The Miracle Workers by Jack VanceMy rating: 4 of 5 stars
“The future is for men of cleverness, of imagination untroubled by discipline”
The model for later Vance masterpieces The Dragon Masters and The Last Castle – where medieval lords war with a hive-mind alien race. Here Vance’s sympathies with the aliens is more pronounced, perhaps because they showcase an ingenuity that the humans have forgotten. Some ironic comedy is made of describing the scientific process of trial and error as miracle-working, as opposed to the fantastic psychic capabilities this society has cultivated and has come to rely on. As with the later tales, conflict drives innovation, and here the ending is more hopeful, with the two sides learning from each other and agreeing a stalemate. The Last Castle ends similarly, but I prefer the darker, more apocalyptic The Dragon Masters, where the aliens have the upper hand and the drama of human survival reaches its peak.
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