Silverberg, Robert

• Series: The Majipoor Trilogy
  • Lord Valentine's Castle (7 r)
  • Majipoor Chronicles (5 r)
  • Valentine Pontifex (5 r)

    • Fantasy series about the king of a world who gets a serious bout of amnesia and must find his way back to the throne again. Overall, pretty standard fantasy. I enjoyed it pretty well, but it didn't make a huge impression on me. Some interesting new devices, like the island of dreams. I think the ideas and plot were pretty good, so I don't really remember what didn't make me like it more.

• Dying Inside (7)

  • A short novel from the 1960's that more or less resembles the diary of a telepath who is slowly but surely feeling his special ability fade away. Lots of interesting ground is covered here...the guy has always been reclusive and is somewhat of a loser. Has he wasted a valuable asset that should have been given to society? How will he cope with the loss and the guilt? This is a book to read more for the concept than for the plot, and the concept is a good one.

• Downward to the Earth (7)

  • In the prologue to this novel, Silverberg admits that the book is not really meant to be original but rather some kind of homage to Conrad's "Heart of Darkness" and the work of Kipling (and his novels of India). The parallels are striking, but to me, they weren't really distracting. The general premise is that of a "fallen man" who returns to a place he once used to his advantage in the hopes that the place would offer him some hope at redemption. In this case, the "fallen man" is a former colony governor on a world populated by elephantine creatures and a companion species, both of which are intelligent, although, by our standards, not outwardly civilized. Though the book dragged a bit at first and admittedly borrows whole scenes straight from the classics of Conrad and Kipling, the payoff at the end is well worth it. This is a fairly short, moving novel worth looking for at an old used bookstore. I'm certain it will be reissued someday as a "classic", so get it cheap while you can.

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