Book Review: Venus Plus X by Theodore Stugeon

Venus Plus X by Theodore Sturgeon

Paperback, 224 pages

Published October 5th 1999 by Vintage (first published 1960)

Hugo Award Nominee for Best Novel (1961)

I read this book in part because I heard it came in second in the voting for the Hugo's in 1960. Losing to Canticle for Lebowitz is no shame. When I saw the concept I was interested to see how a straight cis gender sci-fi writer of 60 years ago handled this topic. In many ways, this book very forward-thinking especially when you consider that it was written before the Women's rights movement.

Sturgeon is a giant of 20th-century science fiction and I certainly have enjoyed his work before. The story follows Charlie Johns your typical 60's man who is pulled through time travel into the far future. Venus Plus X is a narrative split between two times and two societies. One is the world as we knew it in 1960 and the is Lodem a far future Utopia where gender, war, and hunger are things of the past. It is exciting that this book views so many of our civilization's problems to the dynamic created by gender and gender inequality.

At first, I was annoyed that all the characters in Lodem were giving the He/him pronoun but 72 pages Sturgeon does address this issue pointing out that the pronoun confusion is a result of the point of view character Charlie being wrong. "The personal pronoun-there was only one! In Ledom was like that; personal without gender. That Charlie had told himself it was "He" was Charlie's own mistake."

That is pretty forward-thinking for a book written in 1960 and it is clear several times no matter how clumsy TS has tried to write a feminist book. “It's a team, that's what I mean. There's a lot of yammering going on about the women taking over. They're not taking over. They're moving in.” That is not all “The patrists poison themselves. The matrists tend to decay, which is merely another kind of poison.”

It is a mixed bag, in some ways better than I expected but I didn't enjoy the story much. The 1960's storyline is important to the story but it takes so long to get there that it just feels a diversion from the good stuff. Those parts of the story were boring to me and didn't hook me. I just wanted to get back to Lodem parts of the story. The functions of this society and how even the biology works presents lots of interesting dynamics

As a piece of progressive old school science fiction, I am glad I read to add to my knowledge of the genre. I respect Sturgeon for what he was trying to do, but I can't help compare it to the book it lost the Hugo award to. Canticle for Lebowitz holds up very well and doesn't seem dated at all. This one is a completion recommendation at best. Sci-fi readers who are interested in genre works that focus on gender like Left Hand of Darkness must read this one. I liked but did not love this one.