Tower of Glass

Gideon's Fall: When You Dont Have a Prayer, Only a Miracle Will Do Classic Silverberg, short enough to be read in a sitting, yet well constructed with detailed story lines and vibrates with sexual tension.

This 1970 science-fiction novel is Silverberg in top form. The intertwined plots deal with the complex, mystical, and ultimately tragic interactions of humans and androids, and with the building of an immense tower that is intended to broadcast a message to the stars. The first intelligent message from an alien life form has been received, and Simeon Krug is obsessed with his self-imposed role as the man who will respond to that message. Wealthy, powerful, and brilliantly inventive, Krug has made his fortune in many ways but primarily by developing the first artificial people, the androids, to serve as slaves to their human owners. "Tower of Glass" has some of Silverberg's best writing, and the character development is powerful and believable. This fast-paced story is engrossing and exciting from the first page to the last.

Simeon Krug, a fantastically wealthy entrepreneur, endeavors to communicate with the stars in this fascinating tale of a man's incredible hubris and the destruction it wreaks on all within his sphere of influence, which includes the entire world. Every one of Krug's actions appears to be motivated by the need for self-aggrandizement, although he would probably be shocked to hear it; this blindness is a fascinating aspect of the character. Krug wants to stretch his presence across this universe, so he is building a mile-high glass tower on the northern tundra that will house a tachyon projector. He needs workers for his project, so he creates androids that are capable of the full range of human emotion and presses them into service. Some reviewers have complained that the story ends on an inconclusive note but, if you read this story, just think about the havoc that Krug has caused through his single-minded attachment to his own grand schemes without adequate thought to their consequences. Robert Silverberg has penned a worthy cautionary tale about the danger of pairing too much power with too much ambition and too little ability or desire to imagine any result but what the great man intends.

A very good story of ambition and perceptions. None of the themes are particularly unique, but their particular incarnation and use are powerful. I disagree heartily with one of the previous reviewers who stated that no significant commentary was made on the themes of the book. I think this is only true if you are expecting Lazarus Long to pop out whack you on the head with the author's views. The commentary is very present through the character's views and actions, particularly as defined by social class and generation. It is, to put a finer point on it, implicit not explicit. And it requires, I think, an understanding of the minutia of (fairly) modern class distinction. Manuel's love of the thin, high breasted woman compared to his father's love of full figured, rapacious peasant women is a great point of contrast, one of many that together illuminates a lot about the Manuel-Simeon relationship. Not just that, but all father-son and self-made vs. money-born relationships. Maybe I enjoy Manuel and Simeon simply because they remind me of so many real, relatively affluent families I have known. The android/creator/god story had a bit more of a conventional SF approach, but was rendered poignantly and painfully. There was a certain lack-of-conclusion, but in this case I find that a positive. To have extended the story much beyond the conclusion would have risked tacking on indeterminate chapters of boring resolution, the sort of stuff that makes you want to throw an otherwise fine book across the room in frustration.However, I don't think this is nearly Silverberg's best books. Though better than the meandering Nightwings, it is not nearly as good as _Dying Inside_ (Highly recommended. One of the best books ever written) and I don't think quite as good as _Up The Line_, though I'm torn on that.

Now this is interesting, Silverberg manages to not only make a comment on the slim distinction between created and born life but also an examination of egomania at the same time. The story is thus: the millionaire Krug has one dream and that's to make contact with a race from another star. When he gets word that signals are being received from another star, he throws all of his resources into creating a giant glass tower in the middle of the Arctic to make contact with the presumed beings. This of course takes a rather determined personality and Krug goes at his goal almost to the exclusion of all else. Silverberg gets you inside the head of this at times obsessed man and you may not sympathize with this man but you certainly get to know him. You also get a view of the effect this has on the others around him, and a view of the world as well, which Krug has gone a long way to shaping. You see, Krug has made the first "androids", living and thinking beings that grow out of tanks and do most of the work on his tower as well as other uses all around the world. The androids wants a better place in society. However they also worship Krug as a god and pay homage to him in secret shrines. So the tension between human and androids and even between other androids flails around the totally oblivious Krug while the tower goes up and up and up. Sound complicated? It can be but the varied tones and the very three dimensional characters add up to a wealth of great moments and an overall plot that's hard to put down. It may not be the most focused book Silverberg ever did and it suffers a bit from the sheer diversity as he tries to tackle a lot of things at once but it all comes out well (for Silverberg at least, the book is great, the characters don't make out as well) and this is definitely a book to be searched for if you can and snatched up whenever you find it. When I first found it about two years ago I could hardly believe my luck and upon reading it now it was money well spent. They just don't make books like this these days. Get it back into print!