7 /10 1 Votes
Cover artist Leo and Diane Dillon Publisher Doubleday/Ace Originally published 1967 Genre Science Fiction | 3.5/5 Goodreads Language English Publication date 1967 Country United States of America | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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Media type Print (hardback & paperback) Similar Clifford D Simak books, Science Fiction books | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Why Call them Back From Heaven? is a 1967 novel by Clifford D. Simak, which became the initial volume in the Ace Science Fiction Specials line. It was originally published in hardcover by Doubleday in 1967, with the Ace Special and Science Fiction Book Club editions following in 1968. A British hardcover was also published by Gollancz in 1967, with a Pan Books paperback appearing in 1970. German and Portuguese translations were published in 1967; a French translation followed in 1969, and an Italian translation in 1978. Several more paperback reprints appeared in the 1980s.
In Why Call Them Back From Heaven, Simak establishes a society where "science has displaced religion by providing a means of resurrection at the cost of all human values". The novel "explores differing concepts of 'immortality' and the relationship between belief-in-survival (whether in the flesh or spirit) and social mores".
Reviews
Judith Merril praised the novel's "beautifully balanced opening, in which character, plot, and context form an inner-motivated unity", but faulted the lengthy "disappointing action-adventure midsection", which led to an "extremely provocative, though sketchy, conclusion".