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From: donn@sdchema.UUCP
Newsgroups: net.sf-lovers
Subject: Re: Lucifer's Hammer
Message-ID: <1003@sdchema.UUCP>
Date: Tue, 27-Dec-83 01:15:02 EST
Article-I.D.: sdchema.1003
Posted: Tue Dec 27 01:15:02 1983
Date-Received: Wed, 28-Dec-83 02:12:58 EST
Organization: UC San Diego Chemistry Dept. NIH Research Resource
Lines: 29

Lest the (probably more than 3) people who haven't read LUCIFER'S
HAMMER be overwhelmed by Darth Wombat's glowing recommendation of the
book, I would like to mention some of the negative things about the
book.

It is written in a fairly lurid pulp style; at points the writing
(especially dialogue) becomes so bad that it parodies the genre.  I
found parts of the novel to be almost unreadable for this reason.

It is bloated.  There are far too many characters doing much too little
to advance the story.  I would feel less annoyed by this if the
characters seemed at all realistic -- as the book stands, I have a hard
time telling many of them apart.

It is hard to follow.  Many plotlines are constantly switching back and
forth.  The effect is supposed to give you a broader picture of the
effects of the disaster, but since so many of the characters were
uninteresting, I found myself skipping over the dull parts.  There
wasn't as much motivation to follow everything as there was in (say)
Brunner's STAND ON ZANZIBAR, which has similar problems with size and
complexity.

I was rather disappointed by LUCIFER'S HAMMER -- I thought of it as a
quick hack to produce a bestseller.  I know Larry Niven can do better
than this.  All of Niven's novels have been weaker than his stories,
however (in my opinion)...

Donn Seeley    UCSD Chemistry Dept. RRCF    ucbvax!sdcsvax!sdchema!donn
32 52' 30"N 117 14' 25"W  (619) 452-4016    sdcsvax!sdchema!donn@noscvax