Prisoners of Power

Начало книги

Early in these pages, when young Maxim dips his hand into a river on the alien planet on which he has just been marooned, and withdraws it hastily because the water is radioactive, the knowledgeable science fiction reader is likely to say, “Come on, now, fellows—how could he know? Or, if it were so devastatingly, dangerously radioactive that he could determine it without instruments, how could he not know before he stuck his silly hand in it?” But one forgives, proceeds in a smug and self-satisfied way, because Maxim’s adventures are adventurous indeed, his encounters believable, suspenseful, unexpected, and quite beyond anticipation, the Strugatskys being the plot-masters that they are.

Then, some hundred-or-so pages in, the reader realizes that Maxim, being what he is, could most certainly perform that small feat at the river, and would; further, the reader realizes that this discovery was made some time back, indirectly, in the gradual unfolding of Maxim’s character.

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