The Naked Sun (Robot Series): 2/4 (Robot Series)

This follow up to “The Caves of Steel” reverses the context of the earlier story, taking Baley out of his comfort zone - the enclosed city of Earth, backdrop for the earlier novel - and transplanting him in the wide open spaces of Solaria, one of the far-off planets colonised by humans many years before. Solaria takes the integration of robots into human society a step beyond all earlier imaginings and the machine men out-number humans by thousands to one, but thanks to the laws of robotics, they only fulfil the role of slaves on the massive estates of humans who represent the opposite extreme to the crowded Earth cities where humanity is pressed together into an intimate and convention-bound community. The inhabitants of Solaria find closeness to other humans as disturbing as Baley finds his own phobia of unbounded spaces. It is this contrast of opposing social viewpoints which provides much of the conflict and many of the obstacles during a fascinating investigation of a Solarian murder Baley has been called in to deal with. Once again Baley is partnered up with Daneel, the robot who appears so human he can deceive humans and even other robots.This sequel is not quite up to the same standard as “The Caves of Steel” due to a more intrusive didactical element to some of the dialogue, sometimes verging on philosophical debate rather than science fiction. The ending is also a little unsatisfactory as a likable murderer goes free after Baley frames another person as the culprit (although the victim of the frame cannot be said to be totally innocent of instigating the crime). Technically sloppier is the shoddiness of the frame that Baley constructs, and one suspects that anyone with any brains would perceive a logical inconsistency after a few moments of cool scrutiny. Having said this, it’s still an excellent book worth reading more than once (fourth time for me).

Lije Bailey is a city cop. In a future where humanity has split into 2 camps. There are the people of Earth who live a troglodyte existence, safe in the all enclosing womb of big covered cities. The ‘outside’ is a place to be feared and avoided at all costs. All earth dwellers envy but also hate the all powerful ‘Spacers’ who in the dim past emigrated from earth to colonise other planets. Spacers are rich, healthy, powerful and long lived. Their life style is made possible by the extensive use of advanced robots. The introduction of robots into the rigid society of Earth is disrupting and destroying the hierarchy of the cities - taking jobs from people who rely on their employment to give additional status and therefore small relief from the basic existance of life on Earth.In this, the second book in the series, Bailey, having been reluctantly involved in the investigation of the murder of a Spacer on Earth some years before (Caves of Steel) is now called upon to not only leave his safe city environment but also travel into space. Required now to investigate another crime, Bailey has to battle his own phobias about the open air, as well as the prejudices of Spacers against what they see as a dirty and disease ridden Earthman.

Having recently decided to invest in reading classic sci-fi, Asimov was pretty high on my list of authors to look into. This is both the second book in the robot series as well as the second of his titles I have so far read and I must admit while I enjoyed the first book (Caves of Steel) a lot, The Naked Sun takes the core of what made it good and expands on it making it not only a great sequel, but an all round great book.The story once again focuses on Elijah Baley a detective on Earth who has been charged with investigating a murder, this murder is on another planet ruled by colonists called spacers, no earthman has ever set foot there before and it's an uncomfortable experience for both sides.What I loved about Caves of Steel is in abundance here, this isn't a book about police, murder, or even robots though all three aspects are present, it's about the differences in culture between earth and the spacers, how they live so differently based on their environments and upbringing with the earthmen living in super cities almost like hives, eating and showering communally, every inch of space earned through career for small extra luxuries compared with one planet of the spacers where they have so much space and robots to tend their every need that even being in sight of each other physically makes them feel sick. The, I suppose psychology would be the word, of it all and experience Baley goes through trying to understand it all rather hooked me so I read The Naked Sun happily in one day (It is fairly short regardless).Rather a shame that books three and four in the series (Robots of Dawn & Robots and Empire) to reasons unknown to me aren't available on the kindle at time of writing this. Still I have purchased the physical books as I will not miss the next in the series. If you're looking for a sci-fi series with more to it than space ships and lasers then this is a good bet.+ Clever detective novel.+ Different ways humans have evolved to live is fascinating.+ Interesting look at technology.+ Excellent themes.

An enjoyable read, slightly dated but still has a twisty turny plot, and robots of course.I read this when I was a teen and it was one of my favourite books, so it was great to re-read again nearly 50 years later.Could make a good film, if they resisted their impulses to make the robots bad and chuck in lots of fight scene like they did to I robot.