Lord of Light by Roger Zelazny

My rating: 5 of 5 stars


This is a fantastic book by a fantastic writer, and won both the Hugo and the Nebula when it was published. The opener is classic:

“His followers called him Mahasamatman and said he was a god. He preferred to drop the Maha- and the -atman, however, and called himself Sam. He never claimed to be a god, but then he never claimed not to be a god.”

The setting is a planet settled by people from the Star of India who find themselves on a planet with hostile natives, and in order to survive use a variety of technologies to essentially re-engineer themselves. They create a sort of Hindu-related society, with former crew from the ship on the top of the caste system as “gods”. Sam becomes opposed to this system, and introduces Buddhism as part of his long-range plan to overthrow the “gods”.

This is hugely atmospheric and should be on anyone’s “must read” list.



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