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The Demolished Man

Front Cover
206 Reviews
Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group, 1996 - Fiction - 243 pages
In the year 2301, the wealthiest man in the universe is determined to commit murder in a world in which telepaths are used to detect possible crimes before they can happen. Reprint. 10,000 first printing.

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19 pages matching Gus Tate in this book

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User ratings

5 stars
61
4 stars
75
3 stars
42
2 stars
25
1 star
3

You can also see the writer had fun writing it. - Goodreads
Plus I thought the ending was awfully depressing. - Goodreads
Excellent, suspenseful writing. - Goodreads
It reads like a corny police procedural potboiler. - Goodreads
The ending gets a solid thumbs up from me. - Goodreads
The ending left me dissatisfied. - Goodreads
User Review - Flag as inappropriate

I was set to give this story five stars throughout most of the book, but the ending threw me off. Way off.
The majority of the story is a detective story; we follow a crime from the angle of the perpetrator, and the investigating police officer. The caper is made all that much more exciting by the existence of people with esp, known as peepers, of which our investigator is one, and our perpetrator is not. A thrilling game of mouse and peeper cat made the book a quick read, and fun to follow. The inclusion of the catchy lyrics the perpetrator has purposely stuck in his head to keep himself from leaking his crime to the psychics around him interspersed throughout the dialog and action was a great touch that really increased the tension through certain parts of the story.
The conclusion however, I felt turned suddenly to a different tone altogether. The plot became less understandable, and the ending somewhat preachy. I suddenly got the impression that the author wrote the whole book as a means to state the exposition. Five stars until the last thirty pages or so. 

Review: The Demolished Man

User Review  - Adam - Goodreads

I had never heard of Alfred Bester before, but I figured I would give him a shot since this was published in the same series as Sirens of Titan and a couple of Philip K. Dick's books. That's some ... Read full review

All 197 reviews »

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Contents

CHAPTER ONE
5
CHAPTER TWO
21
CHAPTER THREE
36
Copyright

14 other sections not shown

Common terms and phrases

Alfred Bester apprehension asked Barbara D'Courtney Beaumont House Beck began Ben Reich Bester booby-trap burst called Callisto catatonia Cathexis Chervil Chooka Frood's Crabbe crazy cried damned dark Demolition desk dissension have begun door Duffy Esper Guild eyes face father floor girl going guests Gus Tate hand HARRY HARRISON Hassop head hell Jackson Beck Jerry Church Jordan Jumper Keno Quizzard killed D'Courtney killer Kingston Hospital kins kissed laughed laughter Lincoln Powell Line Listen looked Maria Beaumont Mars Mary Noyes mind Monarch mouth murder never nodded Old Man Mose orchid peep peeper picture police Powell's Reich growled Reich muttered Reich shouted Rhodopsin Santis scrambler screamed screen shook skyway smiled Snim Spaceland stairs stared stars Stars My Destination stopped talk telepathic tell Tenser Tension There's took trying turned v-phone voice Wait What's WWHG

References to this book

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References from web pages

The Demolished Man - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
The Demolished Man, by Alfred Bester, is a science fiction novel that was the first Hugo Award winner in 1953. The story was first serialized in three parts ...
en.wikipedia.org/ wiki/ The_Demolished_Man

The Demolished Man - Alfred Bester
Some critics have pointed out parallels in the story line between "The Demolished Man" and Dostoyevsky's "Crime and Punishment", and between "The Stars my ...
www.zenker.se/ Books/ bester.shtml

The Golden Age : Classics Of Sci Fi (Part 2) The Demolished Man ...
The Demolished Man is essentially a crime novel, setting up both criminal and investigator to the reader, and to each other. ...
www.scifitv.com.au/ Blog/ 2007/ 12/ The-Golden-Age-Classic-Sci-Fi-Books-For-Sci-Fi-Buffs-part-2/

The Kick-Ass Mystic Ninjas » KAMN Show #17: The Demolished Man
Summer, Joe and David tackle the first novel to win the Hugo Award, Alfred Bester’s The Demolished Man. The story is on the surface a pulp police procedural ...
www.kickassmysticninjas.com/ 2006/ 08/ 29/ kamn-show-17-the-demolished-man/

Stainless Steel Droppings » The Demolished Man ~Alfred Bester
Last Thursday night the one and only copy of The Demolished Man in circulation amongst the many branches of my local library was placed in my hands by a ...
www.stainlesssteeldroppings.com/ ?p=848

driftglass: The Demolished Man
The Demolished Man. (Apologies to Alfred Bester). "You say you want a revolution. Well, you know… We all want to change the world." -- John Lennon ...
driftglass.blogspot.com/ 2007/ 03/ demolished-man.html

Locus Online Features: Yesterday's Tomorrows: Alfred Bester
A few pages into The Demolished Man (1953), Alfred Bester lays down one of his most cunning lures. Ben Reich is reading a letter, "centuries old," from his ...
www.locusmag.com/ Features/ 2007/ 01/ yesterdays-tomorrows-alfred-bester.html

Panopticism in The Demolished Man - Associated Content
Check out Panopticism in The Demolished Man - Submitted by sigriet ferrer at Associated Content.
www.associatedcontent.com/ article/ 149443/ panopticism_in_the_demolished_man.html

The Demolished Man » But what these unobservant birds
The Demolished Man Ben Reich, head of Monarch Corporation, is one of the richest men on Earth. Or on Mars or Venus, for that matter. ...
poodlerat.bellonae.com/ 2008/ 02/ 18/ the-demolished-man/

BBC - My Science Fiction Life - The Demolished Man
The Demolished Man is at heart a police procedural in a bizarre yet extremely well-realised setting, where telepathy is commonplace and guns are museum ...
www.bbc.co.uk/ dna/ mysciencefictionlife/ A18471602

About the author (1996)

ALFRED BESTER was born in 1913. His fiction career included writing for the pulp magazines, comics, radio, and television. His extraordinary book, The Demolished Man, was the first winner of the Hugo Award for Best Novel and was followed by the brilliant novels The Stars My Destination, The Computer Connection, Golem100, and The Deceivers, and numerous short stories. Bester was honored by the Science Fiction & Fantasy Writers of America with a Grandmaster Award. He died in 1987.

Bibliographic information

QR code for The Demolished Man
TitleThe Demolished Man
Vintage Series
AuthorAlfred Bester
Editionreprint
PublisherKnopf Doubleday Publishing Group, 1996
ISBN0679767819, 9780679767817
Length243 pages
Subjects ›  › 

Fiction / Science Fiction / General
  
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