1st November 2025

Bookmark: Chapter 3

Baley has just met up with Daneel and there’s an incident going on at a shoe shop.

I don’t like Baley and I don’t love the writing. I also am not fond of the humans already but I think I have the hindsight of having read and watched so many other robots and humanity themed books, movies and TV shows. So far, I don’t find much sympathy towards the humans and it sounds like they’re just kind of a miserable lot for no reason but I also don’t think the issues have been communicated well enough to me in the first few chapters. I don’t know if it’s me or the writing but half the time I can’t visualise or understand what is happening. For example, with the Spacers, it sounds like people left Earth and their descendants returned and Earth, in it’s expected envy over welcome, became so hostile and inconsiderate that it caused riots when the Spacers decided they really didn’t want the “Earthmen” to mix with them in the droves. Fair. I imagine there’s much more nuance than that and further reading should reveal that to me.

Now, Baley. Right now, he’s every middle-aged male cop/detective with a chip on his shoulder that I’ve read and watched. I honestly don’t enjoy this archetype and I think that’s because I’ve read and watched it over and over and it doesn’t ever really change. Grumpy, close-minded man slowly becomes less grumpy, more open-minded (or emotional) man (or they just die). I suppose, to be fair to Asimov, Baley came before many of the others. Hank Anderson from Detroit: Become Human, Ash Henderson from Stuart McBride’s novels, Del from I, Robot (okay well that one’s a given), Rick Deckard from Blade Runner (also low hanging fruit), one could argue Arthur Conan Doyle’s Sherlock Holmes, that guy from Dept. Q, Luther, etc. Bonus points if they have an estranged relationship with their children. I think Jimmy Perez of Shetland is one of the only characters I’ve read that plays with those traits without being almost unbearable. I did like Luther but he was frustrating to watch … and maybe the tolerance was because it’s Idris Elba. It’s almost like the broody stubbornness is their entire character. At least when the character is a woman or queer, I assume the harsh exterior is because life is just generally harder for them than others. Which is a bit of a gross generalisation but statistically likely. Although, I honestly couldn’t come to like Marcella. On another note, however, I’ve just learned that Marcella deals with Disassociative Identity Disorder (DID) and so that puts her character in a slightly different light. I don’t know if I stopped watching before that was explored because I don’t recall it.

Anyway, we shall see how Baley grows and evolves throughout the story and as I learn more of the background of the novel I’ll hopefully come to understand it a bit better. So far, it sounds like the Outer Worlds are a nicer place, but I suppose stories with tension can’t really move if everything is fine and dandy. After all, the main tension points so far are a murder and racism. Though perhaps robots vs. humans might not be considered racism, at the very least the Spacers are supposed to be human descendants. Then again, I’m not sure if that still falls under the definition but you get my point, perhaps it’s closer to xenophobia. It’s kind of a sad reflection on the human race that we have individual words for specific types of hate.

I think what I am interested in, however, is the near timelessness of the plot, even though I’m only two chapters in. Stories like The Caves of Steel are just as relevant now as they were in the 1950s, only we’re seeing it unfold into reality all the more.

Post-Reflection

I don’t have much else to add going from this reflection. Finishing the book, I still don’t like Baley and I find the conflict between humans and spacers confusing.