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Eternity Road
Copyright 1997 by
Jack McDevitt
I first read this in 1999 and most recently in May 2000
Having spent the last four weeks flat on my back recovering from a
misspent youth, I was in need of a road book. Jack Kerouac's "On
The Road" would have been ideal, except that it would have resulted in
me quitting my job, calling up my old mate Mike Marsh and setting out to
backpack across Asia. So I settled for something less energetic, namely
making a decision whether to reread "Destiny's Road" by Larry Niven, or
McDevitt's "Eternity Road". I plumped for the latter and think for this
lazy Sunday that I made the right decision.
This is "another humankind struggling to rebuild after a global catastrophe". It is hundreds of
years after almost everybody died. In America, small towns are
rebuilding. A few books survive from before the holocaust. Myths and
legends persist about pre-collapse civilisation. One of these legends is
of the city of Haven, which allegedly survived the disasters and
attempted to maintain civilization and knowledge through the intervening
centuries.
Chaka's brother left on the previous expedition to find this lost city,
from which only one person returned alive, and now, nine years later,
Chaka herself decides to form an expedition and seek once more for Haven.
I enjoyed this. What surprised me is just how many of the travelers get killed off
along the way - it hardly seemed fair really - there I was just beginning
to get their names straight and they're casually disposed of without
even a jot of consideration for the effort I'd already put in. On the
other hand, their deaths add a nice, if sad, touch of tough reality to
the story.
What did I like best? Union Station's greater than 745 years of
dedicated service. Now that's an uptime of which to be proud.
And on the subject of post-Apocalyptic SF, if you haven't yet read "A
Canticle for Leibowitz", then order it from Amazon now, assuming it's
still in print.
Loaded on the 16th May 2001.
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