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The Stars My Destination- the Newest Space Frontier

When one thinks about a “New Frontier” in regards to Space Opera, it usually involves space travel as the Biggest Advancement So Far. The shock value lies with finding new planets and interacting with aliens. In Alfred Bester’s The Stars My Destination, space travel isn’t the kicker, but teleportation is- or “jaunting,” as the book calls it. The novel’s story revolves around this concept of jaunting, which is essentially the concentration-based act of teleporting, and it’s repercussions on the world.

The story starts out simple as Gulliver Foyle, our supposedly under-average man abandoned on a wrecked starcraft in space, is denied help by a passing spaceship called the Vorga-Ta^g. Furious, Foyle starts on a rampage to find and destroy the Vorga for abandoning him among the stars. He steals a spaceship from a tribe among the asteroids, where his face is tattooed like a terrifying tiger, and he flies back to Earth to find and wreak havoc on the crew of the Vorga. We follow Goyle as he threatens, attacks, escapes, and jaunts all over the world to try and learn why Vorga left him behind.
One of my favorite things about The Stars My Destination is the fact that Bester did not simply say, “Oh, jaunting is a thing” and end it there. Instead, we get to see how the human race learned to jaunte, the consequences of Jaunting, and how society adapted to better fit traveling by teleportation. Really, it was so in depth. If you can think of a complication jaunting would bring up, Bester addressed it. Can people juante anywhere? No, they must have a clear idea of their location with coordinates. What happens if somebody jauntes to the same place another person is standing? Jaunte pads in cities are large enough to prevent accidental collisions, but it isn’t fullproof and can happen. It’s a risk. Wouldn’t jaunting allow people to break into homes? Well, homes are built like a maze so that nobody can get a secure image of the room to jaunt to, and the material of the walls prevents jaunting. Women’s rooms don’t even have windows because of the risk of intruders. And, subsequently, women’s rights have severely suffered. My biggest concern with Sci-Fi is creating a world with plot holes, but the worlds in The Stars My Destination have been so thoroughly thought through that plot holes cannot exist. I was really amazed. The world building is insanely detailed and wonderfully diverse. The story also touches on the theme of government control and how the people should not be treated like children. They have a right to know what’s going on in the world, and the ending of the story dealt with that in the perfect way.

Overall, I really enjoyed this novel. I was enthralled by Foyle’s journey and the world he lived in, and I adored the thought behind everything Alfred Bester put into his world.

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