by Philip K. Dick or a dozen Kurt Vonnegut novels. Some writers I like have entire lost decades of writing nothing great.
The Man Who Fell to Earth and Mockingbird are science fiction masterworks and that is undeniable, so one of the things that really interested me in my second time reading The Steps of The Sun is why is this third SF novel not as good? Don Swain asked Tevis about the term speculative fiction is on the cover ofhis collection Far from Home and I think his answer is important.
“The term speculative fiction is used by editors in a desperate attempt to let the public know that this is not "Star Wars" or "Buck Rogers" or whatever. Unfortunately, science fiction is a very big term. We don't have in our critical vocabulary a term to describe exactly what it is I do. I'm not trying to say I'm unique. I think other people have worked somewhat in similar genres, but I like to play games with time and space. I like to imagine what the world might be a hundred years from now, that sort of thing. But, I am not interested in writing about menaces, giant the giant cockroach eating New York, or something like that. I'm not it, which is what some people think of when they think of science fiction. I'm not interested in writing about nuclear catastrophe, devastation, interplanetary war, you know, and that sort of thing. So, in an attempt to find some way of describing what I do, editors come up with terms like speculative fiction.”
The Man Who Fell to Earth and Mockingbird are bookends of Tevis's bouts with drinking and getting sober. Mockingbird plays with grand themes but is a book about getting sober at the heart of it. Mockingbird follows a character who saves the human race by learning to read a skill we lost when Robots took over most tasks for us. The Man Who Fell to Earth is a very deep novel inspired by Tevis feeling like an alien growing up in Kentucky after being transplanted at 10 years old from a very different San Francisco.
I think the heart of the difference is at the end of the quote above. “For the play.” Tevis was coming off the mainstream hit of The Hustler when he wrote his first SF masterpiece, he had a lot to prove. When he wrote Mockingbird he had been away from publishing for almost 20 years he had a lot to prove. The Steps of the Sun is not as tight and coiled as the other Tevis books. He is playing around a bit more. As such the first half that takes place in space is more focused.
TSOS is like all Tevis works slightly autobiographical, this time about a middle-age crisis. Ben Belson the point of view character is impotent, something Tevis admits to experiencing at the time. He was recently re-married at the time. The amount of time spent talking in this novel about a reluctant penis is reason enough to take away a star in the rating. Honestly, that is the reason this book is not the classic the others are because many, many words are wasted on Belson’s flaccid member. There is also a scene when Belson towards the end of the novel argues with a computer therapy simulation (very PKD) and asks it to imitate his mother so he can tell it off. (anyone reading his collection knows Tevis had serious issues with his parents)
Okay moving on…
It is also a novel of the late 70s and 80s that despite Tevis downplaying his predictions of the future makes serious statements about what he thought the future might be. It is important to remember this is coming after the energy crisis of the late 70s. At the very beginning of the talk about the climate crisis. Sad enough we have not solved these things. In the 50s Tevis wrote about the 1980s as an age of enlightenment, now that he was writing in it he saw it as the beginning of the end.
If my quotes from the book focus on World-building it is because Tevis was very interested in the details. The story is about Ben Belson a sort of pre-Elon-Musk type who creates a warp ship and takes off from the grim and dying earth to find a new source of energy. “Clean” burning uranium anyone? That is why he traveled to Fomalhaut 25 light-years away. “I was born in 2012 when the population in the industrial societies was plummeting. It was a wonder I was born at all.”
This is an interesting notion because in our real-world despite the climate crisis, pandemics, and epidemics of school shootings we have never had decreased birth rates, most people still want to have children no matter how bad it gets, but in this future child rates are dropping. After fossil fuels go bust uranium becomes popular and society bounces back.
That is when Ben Belson got rich in real estate… “It was the 2040s, the time of the uranium bust. Nobody was having babies; the military had its crude hands on all the crude oil; whole industries were reeling; just taking away the Mercedes limousines away from all those grey-templed hustlers who sat on their boards had thrown most U.S. corporations into tailspins.”
Belson got rich selling short and while the rest of the world fell apart he became rich. Lost in most reviews of the book is how it spoofs capitalism. “Anna and Myra and I lived in that mansion for eight months toward the end the student riots began. Things were bad all over and the student riots began. Things were bad all over and the students had decided capitalism was to blame. I had no real quarrel with that, although I felt the scarcity of fuels deserved equal billing. For a few days of it a lot of the sons and daughters of the upper-middle class decided I was the enemy, and I got edgy when they started chanting things like “Belson go home.” Hell, I was home. They hanged me in effigy, and it was a damned good effigy too.”
Belson gets rich exploits the failing system, tries to save by going to another world, and ends up declared a pirate. Tevis appears to be commenting on the suicidal nature of capitalism and human civilization. In many ways, the earth and its ecological problems are a mirror to Tevis and his feelings of midlife crisis. Much as his return to writing brought him back to production Belson takes a dying New York/ Earth and brings it the fuel to re-open the skyscrapers and get the elevators running again. (That is the examples the novel uses as silly as it might sound to us.
Uncharacteristic of Tevis this novel is full of asides and commentary that strays from the narrative. Nothing like modern novels, but enough that I noticed the difference having just read The Hustler. Some of the best writing and storytelling in the novel involve the fun Tevis was clearly having writing Belson’s time on the planet he named after himself. Important stuff happens when Ben returns to earth but the best moments are on the planet that has an obsidian surface for huge amounts of land. Singing grass reminded me of PKD’s Three Stigmata. My favorite moment in the book…
“I looked up. Two suns shone pleasantly down on my body. At night there were half a dozen moons. Everything about this place was generous, replete, fulfilling, I breathed as deeply as my lungs would allow, exhaled, and walked slowly down the rest of the hill, into the valley.”
This is a beautiful highlight of what Science Fiction and only Science Fiction can do. A character sitting on a hill looking at another world. Wonderful moment. Once we get back to earth Tevis has his tongue firmly in cheek when he writes about Macy’s being a coal storage or that the air force base is named after Kissensinger. There is more. All funny but might be lost on readers not alive in the 80s.
The Steps of the Sun in the worst moments is a story about a mid-life crisis. In the best moments, it is an ecological warning. At times the goofy stuff overwhelms the good stuff for stretches that other Tevis books never did. That is one reason this book is not remembered like The Man Who Fell to Earth Mockingbird or The Hustler. It is not fair as it is a good book, and a sad last statement. Tevis probably would have been happy to know That the Color of Money was the last novel that entered the world. There are rumors of two kids' books that never got released. I am interested in seeing that. I hope the family finds a deal that works.
The Steps of the Sun is the worst Tevis novel, but it still is pretty great. One nice thing about his short career is there are not entire periods of bad novels like some writers. John Brunner for example is one of my favorite writers but there are a double-digit number of novels he wrote for money. That is not a Tevis problem. I also respect a novel that will come out and say what it means as clearly as possible.
“You Americans did not create that oil you used for your cars, your air conditioners, your lawnmowers, or for the plastic films you wrapped toys and pens and vegetables in. The oil was made by the world itself when great ferns covered Texas and the Persian Gulf. It took millions of years to make it. You and the Arabs threw it away in a century.”
The Steps of the Sun is not a masterpiece but an important piece of the Tevis canon and like it or not it was his final work.
“But having done two novels in a row in which people smoke Marlboros and drive Buicks and turn on the Sonys and they inhabit the world, the real world that we all know and aren't slightly bored with, it's--it would be fun, I think, to do another fantasy novel, another speculative fiction novel in which I can invent my world. You know, when I invent a future as I did in "The Steps of the Sun," which takes place around in the 2060s, I'm not interested in predicting the future. I don't know what the future is going to be like. And, I'm not arrogant enough to pretend to be a futurologist. Most of which, I think, futurology, I think, its largely nonsense, anyway--extrapolating from curves. But, so, I don't know what the future will be like. But I like to invent my own version of the future for the fun, for the play.”
Tevis also called the novel a serial comic novel. The Steps of the Sun is in many ways the black sheep of the small Tevis catalog. There is a reason for that. There is no getting around the reality that it is the weakest of his work. That is not to say there is not value in this book, the reality is when every other book you’ve written is a masterpiece it is a bit unfair to judge against them. We have six Tevis novels and they are rare gemstones compared to the over forty by Philip K. Dick or a dozen Kurt Vonnegut novels. Some writers I like have entire lost decades of writing nothing great.
The Man Who Fell to Earth and Mockingbird are science fiction masterworks and that is undeniable, so one of the things that really interested me in my second time reading The Steps of The Sun is why is this third SF novel not as good? Don Swain asked Tevis about the term speculative fiction is on the cover ofhis collection Far from Home and I think his answer is important.
“The term speculative fiction is used by editors in a desperate attempt to let the public know that this is not "Star Wars" or "Buck Rogers" or whatever. Unfortunately, science fiction is a very big term. We don't have in our critical vocabulary a term to describe exactly what it is I do. I'm not trying to say I'm unique. I think other people have worked somewhat in similar genres, but I like to play games with time and space. I like to imagine what the world might be a hundred years from now, that sort of thing. But, I am not interested in writing about menaces, giant the giant cockroach eating New York, or something like that. I'm not it, which is what some people think of when they think of science fiction. I'm not interested in writing about nuclear catastrophe, devastation, interplanetary war, you know, and that sort of thing. So, in an attempt to find some way of describing what I do, editors come up with terms like speculative fiction.”
The Man Who Fell to Earth and Mockingbird are bookends of Tevis's bouts with drinking and getting sober. Mockingbird plays with grand themes but is a book about getting sober at the heart of it. Mockingbird follows a character who saves the human race by learning to read a skill we lost when Robots took over most tasks for us. The Man Who Fell to Earth is a very deep novel inspired by Tevis feeling like an alien growing up in Kentucky after being transplanted at 10 years old from a very different San Francisco.
I think the heart of the difference is at the end of the quote above. “For the play.” Tevis was coming off the mainstream hit of The Hustler when he wrote his first SF masterpiece, he had a lot to prove. When he wrote Mockingbird he had been away from publishing for almost 20 years he had a lot to prove. The Steps of the Sun is not as tight and coiled as the other Tevis books. He is playing around a bit more. As such the first half that takes place in space is more focused.
TSOS is like all Tevis works slightly autobiographical, this time about a middle-age crisis. Ben Belson the point of view character is impotent, something Tevis admits to experiencing at the time. He was recently re-married at the time. The amount of time spent talking in this novel about a reluctant penis is reason enough to take away a star in the rating. Honestly, that is the reason this book is not the classic the others are because many, many words are wasted on Belson’s flaccid member. There is also a scene when Belson towards the end of the novel argues with a computer therapy simulation (very PKD) and asks it to imitate his mother so he can tell it off. (anyone reading his collection knows Tevis had serious issues with his parents)
Okay moving on…
It is also a novel of the late 70s and 80s that despite Tevis downplaying his predictions of the future makes serious statements about what he thought the future might be. It is important to remember this is coming after the energy crisis of the late 70s. At the very beginning of the talk about the climate crisis. Sad enough we have not solved these things. In the 50s Tevis wrote about the 1980s as an age of enlightenment, now that he was writing in it he saw it as the beginning of the end.
If my quotes from the book focus on World-building it is because Tevis was very interested in the details. The story is about Ben Belson a sort of pre-Elon-Musk type who creates a warp ship and takes off from the grim and dying earth to find a new source of energy. “Clean” burning uranium anyone? That is why he traveled to Fomalhaut 25 light-years away. “I was born in 2012 when the population in the industrial societies was plummeting. It was a wonder I was born at all.”
This is an interesting notion because in our real-world despite the climate crisis, pandemics, and epidemics of school shootings we have never had decreased birth rates, most people still want to have children no matter how bad it gets, but in this future child rates are dropping. After fossil fuels go bust uranium becomes popular and society bounces back.
That is when Ben Belson got rich in real estate… “It was the 2040s, the time of the uranium bust. Nobody was having babies; the military had its crude hands on all the crude oil; whole industries were reeling; just taking away the Mercedes limousines away from all those grey-templed hustlers who sat on their boards had thrown most U.S. corporations into tailspins.”
Belson got rich selling short and while the rest of the world fell apart he became rich. Lost in most reviews of the book is how it spoofs capitalism. “Anna and Myra and I lived in that mansion for eight months toward the end the student riots began. Things were bad all over and the student riots began. Things were bad all over and the students had decided capitalism was to blame. I had no real quarrel with that, although I felt the scarcity of fuels deserved equal billing. For a few days of it a lot of the sons and daughters of the upper-middle class decided I was the enemy, and I got edgy when they started chanting things like “Belson go home.” Hell, I was home. They hanged me in effigy, and it was a damned good effigy too.”
Belson gets rich exploits the failing system, tries to save by going to another world, and ends up declared a pirate. Tevis appears to be commenting on the suicidal nature of capitalism and human civilization. In many ways, the earth and its ecological problems are a mirror to Tevis and his feelings of midlife crisis. Much as his return to writing brought him back to production Belson takes a dying New York/ Earth and brings it the fuel to re-open the skyscrapers and get the elevators running again. (That is the examples the novel uses as silly as it might sound to us.
Uncharacteristic of Tevis this novel is full of asides and commentary that strays from the narrative. Nothing like modern novels, but enough that I noticed the difference having just read The Hustler. Some of the best writing and storytelling in the novel involve the fun Tevis was clearly having writing Belson’s time on the planet he named after himself. Important stuff happens when Ben returns to earth but the best moments are on the planet that has an obsidian surface for huge amounts of land. Singing grass reminded me of PKD’s Three Stigmata. My favorite moment in the book…
“I looked up. Two suns shone pleasantly down on my body. At night there were half a dozen moons. Everything about this place was generous, replete, fulfilling, I breathed as deeply as my lungs would allow, exhaled, and walked slowly down the rest of the hill, into the valley.”
This is a beautiful highlight of what Science Fiction and only Science Fiction can do. A character sitting on a hill looking at another world. Wonderful moment. Once we get back to earth Tevis has his tongue firmly in cheek when he writes about Macy’s being a coal storage or that the air force base is named after Kissensinger. There is more. All funny but might be lost on readers not alive in the 80s.
The Steps of the Sun in the worst moments is a story about a mid-life crisis. In the best moments, it is an ecological warning. At times the goofy stuff overwhelms the good stuff for stretches that other Tevis books never did. That is one reason this book is not remembered like The Man Who Fell to Earth Mockingbird or The Hustler. It is not fair as it is a good book, and a sad last statement. Tevis probably would have been happy to know That the Color of Money was the last novel that entered the world. There are rumors of two kids' books that never got released. I am interested in seeing that. I hope the family finds a deal that works.
The Steps of the Sun is the worst Tevis novel, but it still is pretty great. One nice thing about his short career is there are not entire periods of bad novels like some writers. John Brunner for example is one of my favorite writers but there are a double-digit number of novels he wrote for money. That is not a Tevis problem. I also respect a novel that will come out and say what it means as clearly as possible.
“You Americans did not create that oil you used for your cars, your air conditioners, your lawnmowers, or for the plastic films you wrapped toys and pens and vegetables in. The oil was made by the world itself when great ferns covered Texas and the Persian Gulf. It took millions of years to make it. You and the Arabs threw it away in a century.”
The Steps of the Sun is not a masterpiece but an important piece of the Tevis canon and like it or not it was his final work.
September 24, 2013
the stuff in space is great; once it gets back to earth it seems to get a little lost.
April 17, 2023
Libro scritto molto bene, ottima capacità di approfondire personaggi.
Prima parte lenta, molto riflessiva, auto analisi del protagonista, fatto fatica a motivarmi nel continuare.
Seconda parte più dinamica, divertente. Riflessioni su società molto attuali; la discussione su carbone, solare, eolico e nucleare sembra scritta oggi. Particolari le cinque settimane vissute da cortigiano, non riesco a capire se è una critica all'atteggiamento degli uomini nei confronti delle donne, usando un ribaltamento dei ruoli. Da approfondire.
Sembrava una storia così, leggera, invece alla fine fa riflettere, il problema dell'energia, ci sta toccando in questi giorni e qui si mostra una società che sta lentamente declinando perchè non ha più le risorse energetiche. L'immagine degli appartamenti abbandonati perchè gli ascensori non funzionano, è inquietante proprio perchè è molto verosimile.
“Sì, viviamo bene. Gli altri devono morire per questo?"
Colomba in lutto rispose: "Sì".”
Tutta l'ipocrisia della nostra società: piangiamo i morti, le ingiustizie ma difficilmente rinunciamo al nostro benessere.
Prima parte lenta, molto riflessiva, auto analisi del protagonista, fatto fatica a motivarmi nel continuare.
Seconda parte più dinamica, divertente. Riflessioni su società molto attuali; la discussione su carbone, solare, eolico e nucleare sembra scritta oggi. Particolari le cinque settimane vissute da cortigiano, non riesco a capire se è una critica all'atteggiamento degli uomini nei confronti delle donne, usando un ribaltamento dei ruoli. Da approfondire.
Sembrava una storia così, leggera, invece alla fine fa riflettere, il problema dell'energia, ci sta toccando in questi giorni e qui si mostra una società che sta lentamente declinando perchè non ha più le risorse energetiche. L'immagine degli appartamenti abbandonati perchè gli ascensori non funzionano, è inquietante proprio perchè è molto verosimile.
“Sì, viviamo bene. Gli altri devono morire per questo?"
Colomba in lutto rispose: "Sì".”
Tutta l'ipocrisia della nostra società: piangiamo i morti, le ingiustizie ma difficilmente rinunciamo al nostro benessere.
July 1, 2022
I’ve been working my way through Walter Tevis’ books since I discovered him. He’s known for scifi as well as others like The Hustler. This was a good one, and I was really surprised to see how well he predicted a lot of what’s happening in the U.S. and the world today. The writing is great as always. The main character tells the story, and the first half is a lot of him alone on a distant planet. Then he returns to earth and tries to sort out his life and help the planet. Much like The Man Who Fell to Earth, he struggles to deal with political issues that prevent him from doing what he set out to. A common theme for Tevis and much like the political world we live in today. Well worth a read.
September 26, 2024
Mi reseña en podcast, comodísimo:
https://go.ivoox.com/rf/130442020
https://go.ivoox.com/rf/130442020
April 12, 2012
I really enjoy Walter Tevis' prose style, particularly in The Hustler, The Queen's Gambit: A Novel and Mockingbird. Having heard Walter discuss the sci-fi genre in an audio interview with Don Swain, I know that Walter enjoyed the sociological rather than technical aspects of sci-fi. I therefore did not expect Steps of the Sun to be a high tech space story but felt it fell well short of Mockingbird.
I found myself tiring a little from the main character's flashbacks only to find flashbacks within flashbacks - a bit like 'I remember when I was remembering when.....'. Now, I am sure such use of flashbacks is not considered an absolute no go area but surely it should be used to provide essential character development? Yes, the main character was developed but in a way I personally lost interest and empathy much of the time. If the erectile dysfunction which was constantly referred to really added important plot or character points then I am afraid I missed them.
I found myself tiring a little from the main character's flashbacks only to find flashbacks within flashbacks - a bit like 'I remember when I was remembering when.....'. Now, I am sure such use of flashbacks is not considered an absolute no go area but surely it should be used to provide essential character development? Yes, the main character was developed but in a way I personally lost interest and empathy much of the time. If the erectile dysfunction which was constantly referred to really added important plot or character points then I am afraid I missed them.
April 6, 2024
La sinopsis del libro es tal cual, no hay nada mas allá; la sensación nada mas empezar fue de estar leyendo algo rematademente malo, porque aunque el autor quisiera hacer una sátira de no sé si los viajes espaciales o de los millonarios que sueñan con ello se queda en una sucesión de clichés baratos con un nivel de narrativa y de ideas bastante pobre y tosco; una vez acabado en mi opinión como obra de ciencia ficcion es totalmente prescindible, como thriller no consigue crear tensión ni viajando a otros planetas y como sátira al mundo de los millonarios si es esto lo que es ... le falta mucha mucha chicha; eso en cuanto a este libro en concreto.
Lo que mas me sorprende de todo es que Walter Tevis es el autor de varios libros que tuvieron mucho éxito en sus adapatciones cinematográficas, como son El buscavidas, El hombre que cayó a la Tierra, Gambito de Dama o la maravillosa El color del dinero, y sobretodo de relatos cortos; en definitiva un chasco de libro, tenía en lista de lectura Sinsonte y la verdad creo que se va a quedar en stanby
Lo que mas me sorprende de todo es que Walter Tevis es el autor de varios libros que tuvieron mucho éxito en sus adapatciones cinematográficas, como son El buscavidas, El hombre que cayó a la Tierra, Gambito de Dama o la maravillosa El color del dinero, y sobretodo de relatos cortos; en definitiva un chasco de libro, tenía en lista de lectura Sinsonte y la verdad creo que se va a quedar en stanby
April 18, 2017
My least favourite Tevis novel so far. Despite being written in first person POV, the story somehow kept me at arm's length. I found it difficult to care about any character or event. 2.5 stars.
January 20, 2025
Non so bene da dove iniziare a scrivere qualcosa su questo libro.
In ordine sparso, senza la pretesa di fare una recensione coerente, anche perché perlopiù utilizzo GR come "archivio" delle mie letture e di quello che mi hanno lasciato i libri, un supporto alla memoria futura.
Ma questo libro di Tevis lo avevo iniziato con ben altre aspettative, dopo essermi emozionata con il "mimo" e con l'uomo che cadde sulla terra.
Dunque ecco un secco riassunto (CONTIENE SPOILER, quindi siete avvisati, ma anche in caso vogliate leggerlo... beh... bah) della fatica di Tevis.
Ambientazione: Prossimo futuro. Il mondo utilizza carbone e legna come fonte principale di energia. E anche del plutonio, ma le radiazioni hanno fatto danni quindi non piace molto. La gente non fa piu bambini grazie a una pillola contraccettiva magica. La popolazione mondiale si è ridotta di brutto e le grandi metropoli sono solamente un'ombra del fasto del ventunesimo secolo.
La trama: a un ricco magnate americano di mezza età, annoiato, amante dei soldi, dei viaggi e della f**a (non in questo preciso ordine), si ammoscia il pisellino, diventa nervoso, fa casino con le donne, parte per un viaggio intergalattico con la sua nave in cerca di modi di fare altri soldi tornando sulla terra.
Seguono dettagliati flashback in cui il nostro si lagna del suo "wiener" che non si alza più, e altre lamentele sulle donne (tante) della sua vita.
Descrizione di lui da giovane che in un vagone ferroviario si tocca il pipo in tasca vedendo uno scorcio di coscia di una tizia addormentata di fronte a lui.
L'americano scopre pianeti, trova fonti di energia alternative che lo faranno diventare ricco, si sdraia su un pianeta e il pisello torna a funzionargli di nuovo.
Rientro sulla terra del nostro eroe, casini politici, commerciali.
Cinesi.
Ah, un'esilarante parte in cui viene sequestrato e usato come cortigiana (dato che ora il pipo gli tira di nuovo).
Altre considerazioni della sua ex amante ritrovata a cui lui deve assolutamente riferire, come prima cosa, che ora gli si rizza di nuovo, e lei osserva e per fortuna, magari ora non sarai piu cosi nervoso. Si rimettono assieme, lui fa un sacco di soldi, New York ritrova energia grazie all'uranio pulito, il mondo si accende di luci e il magnate torna a fare soldi e a scopare come non mai.
Ritto come un soldato
puntava alle stelle
ci potevo piantare chiodi
ci potevo appendere un quadro
E no, non me le sono inventate, sono tutte espressioni che trovate nel libro.
Ancora piu stringato?
Ok, mi impegno:
Ricco magnate di mezz'età, annoiato e impotente, va nello spazio per fare soldi, guarisce dall'impotenza, torna, fa soldi, scopa, salva l'umanità.
The end
In ordine sparso, senza la pretesa di fare una recensione coerente, anche perché perlopiù utilizzo GR come "archivio" delle mie letture e di quello che mi hanno lasciato i libri, un supporto alla memoria futura.
Ma questo libro di Tevis lo avevo iniziato con ben altre aspettative, dopo essermi emozionata con il "mimo" e con l'uomo che cadde sulla terra.
Dunque ecco un secco riassunto (CONTIENE SPOILER, quindi siete avvisati, ma anche in caso vogliate leggerlo... beh... bah) della fatica di Tevis.
Ambientazione: Prossimo futuro. Il mondo utilizza carbone e legna come fonte principale di energia. E anche del plutonio, ma le radiazioni hanno fatto danni quindi non piace molto. La gente non fa piu bambini grazie a una pillola contraccettiva magica. La popolazione mondiale si è ridotta di brutto e le grandi metropoli sono solamente un'ombra del fasto del ventunesimo secolo.
La trama: a un ricco magnate americano di mezza età, annoiato, amante dei soldi, dei viaggi e della f**a (non in questo preciso ordine), si ammoscia il pisellino, diventa nervoso, fa casino con le donne, parte per un viaggio intergalattico con la sua nave in cerca di modi di fare altri soldi tornando sulla terra.
Seguono dettagliati flashback in cui il nostro si lagna del suo "wiener" che non si alza più, e altre lamentele sulle donne (tante) della sua vita.
Descrizione di lui da giovane che in un vagone ferroviario si tocca il pipo in tasca vedendo uno scorcio di coscia di una tizia addormentata di fronte a lui.
L'americano scopre pianeti, trova fonti di energia alternative che lo faranno diventare ricco, si sdraia su un pianeta e il pisello torna a funzionargli di nuovo.
Rientro sulla terra del nostro eroe, casini politici, commerciali.
Cinesi.
Ah, un'esilarante parte in cui viene sequestrato e usato come cortigiana (dato che ora il pipo gli tira di nuovo).
Altre considerazioni della sua ex amante ritrovata a cui lui deve assolutamente riferire, come prima cosa, che ora gli si rizza di nuovo, e lei osserva e per fortuna, magari ora non sarai piu cosi nervoso. Si rimettono assieme, lui fa un sacco di soldi, New York ritrova energia grazie all'uranio pulito, il mondo si accende di luci e il magnate torna a fare soldi e a scopare come non mai.
Ritto come un soldato
puntava alle stelle
ci potevo piantare chiodi
ci potevo appendere un quadro
E no, non me le sono inventate, sono tutte espressioni che trovate nel libro.
Ancora piu stringato?
Ok, mi impegno:
Ricco magnate di mezz'età, annoiato e impotente, va nello spazio per fare soldi, guarisce dall'impotenza, torna, fa soldi, scopa, salva l'umanità.
The end
December 26, 2024
Ni de lluny m'ha agradat tant com Sinsonte. Però no només això, sinó que esperava trobar-hi la mateixa sensibilitat i emoció, i en canvi hi he trobat un relat falocèntric amb un protagonista incoherent i estúpid que, malgrat algunes reflexions interessants sobre el canvi climàtic i el dualisme capitalisme-comunisme, s'embranca en un viatge sense cap ni peus per tornar al punt d'inici i perpetuar els mateixos estereotips.
January 30, 2025
A lost, whiny, self-hating socialist billionaire who can’t understand why, the more the government runs the economy the more the economy falls apart, is not the most likable of first-person narrators.
The world is in an ice age, and cannot afford to heat itself, because the world is running out of energy. And because the world is running out of energy, the governments forbid anyone to look for more. Further, they have price controls on energy to keep it from becoming too expensive—with the obvious result that there is a black market that any billionaire can use to buy up six percent of the entire supply of uranium despite an energy shortage.
They’ve implemented price controls and rationing, and yet the problem continues to get worse.
It’s not that the character is unrealistic; you can imagine a Warren Buffet or a George Soros making the same complaints. It’s just very difficult for even a good writer to pull it off. Nabokov did it, of course, but as good as he is Tevis isn’t able to do the same.
So we have a billionaire socialist narrator in a world where socialism is obviously destroying mankind who also goes on and on about his impotence while describing the world’s impotence. And then he starts obsessing about his muscles. It’s a mid-life crisis, but instead of a sports car he buys a spaceship and flies to a socialist planet.
There is no energy on the first planet they visit, and it has a poisonous rain that destroys individual effort and savings. But if you lie down in the grass and do nothing, it heals you and feeds you and takes away your pain. And he realizes this—“Yet if Belson loved me, just who had wiped out my food supply in the first place?… I thought little and felt little.”—but if the planet takes care of him, who cares if the planet also takes away his thoughts and feelings?
Walter Tevis is a fine writer, and he makes this readable. But it’s nowhere near the novel that The Queen's Gambit or Mockingbird is.
The world is in an ice age, and cannot afford to heat itself, because the world is running out of energy. And because the world is running out of energy, the governments forbid anyone to look for more. Further, they have price controls on energy to keep it from becoming too expensive—with the obvious result that there is a black market that any billionaire can use to buy up six percent of the entire supply of uranium despite an energy shortage.
They’ve implemented price controls and rationing, and yet the problem continues to get worse.
It’s not that the character is unrealistic; you can imagine a Warren Buffet or a George Soros making the same complaints. It’s just very difficult for even a good writer to pull it off. Nabokov did it, of course, but as good as he is Tevis isn’t able to do the same.
So we have a billionaire socialist narrator in a world where socialism is obviously destroying mankind who also goes on and on about his impotence while describing the world’s impotence. And then he starts obsessing about his muscles. It’s a mid-life crisis, but instead of a sports car he buys a spaceship and flies to a socialist planet.
There is no energy on the first planet they visit, and it has a poisonous rain that destroys individual effort and savings. But if you lie down in the grass and do nothing, it heals you and feeds you and takes away your pain. And he realizes this—“Yet if Belson loved me, just who had wiped out my food supply in the first place?… I thought little and felt little.”—but if the planet takes care of him, who cares if the planet also takes away his thoughts and feelings?
Walter Tevis is a fine writer, and he makes this readable. But it’s nowhere near the novel that The Queen's Gambit or Mockingbird is.
September 26, 2008
I have enjoyed Tevis's books and this one has an interesting premise -- that the earth has run out of energy and his protagonist is going to another planet to look for uranium. Pretty prophetic for a 1988 sci-fi book! However, the plot gets bogged down with side intrigues and the book turns into what I like to call "horny old guy science fiction". Overall, just okay.
February 29, 2024
about 1/2 of this novel consists of passages of stunning beauty and perception and the other 1/2 is largely inexplicable. tevis taking swings here that i don’t think many writers would dare take today
May 6, 2024
Nunca he tenido claro responder a la pregunta "¿tienes un escritor preferido?", pero normalmente el primero que me viene a la cabeza en formato novela, por lo mucho que me impactaron las lecturas de sus libros (uno de ellos hasta bautizó el blog que tuvimos unos amigos hasta hace unos años), es Walter Tevis. Había perdido la esperanza de ver publicado nada más de este autor en castellano debido a que sus títulos más populares ya habían sido traducidos, pero los menos no parecían tener, de entrada, mucha salida comercial... hasta el superlativo éxito de la serie "Gambito de reina" hace unos años, que imagino que abrió las puertas al interés por el escritor ( Editorial Impedimenta tiene además pensado lanzar una colección de relatos del autor durante este año. Ojalá algún día alguien recupere también los Matheson policiacos o los Trevanian inéditos...)
"Las huellas del sol" presenta, de entrada, un peculiar cruce entre dos cosmos opuestos, los de Robert Heinlein y Stanislaw Lem, al presentar a Ben Benson, un libertario podrido de millones, consumido por la impotencia sexual y el complejo de Edipo, que en el año 2063 se salta todas las leyes terrestres que impiden la exploración espacial debido al inmenso gastos de recursos energéticos que supone y se lanza en busca de Uranio en un remoto planeta. Allá, en la soledad de un mundo cuya hierba canta como si estuviera hechizada y alimenta y cuida del enfermo, Benson reflexionará sobre sus errores en el pasado... mientras que, en uno de los habituales temas de Tevis, descubrirá otros nuevos (como la adicción a la morfina).
A medida que avance la narración Tevis se irá deshaciendo de esos referentes, Benson dejará de parecer un pariente de Jubal Harshaw a medida que sus filias y fobias (románticas, familiares, incluso geopolíticas) vayan impulsando sus acciones (el personaje no cesa de tener en todo momento un impulso casi adolescente que le lleva a a actuar, resultando temerario y sorprendente en algunas ocasiones y haciéndole parecer un insoportable niñato de más de 50 años en otras) y regrese a la Tierra con tal de imponer sus condiciones. Mientras que sus anhelos y sus traumas son lo habitual en los personajes de Tevis, la megalomanía del personaje principal casi lo convierte en el reverso de aquel Thomas Jerome Newton que jamás pudo volver a su mundo natal a pesar de su capacidad de hacer dinero con tan solo chasquear los dedos.
Puede que "Las huellas del Sol" sea la respuesta, dentro del zeitgeist ochentero (Regan, neoliberalismo, Duran Duran) al tremendamente triste "El hombre que cayó a la Tierra" y los conflictos sin fin de los 70. Lo que si es, sin duda, es otra interesantísima adhesión al canon de un autor inolvidable. Y mientras que no se trata de su mejor novela (ni recomendaría empezar a leerlo por aquí), sí es una muestra más del inmenso talento de un escritor al que, creo, no se le ha valorado apenas una milésima parte de lo que merecería.
"Las huellas del sol" presenta, de entrada, un peculiar cruce entre dos cosmos opuestos, los de Robert Heinlein y Stanislaw Lem, al presentar a Ben Benson, un libertario podrido de millones, consumido por la impotencia sexual y el complejo de Edipo, que en el año 2063 se salta todas las leyes terrestres que impiden la exploración espacial debido al inmenso gastos de recursos energéticos que supone y se lanza en busca de Uranio en un remoto planeta. Allá, en la soledad de un mundo cuya hierba canta como si estuviera hechizada y alimenta y cuida del enfermo, Benson reflexionará sobre sus errores en el pasado... mientras que, en uno de los habituales temas de Tevis, descubrirá otros nuevos (como la adicción a la morfina).
A medida que avance la narración Tevis se irá deshaciendo de esos referentes, Benson dejará de parecer un pariente de Jubal Harshaw a medida que sus filias y fobias (románticas, familiares, incluso geopolíticas) vayan impulsando sus acciones (el personaje no cesa de tener en todo momento un impulso casi adolescente que le lleva a a actuar, resultando temerario y sorprendente en algunas ocasiones y haciéndole parecer un insoportable niñato de más de 50 años en otras) y regrese a la Tierra con tal de imponer sus condiciones. Mientras que sus anhelos y sus traumas son lo habitual en los personajes de Tevis, la megalomanía del personaje principal casi lo convierte en el reverso de aquel Thomas Jerome Newton que jamás pudo volver a su mundo natal a pesar de su capacidad de hacer dinero con tan solo chasquear los dedos.
Puede que "Las huellas del Sol" sea la respuesta, dentro del zeitgeist ochentero (Regan, neoliberalismo, Duran Duran) al tremendamente triste "El hombre que cayó a la Tierra" y los conflictos sin fin de los 70. Lo que si es, sin duda, es otra interesantísima adhesión al canon de un autor inolvidable. Y mientras que no se trata de su mejor novela (ni recomendaría empezar a leerlo por aquí), sí es una muestra más del inmenso talento de un escritor al que, creo, no se le ha valorado apenas una milésima parte de lo que merecería.
April 18, 2025
Oh, brillante futuro (Comentario, 2025)
Me ha causado mucha gracia cómo la obra parecía virar en una dirección y da un volantazo para girar en otra. La gracia no tiene que ver con lo inesperado en términos de estructura, sino con lo convencional del retorno a una especie de estado inicial de las cosas. A ver, perdonen el balbuceo, intentaré desenredarme:
Me llama mucho la atención de que el progreso, una edad de oro tecnológica basada en las prácticas extractivas, sea tan clásicamente comprendido, tan moderno, tan lo que prometen las compañías gigantes tecnológicas actuales. Fusión nuclear y materiales extraterrestres que anulan el riesgo de los derrames. Y que la piñata no termine nunca. ¡Salud!
Bah, por fuera del anciano vociferante que se destila en los párrafos anteriores aquí hay una novela que es dos fácilmente disfrutable. Una primera parte que habla sobre ermitaños psicodélicos en planetas de obsidiana, y una segunda que es un entramado de tensiones políticas y detectivescas que supongo disfrutará quien disfruta de los juegos del poder.
Es curioso haber leído esta obra el mismo año que leí Los tres estigmas de Palmer Eldrich. Podrían ser variaciones sobre el mismo tema (magnate deja la Tierra para buscar comercio en el espacio exterior y encuentra una experiencia metafísica en el proceso), digamos que la solución de Walter Tevis es más tibia.
Me ha causado mucha gracia cómo la obra parecía virar en una dirección y da un volantazo para girar en otra. La gracia no tiene que ver con lo inesperado en términos de estructura, sino con lo convencional del retorno a una especie de estado inicial de las cosas. A ver, perdonen el balbuceo, intentaré desenredarme:
Me llama mucho la atención de que el progreso, una edad de oro tecnológica basada en las prácticas extractivas, sea tan clásicamente comprendido, tan moderno, tan lo que prometen las compañías gigantes tecnológicas actuales. Fusión nuclear y materiales extraterrestres que anulan el riesgo de los derrames. Y que la piñata no termine nunca. ¡Salud!
Bah, por fuera del anciano vociferante que se destila en los párrafos anteriores aquí hay una novela que es dos fácilmente disfrutable. Una primera parte que habla sobre ermitaños psicodélicos en planetas de obsidiana, y una segunda que es un entramado de tensiones políticas y detectivescas que supongo disfrutará quien disfruta de los juegos del poder.
Es curioso haber leído esta obra el mismo año que leí Los tres estigmas de Palmer Eldrich. Podrían ser variaciones sobre el mismo tema (magnate deja la Tierra para buscar comercio en el espacio exterior y encuentra una experiencia metafísica en el proceso), digamos que la solución de Walter Tevis es más tibia.
August 11, 2025
Un libro divertido y ligero. Neurótico en lo freudiano más clásico y con una lectura de clases depresiva, dibuja un mundo realmente convincente y bien hecho. Se compromete con el monólogo interior de su protagonista, pero no termina por lanzarlo adonde debe, supongo que con el anhelo de que hasta el más capullo puede redimirse. Eso o que pretende decirnos que casi nunca se castiga a quien lo merece. Por lo demás, no llega a engancharme como la que para mí es la mejor obra del autor. No tiene su profundidad ni intimismo, no te va a dejar pensando después. Pero es bien entretenido. Quizás demasiado en la tierra para la exploración espacial que parece prometer en un principio, aunque es capaz de conseguir los tintes del mejor Solaris. No está nada mal.
December 27, 2013
Count me as a Walter Tevis fan now. I enjoyed The Steps of the Sun quite a bit. I read The Man Who Fell to Earth about fifteen years ago, but didn't know anything about Walter Tevis or his other books until recently, when these things started coming to my attention on Goodreads. I'd like to read Mockingbird. The Steps of the Sun showed up in the used section of the bookshop I frequent first though, and some quirkiness about the cover art, the synopsis, or the by-line ("Can one man save a PLANET? Can one planet save a MAN?") spoke to me, and I decided it was time to read some more Tevis.
Glad I did, because it really exceeded my expectations. Walter Tevis is a very thoughtful writer with a writing style that has an easy flow to it. He writes great characters. He's not so good at predicting the future, but the main character's thoughts are so fun to follow that anachronisms in the setting are overshadowed. We grant, this could happen in a universe somewhere.. maybe.. -ish.
The comparison that comes to mind most readily for this book is with C.J. Cherryh. Like so much of Cherryh's work, Tevis puts you square in the mind of an imperfect person struggling with an imperfect world and takes you through every step of this person's emotional journey. In The Steps of the Sun, we follow someone who is difficult to like, but very human, so identifiable. Ben Belson is a very macho guy's guy, and for as common of a hero trope as that may be, I can't think of many other books with this kind of main character, who also had such a rich emotional life. He can also kick ass when given half a chance.
I will definitely be keeping this book in my collection, as it is unique in the wider world of science fiction. It will be the kind of thing I recommend to people looking for more from science fiction than aliens and whizbang technology. And I'll definitely be reading more Walter Tevis.
Glad I did, because it really exceeded my expectations. Walter Tevis is a very thoughtful writer with a writing style that has an easy flow to it. He writes great characters. He's not so good at predicting the future, but the main character's thoughts are so fun to follow that anachronisms in the setting are overshadowed. We grant, this could happen in a universe somewhere.. maybe.. -ish.
The comparison that comes to mind most readily for this book is with C.J. Cherryh. Like so much of Cherryh's work, Tevis puts you square in the mind of an imperfect person struggling with an imperfect world and takes you through every step of this person's emotional journey. In The Steps of the Sun, we follow someone who is difficult to like, but very human, so identifiable. Ben Belson is a very macho guy's guy, and for as common of a hero trope as that may be, I can't think of many other books with this kind of main character, who also had such a rich emotional life. He can also kick ass when given half a chance.
I will definitely be keeping this book in my collection, as it is unique in the wider world of science fiction. It will be the kind of thing I recommend to people looking for more from science fiction than aliens and whizbang technology. And I'll definitely be reading more Walter Tevis.
March 31, 2014
It's 2063 and nuclear powered spaceships can warp to land on planets of distant suns of our galaxy. But space travel has been forbidden - there is an energy crisis on earth. Oil is almost gone, and coal is so scarce, it's rationed, and earth is in the grip of an ice age. Nuclear powered electricity isn't popular because of accidents. But the coal tycoon, Benjamin Belson, has flown to another sun's planet anyway. He's seeking 'safe uranium'. And he's running away from himself. He's finally realizing he drives the women around him crazy and he wants to change that. The introspection holds up. The alien life forms are truly alien. The political intrigue when he gets back on earth, is fast moving and fun - slipping out of the grasp of authorities. Good romp, assisted by deep self understanding and prophetic insight. China is a major power.
November 10, 2022
Nejslabší Tevisova kniha, kterou jsem četla. Asi proto, že ze všech ostatních jsem zatím byla nadšená, měla jsem vyšší očekávání a proto je to i horší zklamání.
První část mimo Zemi se mi líbila, i když mě otravovaly ty vzpomínky impotenta.
Po návratu na Zem mě bavilo až akční ladění, ale ke konci mě dokonale otrávilo plno politiky, najednou získaná potence a uspěchaný až klišoidní závěr.
Na druhou stranu jsem ale s Benem strávila skoro rok, než jsem to dočetla, a za tu dobu jsem si na něj zvykla, až mi i byl sympatický. A možná mi bude chybět.
První část mimo Zemi se mi líbila, i když mě otravovaly ty vzpomínky impotenta.
Po návratu na Zem mě bavilo až akční ladění, ale ke konci mě dokonale otrávilo plno politiky, najednou získaná potence a uspěchaný až klišoidní závěr.
Na druhou stranu jsem ale s Benem strávila skoro rok, než jsem to dočetla, a za tu dobu jsem si na něj zvykla, až mi i byl sympatický. A možná mi bude chybět.
July 17, 2025
“There is beauty in our galaxy that the human mind can only reach out for and brush against before recoiling.”
This was so bad and boring it’s actually impressive. The main character MIGHT be the worst person I’ve ever read about, and everything miraculously works out for him. Like he was a bad husband (cheated on his wife, verbally abused her, ignored her, etc), a bad father (ignored them and chased money), a billionaire capitalist, and just annoying in general
That quote is fire though and I liked the 2 planets so it gets 2 stars
This was so bad and boring it’s actually impressive. The main character MIGHT be the worst person I’ve ever read about, and everything miraculously works out for him. Like he was a bad husband (cheated on his wife, verbally abused her, ignored her, etc), a bad father (ignored them and chased money), a billionaire capitalist, and just annoying in general
That quote is fire though and I liked the 2 planets so it gets 2 stars
February 5, 2023
Not my favourite Tevis
I’m a fan of Walter Tevis’s futuristic novels but this is not my favourite, partly because the protagonist is not as sympathetic or engaging as some others. I preferred The Man Who Fell to Earth and Mockingbird and am glad I read those before The Steps of the Sun, or I might have given them a miss.
I’m a fan of Walter Tevis’s futuristic novels but this is not my favourite, partly because the protagonist is not as sympathetic or engaging as some others. I preferred The Man Who Fell to Earth and Mockingbird and am glad I read those before The Steps of the Sun, or I might have given them a miss.
July 4, 2023
I am a grown-up. I can read a book in which the protagonist is an unappealing, awful human being. Even one much like Donald Trump. But I don’t want to. Nicely written though it is. Maybe someday.
March 23, 2025
Tiene mérito lograr que te acabe interesando un protagonista tan profundamente odioso como el de la novela, aunque supongo que ahí está la magia de la ficción. Divertida, enamorada del espíritu humano y capaz de predecir a gentuza como Musk con cuarenta años de antelación. Buena lectura.
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August 30, 2024DNF 😭😭😭😭
August 6, 2024
This book has some of Tevis's best writing and also some of his worst.
I love Walter Tevis.
And aside from his early short stories in the 2023 "The King is Dead" collection, I've read everything he has ever published.
I love all of it. Even his work that wasn't exactly my taste (Mockingbird).
I find all his work has a certain nostalgic and familiar charm to it.
I might even reread The Hustler and The Colour of Money.
But this book, about a Billionaire with sex problems, just reads like Tevis's delusions of grandeur.
I'm sad to write this review. I was sad whilst reading this book. I just wanted it to be over. I love Walter Tevis and I wish he were still alive and still widely read. I wish I'd had a chance to meet him.
But this book is just dogshit.
Read it only if (like me) Tevis himself is interesting to you.
I love Walter Tevis.
And aside from his early short stories in the 2023 "The King is Dead" collection, I've read everything he has ever published.
I love all of it. Even his work that wasn't exactly my taste (Mockingbird).
I find all his work has a certain nostalgic and familiar charm to it.
I might even reread The Hustler and The Colour of Money.
But this book, about a Billionaire with sex problems, just reads like Tevis's delusions of grandeur.
I'm sad to write this review. I was sad whilst reading this book. I just wanted it to be over. I love Walter Tevis and I wish he were still alive and still widely read. I wish I'd had a chance to meet him.
But this book is just dogshit.
Read it only if (like me) Tevis himself is interesting to you.
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