Like many other Apple + subscribers, we enjoyed the series Foundation, based on the Isaac Asimov books. While I read a few of Asimov’s robot series years ago, I never ventured into the world of Foundation. A few months ago, I remedied that with a tithe purchase at a favorite bookstore.
The initial trilogy of the Foundation series were originally published as short stories and novellas in the 1940’s and 1950’s. While one is able to discern a through line, the stories in Foundation are episodic with the planet, Terminus, home to the Foundation, as the connecting thread.
I found that I needed to put aside what I knew from the television series to enjoy the stories. Two of the main characters, Hari Seldon and his protégée, Gaal Dornick, are only featured in the first story. The first mayor of Terminus, Salvor Hardin is in two. There is little about the Empire. I imagine that the creators of the series drew from the later books to make the series.
Being science fiction of its time, all of the characters are men. There’s not a woman to be found. Fortunately the series addressed this with a diverse cast.
While I am glad that I finally read one of the Foundation books, I won’t be returning to read the others. I found the stories to be formulaic with a crisis occurring only to turn out well due to cleverness of the main characters.
