Foundation's Fear (58 page)
Not that it truly matters. I know the dangers of writing a long series over decades. I took twenty-five years to wrestle with the six volumes of my Galactic Center series. Undoubtedly there are contradictions I missed in dating and other details, even though I laid it all out in a timeline, published in the last volume. The aliens of that series are not those implicated in this novel, but there are clearly conceptual links.
Science fiction speaks of the future, but to the present. The grand issues of social power and the technology that drives it will never fade. Often problems are best seen in the perspectives of implication, before we meet them on the gritty ground of their arrival.
Isaac Asimov was ultimately hopeful about humanity. He saw us again and again coming to a crossroads and prevailing. The Foundation is about that.
What matters in sagas is
sweep.
This, the Foundation series surely has. I can only hope I have added a bit to that.
Works tracing the intricacies of the Foundation include notably Alexei and Cory Panshin’s historical
The World Beyond the Hill,
James Gunn’s insightful
Isaac Asimov,
Joseph Patrouch’s thorough
The Science Fiction of Isaac Asimov,
and Alva Rogers’
Requiem for Astounding,
which gives a sense of what it was like to read the classic works as they appeared. I learned from all these studies.
For advice and comments on this project I am especially grateful to Janet Asimov, Mark Martin, David Brin, Joe Miller, Jennifer Brehl, and Elisabeth Brown for close readings of the manuscript. My gratitude goes to Don Dixon for his fantastical, future beastiary. Appreciation for general help is due to my wife Joan, Abbe, and to Ralph Vicinanza, Janet Asimov, James Gunn, John Silbersack, Donald Kingsbury, Chris Schelling, John Douglas, Greg Bear, George Zebrowski, Paul Carter, Lou Aronica, Jennifer Hershey, Gary Westfahl and John Clute. Thanks to all.
September 1996
Gregory Benford
—physicist, educator, author—was born in Mobile Alabama. He is a professor of physics at the University of California-Irvine, and conducts research in plasma turbulence theory and experiment, and in astrophysics. He has published well over a hundred papers. He is a Woodrow Wilson Fellow and a visiting professor at Cambridge University and has served as an advisor to the Department of Energy, NASA, and the White House Council on Space Policy.
Many of his best-known novels are part of a six-novel sequence beginning in the near future with
In the Ocean of Night
, and continuing on with
Across the Sea of Suns
. The series then leaps to the far future, at the center of our galaxy, where a desperate human drama unfolds, beginning with
Great Sky River
, and proceeding through
Tides of Light, Furious Gulf
, and concluding with
Sailing Bright Eternity
. At the series’ end the links to the earlier novels emerge, revealing a single unfolding tapestry against an immense background.
for
Foundation’s Fear
“[Benford] brings out the complexities of a galactic empire that Asimov never filled out…the first book stands well on its own.”
—
Denver Post
“[Benford] took on the huge task of answering questions [raised in the original], and difficult as it may sound, he pulled it off with style…. Rest assured, Asimov’s work is in good hands.”
—Craig E. Engler
Editor and Publisher
of
Science Fiction Weekly
“A richly rewarding delight…Benford writes up to his usual high standard and excels in bringing Asimovian concepts…to vivid, visually compelling life.”
—
Publishers Weekly
(starred review)
“Intriguing and engrossing…[a] curious blend of reinventions and retrospective criticism.”
—
Kirkus Reviews
(starred review)
Foundation Trilogy
Foundation’s Fear
by Gregory Benford
Foundation and Chaos
by Greg Bear
Foundation’s Triumph
by David Brin
By Isaac Asimov
Gold: The Final Science Fiction Collection
Magic: The Final Fantasy Collection
Isaac Asimov’s History of I-Botics
Isaac Asimov’s I-Bots: Time Was
by Steve Perry and Gary A. Braunbeck
Published by HarperPrism
Cover illustration © 1997 by Jean Targete
This is a work of fiction. The characters, incidents, and dialogues are products of the author’s imagination and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to actual events or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
FOUNDATION’S FEAR
. Copyright © 1997 by Gregory Binford. All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, down-loaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of PerfectBound™.
PerfectBound™ and the PerfectBound™ logo are trademarks of HarperCollins Publishers, Inc.
ISBN 0-06-114953-5
A hardcover edition of this book was published in 1997 by HarperPrism
First paperback printing: March 1998
10 9 8 7
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1All quotations from the
Encyclopedia Galactica
here reproduced are taken from the 116th edition, published 1,020
F.E.
by the Encyclopedia Galactica Publishing Co., Terminus, with permission of the publishers.