Stephen's Reviews > A Fall of Moondust

As satisfying as a good HARD SF can be, one complaint often leveled against them is that they are TOO LONG-winded and pageTHICK and that those employing IT don't have the proper skills (story-making, that is) to create the narrative friction and plot rhythm requisite to bring the reading experience to a truly enjoyable climax. Well, at under 225 pages, this story's tight, well-honed body is a classic example of "hard" science fiction doing it right. I DID IT, liked it and I would DO IT again and recommend you consider DOING IT the next time you are looking for a little SFtail tale. 

Written in 1961 by one of the masters, this tight, hard tale takes place on the Moon in the near future when our longtime satellite has been colonized and become an expensive tourist destination. The central plot is well laid out and concerns a "cruise" across the surface of one of the "lunar seas" that meets with disaster. From there, the rest of the book is a race against time to save the passengers as various problems are encountered, tempers run high, nerves are frayed, people are frightened, rescue ideas get kicked around and debated, heroes are born, villains exposed...and time, that nasty, unforgiving, unflinching hard ass just keeps ticking. 

What makes this such a good piece of book is Clarke's ability to give excellent detail without spoiling the mood of the story. Clarke's science is meticulous, his rescue ideas plausible and set forth in detail and yet the pace never bogs down and he keeps the narrative motion pleasing. Given the slimness of the novel, Clarke does sacrifice character development and those present are fairly two dimensional. This does not hamper the story and is forgivable given the focus of the novel. 

As good as this was and as superbly crafted from a technical standpoint, I couldn't quite give it four stars (call it 3.5). I think this may have been in part due to my not really being in the mood for this story when I read it. Unfortunately, books sometimes suffer based on our moods when we read them and that my be the case here.  As it is, I still enjoyed it and would say it is certainly worth a read given Clarke's ability to so effectively use the scientific and technical aspects of the plot. 

Nominee: Hugo Award for Best Novel.
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