Thursday, October 10, 2013

Hugo Winner Review: 1966 This Immortal (serialized as ...And Call Me Conrad)



Roger Zelazny
Read 3/2013, reviewed 4/21/2013, revised 10/9/2018
3 stars


I love the genres of anti-hero and of mixing religion and theology with science fiction.  Zelazny explores these themes in “This Immortal.”  I enjoyed this book.  However, Zelazny more fully realizes these themes in his later work “Lord of Light.” 

Conrad is another reluctant hero, and apparently super-human in some way.  But I didn’t like him as much as I liked Sam in “Lord.”  I found it took a longer time than usual to get into both the character and the plot.  The concept about a group a rich people going on a yacht trip in a post-apocalyptic world seemed a little strange at first.  Nonetheless, I liked the premise of an alien doing a survey of the earth as an interplanetary high priced tourist attraction, and Conrad, our anti-hero involved in keeping this visitor from falling into the hands of the tribes of savages and the evil intentions of the government.

In reviewing this book, I’m a little sad that I don’t have as strong an emotional memory of the book.  I do remember feeling a bit let down, but overall liking the book.  I didn’t enjoy it quite as much as “Lord of Light,” but I thought it was well written and realized.  However, this was the first of three Hugo winners I read when my partner underwent radiation treatment.  I stayed in an extended-stay motel so I wouldn’t be contaminated by his radioactive sweat.  I worried about him, and was trying to adjust to my temporary surroundings.  I think this distracted me enough during these first few days of this ordeal that I couldn’t devote myself to full immersion into the story.  This is one I think I should re-read at some point in the future and review again at that time.


I gave this book 3 stars.  I might change my mind in the future.  What surprises me is that this book tied with Dune for the 1966 Hugo.  I haven’t read Dune since college.  I’m saving the rereading for the end of this challenge.  But even with my faulty memory of it from thirty years ago, “This Immortal” seems like a lightweight compared to Dune.  I’m guessing that Zelazny had (has) a huge fan base, and with this book finally getting Zelazny on the ballot, his fans came out in droves to vote for it.

8 comments:

  1. I think I really loved the pace of this book almost more than anything else. Weirdly slow post apocalyptic yachting as you call it, punctuated by really terrific fight scenes. I'm not really even a fan of a fight scene in books but in this case I had a lot of fun reading them. Also Conrad's hell hound was redonks. All that being said, I agree, it does not make sense that this book tied with Dune of all books.

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  2. Having done a little research online and conversations with co-workers about this book helped lead to my discovery that Zelazny has novels based on quite a few mythologies. Even though I wasn't as thrilled by this one, I now want to read them all!

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