Balise reviewed Foundation by Isaac Asimov (Foundation, #1)
Review of 'Foundation' on 'Goodreads'
3 stars
I have a problem with Foundation. I do consider myself an Asimov fan, and I've never been able to finish Foundation. Hell, up until this time, I hadn't even finished the first volume of Foundation. Not by lack of trying; I think I may have started to read it 4 or 5 times in the last 12 years or so.
To me, this is annoying, because Foundation is widely acknowledged as a great achievement in Asimov's (prolific) career and more generally in Sci-Fi. So I felt I was missing out.
Foundation is the story of the fall of the Galactic empire and of the ways to alleviate the consequences of it. I think what disturbed be most for my first attempts was that the five parts of the book are very loosely tied, a huge chunk of time goes by inbetween, without it being spelt out immediately, and with little …
I have a problem with Foundation. I do consider myself an Asimov fan, and I've never been able to finish Foundation. Hell, up until this time, I hadn't even finished the first volume of Foundation. Not by lack of trying; I think I may have started to read it 4 or 5 times in the last 12 years or so.
To me, this is annoying, because Foundation is widely acknowledged as a great achievement in Asimov's (prolific) career and more generally in Sci-Fi. So I felt I was missing out.
Foundation is the story of the fall of the Galactic empire and of the ways to alleviate the consequences of it. I think what disturbed be most for my first attempts was that the five parts of the book are very loosely tied, a huge chunk of time goes by inbetween, without it being spelt out immediately, and with little to none common characters between the parts (a character who's present in one part may well have become almost a myth in the following parts). So, to me, it's confusing and annoying - that feeling of just having a glimpse of a character and poof it disappears into oblivion bothers me. Granted, once you "got" the underlying structure, it is less confusing.
I also learnt (because I did some meta-reading afterwards) that Foundation as we know it today was in fact published as "individual" stories (in Astounding). A note from the editor at the beginning of the book would have been welcome, though.
So I finished the first one... where do I go from here? I'm not convinced I'll continue. I mean, it's objectively good, and I can see the appeal, having the impression of reading how history writes itself in a pretty imposing setup. But... I just don't think it's my kind of good, and by that I mean "the kind of good I really enjoy". I still feel I'm somehow missing out, but now I'm at peace with it. I may still have some nagging feeling at some point in the future telling me that maybe the second volume (or the third, or...) is kind of different and that I am indeed missing out, but we'll see when/if the time comes :)
