The Caves of Steel by Isaac Asimov

Caves of Steel Book Cover

This is the first in a series of the Robot Novels by Isaac Asimov. The main characters in this book are Elijah “Lije” Baley, a plainclothes cop, and R. Daneel Olivaw, a humaniform robot. The story takes place on futuristic Earth, approximately 3021 AD. Earth is heavily populated and most cities are mostly underground and interconnected. The major Cities such as New York are referred to with the capital C because of their massive size. New York City’s population is somewhere around 20million and Earth’s population tops 8 billion. Some people criticize Asimov by because Earth’s population will top 8 billion by 2020 according to many calculations. We have to remember that this is just a fiction book written in the 1950’s after all. These massive Cities are essentially enclosed underground and agoraphobia is common among most of the population.

Until recently almost all robot labor had been restricted to the Outside, for farming and transporting goods. There is a strong anti-robot sentiment among most humans and Lije Baley is no exception. He fears and hates robots. Recently, robots have been slowly begun to take menial jobs from humans. The main fear is that eventually robots will take over everyone’s job and leave none for people. Lije Baily is called to the Commisioner’s office and given a special task. He must investigate the murder of a prominent Spacer with the assistance of R. Daneel Olivaw, a humaniform robot.

The are 50 Spacer worlds originally colonized by humans. Their population is only around 5.5 billion, but their technology and military power far surpass humans. Their immune systems are far weaker than those on Earth because their new worlds are essentially germ free. They are unwilling to risk infection, so have insisted that Earth cooperate by allowing R. Daneel Olivaw to assist with the investigation.

I won’t go into any details about the investigation, but Asimov keeps you guessing all along the way. The culture of futuristic Earth is very interesting, and the interaction between Lije and Daneel offers plenty of philosophical situations to be explored. It is very interesting to see how their relationship develops throughout the series. Overall, I’d have to say that R. Daneel Olivaw is my favorite character in the Robot & Foundation series. He definitely plays one of the most important roles throughout all of the novels. Of course a Robot Novel wouldn’t be complete without The Three Laws of Robotics, which are weaved nicely into the plot. By the end of the book you can see how Asimov is working to connect the Robot series to the Foundation series.

2 thoughts on “The Caves of Steel by Isaac Asimov”

  1. Really Nice and crisp review man, Thanks a lot.

    After reading “prelude to foundation” I decided to read the entire series in a chronological order and it is really nice experience. So far I finished “Complete Robot” and “caves of steel” its like as if building a house brick by brick and you have no idea how the shape of the house will be and you can feel it as everything is slowly taking shape.
    Anybody who is new to the world created by Isaac Asimov I strongly recommend read it in chronological order.

    cheers!

  2. Glad you’re enjoying reading in chronological order. Have you read previously in order of publication? Please come back and share your thoughts on the other books as you finish them.

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

Please prove you are a human * Time limit is exhausted. Please reload the CAPTCHA.

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.

Related Post

Foundation coming to HBO!Foundation coming to HBO!

Home_Alone_Boy1

Aaaaaahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh!!!!!!

This is it! Isaac Asimov’s Foundation will finally make it to visual media. After the rights passing through a few hands, they’ve finally made their way to HBO. Check out the entire article at The Wrap where Jonah Nolan talks about the new project. I’ll definitely keeping tabs on the development. No dates were given, so I’ll try to hold back most of my excitement until I hear more.

The Wrap via The Verge

Humans to become immortal cyborgs within 20 years?Humans to become immortal cyborgs within 20 years?

About a year an a half ago, I reviewed The Age of Spiritual Machines by Ray Kurzweil. I never did get around to reading his slightly newer book, The Singularity is Near. I just ran across an article that quotes him as saying

I and many other scientists now believe that in around 20 years we will have the means to reprogram our bodies’ stone-age software so we can halt, then reverse, aging. Then nanotechnology will let us live for ever.

He goes on to describe a number of medical advancements that seem unbelievable.  He doesn’t really expand on how many people, or rather WHO will have access to this technology.  We can’t very well have billions of immortal cyborgs running around for eternity, now can we? I think that those denied immortality, or at least extended life-spans, would wage war against those that would keep the technology for themselves.

Credit: Telegraph via Geekologie

Note: For those of you not familiar with Geekolgie, be sure to check that blog out.  I added it to my newsreader about 2 months ago and it keeps me entertained every day!

A Princess of Mars by Edgar Rice BurroughsA Princess of Mars by Edgar Rice Burroughs

I recently started using Overdrive, a digital library site that my local library participates in. I stumbled across Sense of Wonder: A Century of Science Fiction. A Princess of Mars was just the first of dozens of stories, novellas, and novels strung together with commentary on Science Fiction as a genre. I thought it would be interesting to branch out to some older stuff that I normally have not had a chance to get to.

A Princess of Mars was originally published in 1912 in All-Story Magazine under the title “Under the Moons of Mars” by Normal Bean. The story begins with the narrator explaining that he is relaying a manuscript given to him in book form. He goes over a brief biography of the main character, John Carter, known as Captain Jack Carter of Virginia — an American Civil War veteran. John finished the manuscript the shortly before his death in 1886. The manuscript begins normal enough, talking about how John and one of his friends were prospecting for gold out West. They found a good spot, and the friend was going to head back to get proper papers for staking the claim. John happens to notice three dots in the distance in the direction his friend departed, and after investigating is convinced that Apache Indians are pursuing his friend. Not much of a spoiler, but here it goes — he tries to save his friend and fails, then finds himself chased into a cave. This is where the story takes a turn toward science fiction. After a brief series of events that I won’t get into, John finds himself in some type of out of body experience then wakes up on Mars. (more…)