The story of ‘Slippery’ Jim diGriz, a conman and criminal in a future where humans travel the stars and virtually all criminality has been genetically removed from the human race. This book had a ton of potential: a rogue character who pulls off heist-after-heist, squaring off against police and other criminals, challenging them to a contest of wits to see who can out-heist who. While the idea is fun, the writing is not quite good enough to pull it off.
Heists should be exciting, mysterious, and full of surprises. The way the heists in this book are written up, they are, at best, mildly clever, and occasionally, painfully predictable. The characters in heists should be unique, exciting, and charming. Instead, most of the characters come off as brash, the dialog is awkward, and none of the humor landed for me. I was hoping for George Clooney and “Ocean’s Eleven” in space. Instead, I got a Sci Fi original, with some no-name actor, and low production values.
This book was written in the 1960s, so perhaps it just hasn’t aged well (some details definitely haven’t, such as space-faring civilizations still using paper cash and newspapers). Or maybe Harrison’s writing style just isn’t for me. Either way, I’m not likely to continue reading this series.
