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Synopsis: The people in the Second Foundation are living a Golden Age. They have defeated The Mule and placed the First Foundation back in control. Better still, they have repaired the damage the Mule did to Seldon's Plan. So well, in fact, that it seems to be working better now than before the disruption. Could it be too much of a good thing. Is this Golden Age the calm before the storm? A young high official of the Second Foundation believes the Galaxy has yet to face its greatest peril. So does a young Terminus Councilman. If only they can get the others to listen!
WARNING! The comments contain spoilers to the previous book in the series Second Foundation proceed at your own risk :)
Comments: Foundation's Edge was written as a novel as opposed to the middle three books which were written as serial stories for the pulp magazines of the 40s. It shows. It also shows much improvement to Asimov's writing.
It's worth mentioning The Good Doctor wrote Foundation's Edge almost 40 years after the last story in Second Foundation. Yet he had begun writing it in the 50s, shortly after the Foundation Trilogy became a hit. However, by that time Asimov was more interested in writing non-fiction (namely science popularisations) and he stopped work in the new novel shortly after he began it.
This novel is by far the most complex in the Foundation Universe. We have two central characters, Golan Trevize of the Foundation and Storr Gendibal of the Second Foundation, driving the story. Each of them has a sidekick of sorts (Janov Pelorat and Novi respectively), plus detractors, people conspiring against them and one or two trying to be supportive. Whew! And that's not all. We find that there may be a third power operating in the Galaxy.
Everything manages to hang together except one little loose end that launches the next and final book. How Asimov did it is a mystery second only to how the Good Doctor managed to write so many books ;) Everything in this complex plot comes together in the end briliianty.
At the start of the book Councilman Trevize anounces that the Second Foundation was not, as is believed, destroyed. It still exists and it must be destroyed, lest it keep on manipulating the destiny of Terminus and the Foundation. We also see Speaker Storr Gendibal of the Second Foundation proclaim the Seldon plan meaningless. He demonstrates that it cannot possibly be working as well as it appears to be working, therefore something or someone else must be interfering. Sure, this mystery third power is helping the Second Foundation at present, but what it will do in the future? ("manipulate us like we manipulate the Terminians!" would have been a great answer, alas it is not in the book).
Trevize gets arrested by Mayor Harla Branno and sent to find the Second Foundation. Is this a real assignment or is it exile? Maybe it's worse than that: a trap. Trevize, along with Dr. Janov Pelorat, a historian and mythologist of little account, will try to find out. Oh, they will say, if asked, that they're looking for Earth, the legendary planet where the human race originated. A good cover story, but one that might attract attention.
Gednibal, for his part, must play politics at the Speaker's Table not just to alert the others to the danger he alone can see, but to save his own career as well.
Again, Whew!
This is all just for starters. The secondary characters and the incidental characters remain to be even mentioned. All have a role to play and their bit to add to the complexity of the plot.
So what else can be said? Well, there is one thoroughly meaningless scene with background characters the reader doesn't care about. It points out a small plot development, but it really shold have been excised from the novel.
There are some fluff scenes that add color to the novel. These are okay and even interesting in their own right, but trivial in the larger scheme of things. They are few and far between and they don't get in the way of the telling of the story.
We also find out how effective the Second Foundation's deception was. Trevize may believe the destruvtion a sham, but he's convinced that Trantor is not the place to look for it <G> Pelorat is disappointed since he very much wanted to see the Galactic Library at Trantor. Instead they head for an obscure system.
Pelorat discusses soime myths regarding the Earth. Some of these are allusions to other Asimov novles (the Empire Novels), and it is a bit of a thrill to know more than the main characters do :) Some secondary characters also contribute to the Earth mythos, linking it to The Mule in ways that, later on, cannot be believed (at least not by me).
This book was also Dr. Asimov's first best seller (after writing professionally for decades).
Finally, while I like the book I've never developed a taste for th title. The working title was "Lightning Rod," which makes a lot of sense but may give too much away too soon, and a Foundation Novel should ahve the word "Foundation" in the title. Later it was to be called "Foundation's at Bay." I wish they ahd let that one stand <sigh> What can one do?
Yet a book cannot be judged by its title, or cover, and Foundation's Edge delivers an interesting, complex plot different in form and substance, but not on intelligence, than the previous books in the series. A great read.
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