Definitely one of Clarke's best novels, which is saying something given his tremendous body of work. The novel won both the Hugo[1] and Nebula[2] Awards for Best Novel. Luckily, this is also terribly interesting, far more so than I ever would have guessed. "If you want a particular story, you should write it yourself." Engineers, monks, old men who retire to Sri Lanka, There are some great authors I am just never going to love, and Arthur C. Clarke is one of them. It follows one scientist's 'impossible dream' to fulfillment, and although the en. Performance & security by Cloudflare, Please complete the security check to access. The tower is to stretch from the Earth's equator to a satellite that is in geostationary orbit. Such a structure would greatly reduce the cost of sending people and supplies into space. When I was a kid, Arthur C. Clarke's 'The Fountains of Paradise' was one of my favorite books. Click here to see the rest of this review I love this book in many ways, not all of them rational perhaps. It foreshadows the exploits of Vannevar Morgan in his determination to realize the space elevator. A truly breathtaking work of speculative fiction; the scenes set 400km above the Earth's surface actually triggered my vertigo at one point! This was before buckminsterfullerene had been developed, so diamond cables seemed a leap--but, again, a plausible leap. However, the only suitable site, a mountain in the fictional country of Taprobane (very closely based on Sri Lanka), happens to be already occupied by a monastery which is quite … This was one of the first science fiction books I remember reading that I could see the possibility of something which (at that time) seemed impossible. Luckily, this is also terribly interesting, far more so than I ever would have guessed. Hearing of the difficulties, a group of people living on Mars contacts Morgan and suggests that the tower be built there instead. However, I bought this book years ago and, for some reason, it's sat languishing on my bookshelves, unread and getting dustier by the year. Any suggestions? Yes, it's something of an architectural procedural, and much of the story is taken up with the events of the project lead (Vannevar Morgan) to get the thing started. Such a structure would be used to raise payloads to orbit without the expense of using rockets. 4.5 to 5.0 stars. This Hugo-winning 1979 novel helped popularize the "space elevator" that has been reused many times in science fiction (though I don't think Clarke actually invented the idea). There are some great authors I am just never going to love, and Arthur C. Clarke is one of them. Cloudflare Ray ID: 5de7c5e18b21d919 King Kalidasa, tyrant of the second century, murderous usurper of an ancient kingdom, sought to reach heaven by creating his lofty Pleasure Garden, with their towering fountains and the panorama of beautiful maidens. Space elevators are awesome. The mountain on which the space elevator is built is called Sri Kanda in the book, and bears a strong resemblance to the real mountain Sri Pada. British Science Fiction Association Award, The Collected Stories of Arthur C. Clarke, Interplanetary Flight: An Introduction to Astronautics, How the World Was One: Beyond the Global Village, An Encyclopedia of Claims, Frauds, and Hoaxes of the Occult and Supernatural, Arthur C. Clarke's World of Strange Powers, Arthur C. Clarke Institute for Modern Technologies, https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=The_Fountains_of_Paradise&oldid=979904748, Nebula Award for Best Novel-winning works, Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License, At the end of the novel, Earth turns into an icy wasteland because the Sun has cooled. Refresh and try again. The basic plot of The Fountains of Paradise can be summed up with two words: space elevator. I must've read it more than half a dozen times, checking it out from the library. Faster-than-light travel, teleporters, electromagnetic artificial gravity--all staples of Star Trek--seemed implausible to me then. Elevators that take people from the surface of Earth all the way across thousands of kilometers to orbit. Although the engineer's heart is failing, he rides up the tower to take food and oxygen to a group of stranded students and their professor. The book won the two major sci-fi awards, the Hugo and the Nebula, back when it was published in 1979, but the cover blurb never grabbed my interest enough to read it over the years. It's a fun story of an engineer's attempts to "elevate" humanity. Space elevators, yawn.

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