Frederik Pohl

Gateway (Heechee Saga)

Sarah Sammis

At a time of food shortages, a crashing world economy and recently expensive fuel, Gateway by Frederik Pohl is relevant and contemporary. Told in flashback through a series of conversations between a patient and his psychiatrist, Gateway, is an account of Robinette Broadhead's time on Gateway, an alien outpost.

Gateway captures the feeling of adventure of the classic frontier stories bringing to mind the works of Daniel Defoe, Robert Louis Stevenson, Jack London and Jules Verne. Gateway is both an island of untold mysteries and treasure and port of call for potentially dangerous trips into uncharted space.

The old days of exploration to the "new world" were controlled by governments. Gateway, the profits go to the "Corporation". Anything that can be charged or taxed is and failure to pay will result in being kicked off Gateway (whether or not a seat on a ship is available). Having worked for a number of venture capital funded, cash-strapped corporations, I found the seedy business side of Gateway very amusing.

Gateway by itself is solid, well told science fiction. Pohl adds more realism to it by including tidbits of fictional ephemera like lines of code from the computerized psychiatrist, rules and regulations posted by the corporation and a large number of classified ads. The classifies were my favorite addition to the novel.

The book is the first novel length story set in the Heechee universe. They were first mentioned in Merchant of Venus. The remaining books in the Heechee book are Beyond the Blue Event Horizon (1980), Heechee Rendezvous (1984), Annals of the Heechee (1987) and The Boy Who Would Live Forever (2004). I have the remaining two books of the original trilogy and will be reviewing them early in 2009. If I didn't have other reading commitments, I would be reading and reviewing them now.

A thought for you as I close this review. Don't the ships on 1977 cover look like the Axiom from Wall-E?

Anthony

I really enjoyed the way the author switched between the different narratives in this book. At first I was annoyed by the tidbits of world-building articles and things that would appear on the pages but they ended up being enjoyable for me.

I'm not sure if I will continue on in the series as most people don't seem to rate it highly (minus #2) but this was definitely enjoyable.

Would recommend for getting into sci-fi!

Gavin

Hits hard, leaves marks. The ignoble, epistemically pinched, economic-realist sci-fi as written by the Strugatskys or Stross. I love it so much that even the Rogerian psychotherapy at its core doesn't annoy me; that even its 90% focus on one spoiled and abusive bastard is a merit of it. Spoilers everywhere. Physics and sin. No shortage of things left to do.


 In one sentence: Dreadful human being reflects on his dreadful actions while dead aliens look on.

 To be read when: overconfident; always.

 
    Galef type: 

Values 2 - thought experiments for you to reflect on how you feel about something .

Kelsey Lynn

Almost done with the Hugo 70s, and this is probably my favorite of the decade. 
 Gateway is the beginning of Pohl's 'Heechee' series. A wonderfully written and interesting intro to a future influenced by the discovery of alien technology. What made me love this book, a lot, is honestly what will make a lot of people hate it.
 The story revolves around Robinette 'Bob' Broadhead, a somewhat emotionally and existentially lost man. Who grew up in food mines and won the lottery. With his winnings he buys a one way ticket to Gateway, an alien (the heechee) hub discovered abandoned and with hundreds of ships with settings no one understands. All people know is they will go from Gateway, to somewhere unknown, and back again. This has become the goal of treasure hunters, thrill seekers and desperate people. You pay a fortune to go, you get in a ship and IF you make it back, there is money for photos, readings adtifacts, anything you can find. Making money isn't hard, it's actually making it back. This hub has been abandoned for a long long time. Some of the unknown coordinates could be in the middle of a star now, the ship could run out of fuel and no one would know. The death rate is high.
 So our Rob is hoping to win the lottery twice.
The story is told in two main ways, and a third smaller way. Half of the book is in present day, Rob is rich, but so broken he's seeing an AI shrink. We begin learning of this end all mission that messed him up, but through an unreliable and defensive narrator. The other half (it's every other chapter) is Bob on Gateway, his arrival, and the build up to said event. This method creates akward pacing at times, but is an interesting way to control the emotional tension of the book. You keep waiting for the other shoe to drop. I love love love this kind of stress. It never felt like an adventure or a romance, it was always emotional, a drama, teensy thriller, so far an uncommon thing for Hugo winners. 
 The third style was taking a page from 'Stand on Zanzibar' a previous winner, every few pages or so we'd have the classifieds of Gateway, excerts from a lecture, a history text, a letter home. Little interludes to help us understand the thoughts and inner workings of Gateway and just how little of the HeeChee the actually know.
 
 Now, on to what I LOVE and most people hate. A, Bob, is not likeable, he's got a huge chip off his shoulder, he's mean, he's a womanizer, violent, a coward, not a lot going for him. But for me, this made him one of the most real characters yet. He wasn't a hero, or a mary sue, he was a legit human being, flaws and all. B, The excitement is the emotional drama, the dread and worry that builds is the drama of the story, there is no bad guy, the climax is the two versions of the story converging, and for most, it was probably lackluster. I love love love this style of casual emotional drama. C, This has what my partner likes to call 'a Kelsey ending' anticlimatic and emotionally raw. I both want and don't want to read the second book cause I don't want to lose the intensity of this ending for me. I want it to remain so, raw and unfinished and honest and real. I don't want some magic to fix things. 

Loved it

Gateway (S.F. Masterworks)

ashley hopkins

I just started this, but it started off interesting
Review to come. :)

Just know for now I really enjoyed it. I'm interested to see if there will be a second.

Pam Sartain

An uncomfortable read, with Bob, as the protagonist, someone you spend most of the book not understanding properly. 

It was strange, but good! An important book in the genre!

I can see the huge influence this book had on Alistair Reynolds!

Gateway (Heechee Saga)

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