The Gods Themselves by Isaac Asimov

read by Scott Brick

This book interested me because I heard that it featured a triad—a stable romantic partnership involving three individuals. It was one of a handful of examples of polyamorous relationships in science fiction that a group of friends on Facebook were able to come up with. Since I also enjoy dipping into the odd New Wave hard sci fi novel, and Asimov is of course one of the greats, I decided to give this one a go. 

It doesn’t start in a promising way. Basically a cadre of in-fighting, nerdishly vicious, and highly competitive white-guy scientists discover a source of infinite free energy, and they fight and fight and fight about it. Who really discovered it, who gets how much credit, whether it’s dangerous in any way and how shall we discredit and ruin the career of anyone who dares to ask that question, and so on. This, and the discovery that the energy source is actually a parallel universe with slightly different laws of physics than our own and that this may cause the sun to blow up, take up the first third of the book.

In the next third of the novel, we get to visit the alternate universe. This is where, for me, the book gets interesting. The species that has initiated the energy transfer (which goes two ways and thus benefits the civilization utilizing it in each universe) consists, in its immature form, of three genders: Rational, Emotional, and Parental. Every relationship consists of a triad including one individual of each gender, and they blend their essences to produce exactly three children, one of each gender. After that, they go on to the next phase of their existence.

All of this is interesting enough in theory. But what hooked me was Asimov’s gritty, unsentimental but not unsympathetic depiction of the everyday reality of these beings. He paints a vivid picture of the way their society is shaped by being comprised of three genders with very distinct roles and personality types, how that affects relationships and thought patterns, what this kind of relationship feels to someone who is in it and how that differs by gender. 

The day-to-day happinesses and compromises and failures to communicate and generosities of any romantic partnership, as transformed by the triune nature of relationships in this society, don’t have to be imagined by the reader. Asimov shows us both the differences and the similarities between that form of relationship and the two-person sort that most of us are more accustomed to and he does it with a very… I can’t say human touch here, can I? With a portrait painter’s eye for the homely, telling detail.

In the third part of the book we get on with the business of saving the universe, and for me it becomes somewhat less interesting. I mean, of course I’m all for the universe being saved, especially when saving it means flipping a highly humiliating bird at the forces of greed and egotism that got us in that mess in the first place. The pacing, once you figure out who’s who and what their agendas are, is good. The characters are interesting, the lunar society depicted is interesting, and there’s even a well-written central female character. It’s a good story and a fine final third. But for my taste, Part 2 is what this book is all about.

Verdict: read it! Just be prepared to do some eye rolling for the first hundred pages or so. Your patience will be rewarded.