On the shortcomings of Spider Robinson and certain forms of science fiction…

6 January 2008 | Culture | Comments

Today is the last day of my glorious two-week Portland vacation with Kathi and the kids, and aside from one work crisis that dragged me back into my professional mindset it has been a delicious time. I deliberately left the business books at home and have been reading science fiction novels, Steve Martin’s new memoir, and other things that have little to do with my job. Wandering around Powell’s City of Books and looking for something to read, I picked up Spider Robinson’s “Lifehouse”– part of a trilogy of which I’ve read the others a few years back. I swallowed Lifehouse whole in a couple of days, but it feels like a less-than-nutritious meal.

There are two poles within science fiction: the north pole is the stuff that sits in the science fiction aisle of the bookstore but that other people can read. This is science fiction that has a mission beyond the author’s and publisher’s narrowly book-specific one of “sell as many books as possible,” and that is to expand the general science fiction readership. I like this kind of science fiction a lot, and think that the mission is worthwhile because this sort of science fiction prompts people to think about our world, the future, how to make the future better, and other sorts of useful questions.

The other pole is science fiction written for science fiction geeks. “Hard” science fiction that purports to be more scientifically accurate than most falls into this camp. And then there’s the sort of stuff that Robinson sells, which is simply inside baseball. Lifehouse is by a fan for other fans and you have to be a fan to get most of the jokes and sensibility. Now, as it happens I DO get most of the jokes, but that doesn’t mean I think the book succeed.  It’s not bad, but it sure would have been better with a strong editor who made Robinson work for the audience more.

Here’s the other thing about this book: sure, it’s part three of a trilogy, but it feels like more of the same throughout Robinson’s recent ouvre. His books tend to end in paradise scenarios in which all the world’s problems are solved. Ho hum. It also feels like he is trying to have all his books lead to one grand mega-narrative, sort of like what Heinlein and Asimov both did in their final years. The problem with this is twofold: first, Robinson is no Heinlein and no Asimov; second, at 60 he’s just too darned young to be doing this.

For the diehard Spider Robinson fans out there– yes, I know. I’ll just stop reading his stuff and also stop raining on your parade. I just wish that Robinson would work a little harder, be a little less smugly self-satisfied, and I guess I care because deep down I think that he’s a better writer than what he’s churning out right now.