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    Frankenstein Unbound
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    Frankenstein Unbound
    Unavailable
    Frankenstein Unbound
    Ebook232 pages5 hours

    Frankenstein Unbound

    By Brian Aldiss

    3/5

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    Unavailable in your country

    Unavailable in your country

    About this ebook

    When Joe Bodenland is suddenly transported back in time to the year 1816, his first reaction is of eager curiosity rather than distress…
    This is Aldiss’ response to Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein, available for the first time in eBook.

    When Joe Bodenland is suddenly transported back in time to the year 1816, his first reaction is of eager curiosity rather than distress. Certainly the Switzerland in which he finds himself, with its charming country inns, breathtaking landscapes and gentle, unmechanised pace of life, is infinitely preferable to the America of 2020 where the games of politicians threaten total annihilation. But after meeting the brooding young Victor Frankenstein, Joe realises that this world is more complex than the one he left behind. Is Frankenstein real, or are both Joe and he living out fictional lives?

    BRIAN SAYS: Developed as a tribute to Mary Shelley’s work, following the writing of Billion Year Spree, with its proposal, since widely adopted, that Frankenstein is the first seminal work to which the label “SF” can be logically attached. Frankenstein makes a female monster to accompany the male; Bodenland, lost from our time, hunts down first Frankenstein and then the monsters, becoming monstrous himself in the process.

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherHarperCollins UK
    Release dateApr 25, 2013
    ISBN9780007527465
    Unavailable
    Frankenstein Unbound
    Author

    Brian Aldiss

    Brian Aldiss, OBE, is a fiction and science fiction writer, poet, playwright, critic, memoirist and artist. He was born in Norfolk in 1925. After leaving the army, Aldiss worked as a bookseller, which provided the setting for his first book, The Brightfount Diaries (1955). His first published science fiction work was the story ‘Criminal Record’, which appeared in Science Fantasy in 1954. Since then he has written nearly 100 books and over 300 short stories.

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    Reviews for Frankenstein Unbound

    3/5

    80 ratings4 reviews

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    • 4/5
      This is the first novel in Brian Aldiss's monster trilogy; I unwittingly read the later novel Dracula Unbound first, two months ago. In this one it is 2020 (the book was published in 1973, when that was still the fairly far future), when increasing stability in the space time continuum is causing timeslips, one of which sends Joseph Bodenland back to 1816 Switzerland. He meets Mary Shelley, plus Percy and Lord Byron, during the summer the former wrote her masterpiece, Frankenstein. There are some great scenes where Bodenland interacts with these literary giants, revelling in their speculative thinking, way ahead of its time, but very unrealistically idealistic from a 21st century view point. However, time is more mixed up than he thinks - in this version of 1816, while Mary Shelley still wrote Frankenstein, Victor Frankenstein is also a real person who created a real monster, and its female partner, which Bodenland pledges to hunt down, to prevent what he sees as the impact of Frankenstein's amoral scientific endeavour on his own present day situation. The novel is thus a perhaps slightly awkward amalgam of literary homage, Gothic horror and thriller chase. I found the ending slightly unsatisfactory.
    • 3/5
      Brian Aldiss held my attention for several days with this book, but left me confused as to whether this was an attempt to write a piece of what came to be called steam punk, or an involved literary puzzle, like the Jasper Fforde Thursday Next, novels. still, it's worth reading, and gives a bit of depth to those more interested in the doctor than the monster.
    • 3/5
      This is the book that the Roger Corman movie was (loosely) based on.
      I actually thought the film, although definitely a 'B-movie' did a better job in some respects of delineating the parallels between the sci-fi scenario that Aldiss sets up and the classic story of Frankenstein.
      In the 21st century, nuclear war in space has ruptured the space-time continuum, causing bizarre 'time-slips.' Caught in one of these, an influential man finds himself 200 years in the past - but a past where it seems that the fictional story of Frankenstein is fact. We meet our infamous scientist, and our protagonist is soon caught up in trying to save an innocent woman from being executed for a killing committed by the monster.
      Another 'slip' occurs, and our protagonist now finds himself some months later, in what may or may not be a different reality again, hanging out with Byron, Shelley and Mary Godwin (soon-to-be Mary Shelley).
      Reality seems to be unraveling. Our protagonist becomes somewhat obsessed with tracking down the monster in his 21st-century car and killing it.
      But is the real problem that humanity, in whatever century one may be in, seeks out forbidden and dangerous knowledge, as the original Frankenstein illustrates? Or is it the human hatred of and violence toward anything different and unknown?

      This short, philosophical novel is really Aldiss' musings on these issues. It's OK, but perhaps could have been better executed. I liked how, in the movie, the protagonist was actually a scientist responsible for the device which caused the timeslips, setting up a nice parallel between him and Dr. Frankenstein. In the book, he's just a random guy, it seems.
    • 2/5
      I don't understand why this book is so well regarded. It's not old enough for this to be a problem of time either. Written in the early 70s, Frankenstein Unbound doesn't work regardless of allowances made for age. The plot of the novel takes place in the year 2020 after a nuclear war has opened a rift in the space time continuum. Yeah, I'm serious. This rift has allowed the narrator to fall through time back to the age of Frankenstein and his creator Victor.Except it actually takes him to a parallel universe, since these were fictional characters even in his world. Also, Mary Shelley is there and doesn't realize her book has come true, until the narrator tells her. She hasn't even finished writing it yet. They also have a short-lived romantic encounter. He also pawns his uranium powered watch in this era for cash. I mean, at some point, it just becomes silly. The science is junk and the plot can't overcome it. The narrator seems, to be frank, quite stupid and that isn't intentional. His reactions to events lack realism. The reaction of characters to him lack believability. If you are going to go play with classic characters and classic historical figures, you better know what you are doing. Aldiss had no clue in this novel. I just can't figure out why it is regarded so well. On some level, the Shelleys and Lord Byron actually weren't terrible in terms of characterization. It seemed like Aldiss wanted to write a novel about them, and was using the paper thin plot as a justification to do it. But it isn't worth diving into this whirlpool for a very tiny pearl.Don't let this book ruin Aldiss for you though. Hothouse, while not perfect, is vastly superior and a must read.