Pohl succeeds with full and complex characterizations that make this a far better read than it would have been if put together by a less skilled writer. With a destinational setting of Mars, Pohl competes with science fiction royalty in thin air, but of course, the far side benchmark is still the great Ray Bradbury who shrugged aside any scientific considerations and may have written a line like “they got in the rocket and went to Mars”. This is a scientifically sound book, too, both astronomically as well as biologically, at least within the artistic license afforded a sci-fi writer. Overpopulation and Malthusian restrictions were also a theme in Gateway, perhaps a recurring element in Pohl’s fiction. With the frequent references to over-population it is vaguely reminiscent of Brunner’s Stand on Zanzibar. He tells a good story – especially with an interesting, and ongoing (though ultimately not very satisfying) theatrical irony theme crafted with a mysterious narration technique. Pohl brings an approachability to his very competent hard science fiction a pleasing meld of technically believable sci-fi with humanistic and psychological elements. Just as Frederik Pohl’s 1977 novel Gateway was about greed, Man Plus, his 1976 offering, is about ambition, and may be seen as an almost Kafkaesque allegory.
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