Short description
In the year 2301, guns are only museum pieces and benign telepaths sweep the minds of the populace to detect crimes before they happen. In 2301 murder is virtually impossible, but one man is about to change that.
Long description
In the year 2301, guns are only museum pieces and benign telepaths sweep the minds of the populace to detect crimes before they happen. In 2301 murder is virtually impossible, but one man is about to change that...Ben Reich, a psychopathic business magnate, has devised the ultimate scheme to eliminate the competition and destroy the order of his society. The Demolished Man is a masterpiece of imaginative suspense, set in a superbly imagined world in which everything has changed except the ancient instinct for murder.
Review
..... is Reich, ridden by the nightmare of a faceless man whom he later identifies as a business rival, D'Courtney. Helped, but also jeopardized by the Espers with their special powers of telepathy, Reich kills his man but cannot escape evidence for a conviction. But Reich is still left with his nemesis- the Man With No Face-until he is reconverted from demolition towards a new life. A new language (could it be esperanto?) and symbols for what is basically a scrimmage of man against man. (Kirkus Reviews)
additional information
SALES POINTS * #14 in the Millennium SF Masterworks series, a library of the finest science fiction ever written * The first-ever winner of the Hugo Award for best sf novel of the year. * 'Bester's two superb books have stood the test of time. For nearly fifty years they've held their place on everybody's list of the ten greatest sf novels' -- Robert Silverberg * 'Alfred Bester wrote with the pedal to the floor and the headlights on full beam. His work combined erudition with an unparalleled imaginative inventiveness. Bester was writing cyberpunk while William Gibson was still running around zapping the other kids at school with a toy raygun' -- James Lovegrove
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