clew's reviews: a book log

Higher Education, Charles Sheffield & Jerry Pournelle

Earth is a Riders-of-the-Purple Wage sort of setup, with the schools used mostly to opiate the masses under pretense of not damaging any child's self-esteem. Our idiot young hero pranks out; his sole chance at a job is an asteroid mining firm, which is all Tough but Fair about teaching last-hopers Real Math and Reading because otherwise Space Will Kill You, Kid.

I found that a bit creaky; the setup on Earth was so bad that I thought it unlikely anyone coming out of it could be taught as much as they were taught and as quickly. Also, the setup on Earth was so bad that it wasn't clear why it was stable; no-one at all seems to profit from it. When I was particularly unconvinced by it, the whole thing smelled like old geezers complaining that things aren't now what served them well in their youth, pass the port and Stilton.

However, our loutish hero is being sent back to Earth later in the series, and maybe he will understand more or at least have more explained to him, which in turn might make the setup more politically plausible. So wrote clew in SF&F.