The Best Fantasy Sci-Fi World You've Never Heard Of

In 1998, a prophetic photo of Jeff Bezos was taken. He is leaning against a warehouse shelf full of books, wearing preppy, geeky clothes with a wry smile sitting across his face, as if he knew all along he'd become the richest man in the world.

But it isn't this which makes the photo prophetic, it's the book he holds open in his hands that calls to his future. It's called 'The Stars My Destination' by Alfred Bester, an American sci-fi author. Twenty-three years after that photo was taken, Bezos would take to space in his New Shepard rocket. The stars were indeed his destination.

I noticed this odd coincidence recently (or perhaps Bezos always knew he'd be riding space rockets and this was a hint?) and since I love classic sci-fi, I decided to give the book a read. Actually, to give the book a listen. It was on Audible after all.

Unbeknownst to me, 'The Stars My Destination' is a highly acclaimed work of fiction, lauded by noteworthy people such as Neil Gaiman and the late, great Carl Sagan. After listening to it, I can see why.

You see, 'Stars…' isn't just a gripping and propulsive sci-fi adventure about a man hell-bent on revenge (Gully Foyle), no, Bester goes further, his painting of the solar system in his dystopian future is Tolkienesque in its scale. The depth of his world-building is incredible.

It is a time when humans have conquered all the planets of the solar system, where space travel is the norm, where corporations have effectively taken the place of both governments and religion and their CEOs are the socialite heroes of the 25th century.

Fine , all is believable, but Bester moves humanity on much further than mere corporatism and spaceships and dares to dream further.

His 25th century is also a time where the common man has mastered teleportation via the power of thought, an activity called 'Jaunting' named after the scientist who first pioneered its possibility, as well as a time of psychics, telepaths and mind-readers. Bester has evidently spent an inordinate amount of time pontificating over the impact of such activities. Cars and planes are now only used by the super-rich as status symbols of their extravagance, and the richest of all refuse to jaunt as it is seen as vulgar.

Buildings are now mazes so individuals cannot simply 'jaunt' inside (else risk jaunting into walls and dying), cities are now full of 'jaunt-stages' that replaced train stations and airports and events like New Year are celebrated for 24 hours as party-goers jaunt ahead of midnight around the globe.

Bester also talks of a new criminal underclass of jaunters, those who jaunt into burning buildings and crime scenes to loot before jaunting back to safety and how their parasitic behaviour is a scourge on modern society.

Furthermore, he writes in great detail about the economic devastation jaunting has caused, how entire industries disappeared overnight and the tension this has caused between the different planets depending on what they did and did not manufacture before the jaunting revolution. The book itself covers the outbreak of war between the inner and outer planets as societies battle for resources.

Though as fantastic as Bester's universe is, his approach is also nuanced. He puts limits on the remarkableness. Humans, even the most skilled, can only jaunt approximately 1000 miles at a time, meaning many have to "leap-frog" from jaunt-stage to jaunt-stage to cross the globe and he makes it clear no one has ever jaunted through space, though many have tried and disappeared into the inky blackness. This allows for some classic sci-fi adventures with spaceship chases and so forth.

Before behemoths Star Wars and Star Trek came along to redefine this genre, older sci-fi ('Stars…' itself was published in 1956) was much more about existentialism, God, human desire and man's place in the universe. It was rife with retro-futuristic references, such as televisual phones, handbrakes on space crafts, robots serving humans drinks at bars and so on. It had a glamour and a headiness of possibility before lightsabers and Klingons dragged sci-fi into the modern age, into what we know it as now.

And perhaps that's the way it goes too with Tolkien's work. Lord of the Rings came out two years before 'Stars…' and had the same nuances as Bester's work. The magic ring was all-powerful, but couldn't do all-powerful things, at least for those who carried it. Tolkien still forced his characters to walk across Middle Earth, rather than use magic, just as Bester still forced his characters to fly space ships through the solar system, and still dock their ships conventionally, whether it be on Earth or on strange sub-civilisations inhabiting moons and asteroids (one civilisation, in particular, made an astroid habitable by scavenging parts from spaceships and lived for a few hundred generations as people who worshipped the life-giving miracle of science and engineering. "Most scientific" they would exclaim to almost any turn of event).

Bester's novel delights at every opportunity as yet more world-building is found in every chapter. He covers the banning and covert practices of religion, the power of hypnotic learning and killing, the advances in mental health and mental torture, the brutal justice system in the 25th century and even the odd side-effects of science  itself ( one character has accidentally become radioactive or "hot" as he's labelled and therefore must adjust his behaviour around this problem).

There's not a single element of the story that doesn't make sense when applied to the grander scheme of Bester's vision. It all makes sense, it's perfectly knitted together. This story is a deep plunge into a bizarre and chaotic solar system and Bester pulls all these elements together not as side notes for their own sake, but as essential keys to how the story progresses.

If we're jostling for position of the best fantasy world out there, Bester's 'Stars…' surely should feature, for it is great, perhaps even the greatest, most ambitious and most comprehensive of its kind. Dive in, be consumed, follow the ignorant protagonist Gully Foyle as he stumbles through a journey of discovery with you, the reader. This is a remarkable and comprehensive read (or listen) for any true sci-fi enthusiast and a defining work of fiction that has stood the test of time.