The Squares of the City
1965 novel by John Brunner
 Cover art from first edition | |
| Author | John Brunner |
|---|---|
| Cover artist | Robert Foster |
| Country | United States |
| Language | English |
| Genre | Science fiction |
| Publisher | Ballantine Books |
Publication date | 1965 |
| Media type | Print (Paperback) |
| Pages | 319 pp |
The Squares of the City is a science fiction novel by British writer John Brunner, first published in 1965 (ISBN 0-345-27739-2). It was nominated for the Hugo Award for Best Novel in 1966.
It is a sociological story of urban class warfare and political intrigue, taking place in the fictional South American capital city of Vados. It explores the idea of subliminal messages as political tools, and it is notable for having the structure of a famous 1892 chess game between Wilhelm Steinitz and Mikhail Chigorin. The structure is not coincidental, and plays an important part in the story.
Reception
Algis Budrys found the novel to be more artifice than fiction, saying "this is a confusing, overpopulated, almost-unidentifiable-with story set in a city which seems to have been created for the sole purpose of having Brunner set a 'human chess game' in motion upon it. . . . There is nothing in particular here to catch and hold the reader's involvement".[1] Judith Merril, however, found Squares "an impressive piece of work" with "complexities [that] add richness rather than spread confusion." She noted, however, that the demands of the novel's "elaborate structure" weakened it by impelling Brunner to sacrifice character development in order to depict "interpersonal exchanges."[2]
References
Sources
- Tuck, Donald H. (1974). The Encyclopedia of Science Fiction and Fantasy. Chicago: Advent. p. 71. ISBN 0-911682-20-1.
External links
- The Steinitz-Chigorin game
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Works by John Brunner
- Echo in the Skull (1959)
- The World Swappers (1959)
- Slavers of Space (1960)
- The Atlantic Abomination (1960)
- Secret Agent of Terra (1962)
- The Super Barbarians (1962)
- Listen! The Stars! (1963)
- The Astronauts Must Not Land (1963)
- To Conquer Chaos (1964)
- The Whole Man (1964)
- The Martian Sphinx (1965)
- The Long Result (1965)
- The Squares of the City (1965)
- The Productions of Time (1967)
- Stand on Zanzibar Doubleday (1968), (1969)
- Double, Double (1969)
- The Jagged Orbit (1969)
- The Sheep Look Up (1972)
- Web of Everywhere (1974)
- The Shockwave Rider (1975)
- The Infinitive of Go (1980)
- Players at the Game of People (1980)
- The Crucible of Time (1983)
- The Tides of Time (1984)
- Children of the Thunder (1989)
- A Maze of Stars (1991)
- Muddle Earth (1993)
- Times Without Number (1962)
- Not Before Time (1968)
- The Traveler in Black (1971)
- Entry to Elsewhen (1972)
- The Best of John Brunner (1988)
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