Product Description

The future is a grim place in which the declining human population wanders, drugged and lulled by electronic bliss. It's a world without art, reading and children, a world where people would rather burn themselves alive than endure. Even Spofforth, the most perfect machine ever created, cannot bear it and seeks only that which he cannot have - to cease to be. But there is hope for the future in the passion and joy that a man and woman discover in love and in books, hope even for Spofforth. A haunting novel, reverberating with anguish but also celebrating love and the magic of a dream.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #9848 in Books
• Published on: 2007-06-14
• Original language: English
• Binding: Paperback
• 288 pages

About the Author
Walter Tevis (1928-84) was born in San Francisco but his family moved to Kentucky when he was ten. However, he was suffering from rheumatic fever and was left behind, alone in hospital. He rejoined his family in Kentucky after a year and attended school there. After service as a carpenter's mate in the Second World War, he went to the University of Kentucky where he earned a bachelor's and a master's degree in English. He then taught at various high schools in Kentucky before becoming a professor at the University of Ohio. He began publishing science fiction in 1957. He published The Hustler in 1959 and The Man Who Fell to Earth in 1963 but he was struggling with a serious drink problem and a long gap in his writing career followed. However, in the four years before his death from cancer, he published Mockingbird, which is now widely recognized as a science-fiction classic, The Steps of the Sun and The Queen's Gambit.

Customer Reviews

An enthralling and thought-provoking futuristic read!

I've always wanted to get into reading SF and Fantasy, but always found them difficult to follow, and overlong, but I stumbled on this gem by chance that was just 250 pages long, and I wasn't disappointed!

'Mockingbird' by Walter Tevis is about a very sparse and isolated futuristic world in which appears very few humans live, yet with many robots that are almost 'too' human for comfort! The story is told as the reading kept in personal 'tape' diaries. These are kept by three main characters; one man, one woman and a robot! Though there is such a very strong sense of 'desolation' within the place, one still wanted to be there - if only to see what it was like! Unlike many other SF books I have attempted to read, I was able to follow this one with ease - the writing flowed and was 'simple' with very vivid characters. There were clear personality differences within each - even to the way that they kept their diaries; some merely used numbers to separate the days - others did not. In fact, the whole story had a dark sense of 'datelessness' in that it was so far into the future, it almost made one feel that the entire history of the world had been forgotten... These people no longer knew how to read or write, or even 'feel', but despite this, one will be surprised as to how emotional some passages can be! One in particular was when 'Paul' placed a vase Annabel had made inside her coffin, and in her arms - this was particularly moving, and was a sentiment one would not expect to find between the covers of an SF novel!

I would recommend this book to anyone - both to those who have not attempted such fiction before, and those that are open-minded.

Definitely Five Stars!

To read a Mockingbird
This is amongst one of the finest books I have read in the SF Masterworks series. It is SF as literature, exceptionally well written and is beautifully paced. Having come to this book without any idea of what it was about I would recommend that you do the same. It is without doubt one of the best novels I have ever read.

One to read...
Yes, it is in the future, there are robots of great perfection and fundamental flaws, humanity is dying out due to a robotic decision that was never corrected; but - the actual story is about self discovery, about a man robbed of his individuality and how he reclaims his place and role in his own life and in the world... with a little help from a woman and a robot that can not die.

Highly recommended!