Venus Plus X, Theodore Sturgeon
Venus Plus X, Theodore Sturgeon
List: $19.99 | Sale: $13.99
Club: $9.99

Venus Plus X

Author: Theodore Sturgeon

Narrator: J.S. Arquin

Unabridged: 7 hr 47 min

Format: Digital Audiobook Download

Publisher: Tantor Media

Published: 04/12/2022

Categories: Fiction, Science Fiction


Synopsis

From Hugo and Nebula winner Theodore Sturgeon comes a seeming utopia: a world with only one gender and no poverty, pollution, or war—but at what cost?

Charlie Johns has been snatched from his home on Earth and delivered to the strange future world of Ledom. Technology has triumphed over hunger, overpopulation, pollution, and even time and space. But there is a change Charlie finds even more shocking: Gender is a thing of the past. Gone are the tensions between male and female. Gone is the human preoccupation with sex.

As Charlie explores Ledom and its people, he finds his engrained human precepts are profane in this new world. But then why are his hosts so eager for his approval? Something isn't right about Ledom's ideal existence. And when cracks begin to appear in its flawless façade, Charlie must unearth the city's terrible secrets . . . before it's too late.

Theodore Sturgeon's visionary tale is literary science fiction at its most brazen and inventive. A scathing critique of American puritanism that unabashedly explores questions of sexuality and gender, it remains as relevant, insightful, provocative, and troubling as when it first appeared in print.

About Theodore Sturgeon

Theodore Sturgeon (1918-1985) is considered one of the godfathers of contemporary science fiction and dark fantasy. The author of numerous acclaimed short stories and novels, among them the classics More Than Human, Venus Plus X, and To Marry Medusa, Sturgeon also wrote for television and holds among his credits two episodes of the original 1960s Star Trek series, for which he created the Vulcan mating ritual and the expression "Live long and prosper." He is also credited as the inspiration for Kurt Vonnegut's recurring fictional character Kilgore Trout.

Sturgeon is the recipient of the Hugo Award, the Nebula Award, and the International Fantasy Award. In 2000, he was posthumously honored with a World Fantasy Award for Life Achievement.


Reviews

Goodreads review by Franco on January 21, 2018

4.5 Mi cuarto libro de Sturgeon, y ¡qué sorpresa! Sin lugar a dudas, mi favorito de él. Conmovedor, visionario, emocionante y esperanzador. Venus más X explora la moralidad, el machismo, el feminismo, la sexualidad y principalmente lo más duro y vergonzoso que reside en nuestra naturaleza como seres......more

Goodreads review by Kalin on July 31, 2019

A Platonic dialogue exploring the similarities between the sexes and our stereotypes about sex, many of which sadly persist, more than 60 years after the book was first published. As usual, I'm awed by Sturgeon's courage, insight and warmth. (Although this particular story seemed more clinical, cold......more

Goodreads review by Craig on August 20, 2024

Venus Plus X is one of Sturgeon's best-known novels, but not necessarily among his best (in my opinion, of course!) It was on the Hugo Award ballot for best novel of the year in 1961, but lost (quite rightly, again in my opinion) to Miller's A Canticle for Leibowitz. It's more of a long fictionalize......more

Goodreads review by Jemppu on June 11, 2021

"You cannot be objective about it because you have been indoctrinated, sermonized, drenched, imbued, inculcated and policed on the matter since first you wore blue booties. You come from a time and place in which [...] the importance of then- difference, were matters of almost total preoccupation." A......more

Goodreads review by Kaisa on July 12, 2015

This is a SF classic I would like to see discussed more often. Written in 1960, it is vitally relevant to the current transformation in constructing gender and sexuality. If nothing else, it serves to remind us that the change has been going on for quite some time. Venus Plus X takes an everyman obse......more