More Tales of Pirx the Pilot

Lem's vision of the future is probably closer than what we'd see from most other writers. When other authors envision grand spires rising into the stars and sleek spaceships careening through the void, captained by dashing pilots and heroic crews, Lem seems to realize that when we get there, the future will be populated by people. People like us, who will be mechanics and engineers and scientists, whose job will be to make sure all these complicated pieces of equipment that send us shakily climbing into the stars won't fall apart or go haywire. It will be scary and boring and exhilarating and mundane. Just like your job now. In this second volume of Pirx stories, our hero is the same and not the same. Where in the first volume we met him as a bumbling pilot learning the ropes and discovering solutions by bucking conventions and not accepting what he was told, here he's a seasoned and established pilot, much calmer than before, with none of the awkwardness of his earlier self. It feels like a whole different character at times and the stories have changed slightly, to more cerebral mysteries that don't have easy answers, like if Isaac Asimov had started to get really cryptic. All of these tend to revolve around robots or technology. In two of them, Pirx and company go hunting for a robot, and while the stories themselves are slight, there's a haunting atmosphere to it, as Pirx discovers that just because you program something doesn't mean you understand it. The other two are puzzles, with one showing Pirx under review for a run gone poorly . . . in that he's faced with the fact that one of his crew is a robot and may be trying to sabotage things. The other has him investigating a crash (and the slow motion destruction of the ship while the ground crew watches helplessly is both more dramatic and eerie than any Star Wars special effect) . . . these tales mostly revolve around talk as he debates ideas with different characters before either the solution presents itself or we discover what Pirx knew all along. This is not exciting, action packed SF, but it is thought provoking and worth it just for the feel alone, of a future feel of grit and errors and dust and failure and people who are just cashing a paycheck so they can get to the weekend. Perhaps a bit flatter than the first volume (nothing really comes close to the robot banging out the Morse code last words of a crew) but still worth a read if you're a Lem fan or want to discover how realistic science-fiction isn't necessarily an oxymoron.

Makes for a great read. Each story is strong on its own, and most are short enough to read in one sitting. In these tales we see Pirx has matured from a bemused rookie into a somewhat world-weary expert pilot. Pirx's adventures take him from the vastness of space to the colonies on mars and on the moon, as well as to an uninhabited earth-like planet who's rocky spires beg to be conquered. The focus of most of the stories is artificial intelligence gone awry and man's over-reliance on technology. All are written with Lem's trademark humor, technological realism, and eye for human character traits. A must-have for Lem fans, and a great buy for sci-fi lovers in general.

As a teacher of reluctant readers, I cannot keep copies of this book on my shelves. I used to introduce Stanislaw Lem to the students first, but this intimidated them. After I changed to letting the stories hook them first, I have found all of his books disappearing. They are fascinated by irreverence and humour in quality writing. I cannot complain about the books disappearing; they are reading.

This book is great, although I'm not too crazy about the translation. Realistically though, if you're not planning on learning to speak Polish fluently anytime soon, you should get this copy. It's not that bad. Lem is a great, realistic, down-to-earthy (no pun intended) Science Fiction author. Also get Solaris,...and Fiasco.

Lem, as always, comes through. In some of his other work he takes on philosophy, science, religion, usually with a humorous strain; in this book, and its predecessor, Tales of Pirx the Pilot, he chooses to write straight hard SF. However, the image usually conjured up by 'hard' SF is Asimov, Heinlen, and so on, meaning writing anchored on scientific devices and with generally far less time spent on character development. Pirx is a welcome antidote. He is an engineer and pilot, grounded in a reality made up not of quantum-physical theories but of nuts and bolts. He's a professional and strictly blue-collar. REading this book might give you an idea of what the future REALLY will be like.