I love Weinbaum's short fiction, but the two novels I've now read were both disappointing. The first third of this is comically bad golden age dreck; the second two thirds is a bit better, offering a few potentially thought provoking concepts around the nature of dystopia, but in the end doing nothing with them. ( )

Period piece, dripping with patriarchy, sexism, and eugenics. ( )

"The mountainies pay taxes to no one."
"And no one builds them roads, nor digs them public wells. Where you pay little you get less, and I will say that the roads within the Empire are better than ours." ( )

I red this long ago, since it was in my father's collection, so I do not recall it all. I remembered the Black Flame as character who was the daughter of the leader of a revolt of the semihuman creatures of this post-holocaust world, but on rereading a bit of it, I see I was wrong. Black Margot is the the sister of the ruler of this world, and it is another women who is the daughter of the former rebel leader.What I really recall is not the events this story so much as the brief vivid account of the former rebellion. ( )

Nicely done Rip Van Winkle might save the future story, written in a style that says "Wow, if Weinbaum had lived. . . ." Ignore the self-congratulatory introduction by Moskowitz and just start into the story--you'll have a nice read. ( )

This was one of the better Golden Age novels. It was one of the first to focus on a character's motivations rather than the ultimate ray gun or the monstrous alien from planet Xipitax.

I think Weinbaum would have been one of the real greats of the period if he hadn't died so young. ( )