Starfarers was one of Poul Anderson's last works, published in 1998 three years before the science-fiction author's death at the age of 74. It also looks back decades to his early career, incorporating the short story "Ghetto" that was published back in the 1950s. Its plot praises the human ambition to explore: after x-ray starship trails are discovered in star systems far away, the starship Envoy is launched to meet these aliens.Relativistic effects mean that thousands of years will pass on Earth and only a brief time for the crew on board. Between chapters on the adventures of the crew, Anderson depicts the changing civilizations on earth, along with the gradual decline of interest in starfaring and the restriction of visiting starship crews to a ghetto. While Anderson makes the interesting suggesting that space travel may only be a brief phase in a species's evolution, this is a frustrating book, featuring many of the perennial flaws of Anderson's style but magnified and feeling something like a halfhearted effort. For one, Envoy has a motley crew: a Hungarian, Israeli, Scotswoman, Chinese, Zulu, etc. Anderson may have thought he was adding color and authenticity by having them speak in dialect or make reference to their homes, but really these are a bunch of ethnic stereotypes. Only people who think that e.g. the Irish walk around greeting each other with "Top of the mornin' to ye" will be able to suspend disbelief. Artificial intelligence and personal computing are absent. The lack of the former is easy to understand: Anderson was an ardent Libertarian, and as he set out in his earlier series beginning with Harvest of Stars, he believed that the rise of super-human intelligence would lead to central planning and quench human initiative. The lack of more computing than the screens that the crews consult is inexcusable: by the time Anderson wrote this book, PDAs existed and technology was moving to smaller form factors, but his people of future have no more tech than what could have been imagined in the 1950s. Finally, the dialogue is often risible, with characters discussing basic aspects of the plot with each other after they have already lived and worked closely with each other for years. For a novelist with a career of a half-century behind him, it is strange how Anderson forgets the "show don't tell" principle.
A slightly interesting story but the writing is preposterous and pretentious. Specifically, the dialogue between characters, astronauts chosen for a mission of indeterminate length to a distant star, is unbelievably cliche and shallow. Even after spending years with eachother on the mission, they are still discussing basic facts and motivations in each others' lives? Dumb.The larger issues, relating to the starfarers being isolated from planetary populations due to time dilation effects, are more interestingly covered by Vernor Vinge in "A Deepness in the Sky", or even Charles Sheffield in "Between the Strokes of Night." Both of those works examine how a starfaring population can become culturally isolated from planet-bound humanity, but manage to avoid the pretentious dialogue and characterizations of Anderson.
What do You think about Starfarers (1999)?
I absolutely loved this book!!I haven't read a lot of books that take place in space, so "Starfarers" was a fantastic place to start. And it isn't quite what I expected from the summary that was on the back.The worst part to get through was the very beginning, simply because there was a lot of scientific talk that went over my head until I went back to reread it. However, once I got past the prologue and into the actual story, it held my interest and left me wanting more."Starfarers" has a little bit of everything. Drama. Romance. Mystery. Intrigue. And even a few comedic moments. It really shows the way that a group of people would mix together and live together if they were in s apace ship that was designed to take them farther away in space than anyone's ever gone before. The zero-zero drive is an amazing idea!! Occasionally, the story goes back to what's happening on earth and with other starfarers. Some of those bits are interesting, and some of them were a bit more difficult for me to get into. But I like the idea of seeing how Earth is changing while the main characters are out on their journey in the stars. So it wasn't too bad at all. But I'd have to say the best part for me was when the story was focusing on the crew members and what they were up to.And the aliens!!! My goodness! They aren't at all what I think of when I think of aliens. Which is a great thing. I loved the parts with the Yonderfolk.
—Crystal
