Status
Available
Call number
Collection
Publication
New English Library Ltd (1980), Edition: Not known, Paperback
Description
He was 'The Visitor' . . . in a society revolutionised and troubled by a transportation device that let you walk through a door and be anywhere in the world - instantly. He was 'The Visitor' . . . at a time when unauthorised travel had caused the violent deaths of countless millions and the survivors were quaking in fear. He was 'The Visitor' . . . in a world where the invasion of privacy was the ultimate crime and where his obsession with visiting places where he had no right to be led him on a perilous adventure towards his own destruction.
User reviews
LibraryThing member isabelx
Next he came to a small study, with an open bureau bearing a Halda typewriter, documents in pigeon-holes, a pile of dusty correspondence papers which he blew at gently until the name and address were legible. From it he learned that the house's owners had been called Eriksson, that they were indeed
Their skelter code was printed on the letterhead!
The skelter is a transportation device that lets you walk through its door and out of any other skelter on the planet, as long as you know its code. There are even skelters that open straight into to the heart of an incinerator, although their codes are strictly controlled to stop people making use of them to dispose of dead bodies and other evidence of criminal activity, rather than just rubbish.
Supposedly the invention of the skelter caused worldwide devastation, as there was originally no way of preventing access to anyone who knew the code. As well as facilitating robbery and crimes of violence, it also allowed terrorists and saboteurs easy access to plant bombs and make a quick getaway to the other side of the world, and allowed diseases to spread with impunity. The human race has been decimated by the skelter, and a disease called contagious puerperal fever has led to a gender imbalance, with 5 men to 3 women (and not many of them are fertile, since any woman not immune to CPF is sterilised for their own safety). Now that a device called the privateer has been invented that allows you to screen incomers to your skelter, and deny them access, the elite, skelter using population tend to live on islands, although there are some people who are 'stuck', unable to bring themselves to walk through the door of a skelter, for fear of what might happen, and there are also skelter-hating populations living at a lower technological level. Stealing skelter codes or using them to invade someone's privacy is punishable by being forced to wear a bracelet that prevents access to the skelter system.
I can't see that anyone would actually want to have such an insecure device providing access to their homes. In reality, the rich might have private skelters (although I am sure that they would be placed just outside their well-guarded perimeter defences), but I am sure that everyone else would just use public skelters.
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in Sweden, near a place called Umeå, which he would have to look up on a map when he got home, and something else which struck him as simply incredible!Their skelter code was printed on the letterhead!
The skelter is a transportation device that lets you walk through its door and out of any other skelter on the planet, as long as you know its code. There are even skelters that open straight into to the heart of an incinerator, although their codes are strictly controlled to stop people making use of them to dispose of dead bodies and other evidence of criminal activity, rather than just rubbish.
Supposedly the invention of the skelter caused worldwide devastation, as there was originally no way of preventing access to anyone who knew the code. As well as facilitating robbery and crimes of violence, it also allowed terrorists and saboteurs easy access to plant bombs and make a quick getaway to the other side of the world, and allowed diseases to spread with impunity. The human race has been decimated by the skelter, and a disease called contagious puerperal fever has led to a gender imbalance, with 5 men to 3 women (and not many of them are fertile, since any woman not immune to CPF is sterilised for their own safety). Now that a device called the privateer has been invented that allows you to screen incomers to your skelter, and deny them access, the elite, skelter using population tend to live on islands, although there are some people who are 'stuck', unable to bring themselves to walk through the door of a skelter, for fear of what might happen, and there are also skelter-hating populations living at a lower technological level. Stealing skelter codes or using them to invade someone's privacy is punishable by being forced to wear a bracelet that prevents access to the skelter system.
I can't see that anyone would actually want to have such an insecure device providing access to their homes. In reality, the rich might have private skelters (although I am sure that they would be placed just outside their well-guarded perimeter defences), but I am sure that everyone else would just use public skelters.
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LibraryThing member burritapal
A post-apocalyptic fiction about a much-reduced population, due to an epidemic that caused women to be outnumbered by men. The result is, even more unhappy marriages than the norm of reality, as having a wife, any wife,is a status symbol. Moreover, one can travel instantly to almost any part of the
Not my favorite Brunner.
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world via a "skelter," a shelter that sends you on your way instantly, if you possess the correct code. Humans are still causing the same problems as ever--there are the ones with power who use it to oppress others. There are men who want to dominate and use women...Not my favorite Brunner.
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LibraryThing member jwhenderson
He was "The Visitor" in a civilization that had been transformed and disturbed by a means of travel that allowed anyone to immediately travel anywhere in the world by walking through a door. The world was in a period when unrestricted travel had violently killed untold millions of people and the
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survivors were trembling in terror. Importantly this novel depicts a society where violating someone's privacy was the worst possible crime. The protagonist, who unfortunately had a fixation with going to areas he had no business going, embarked on a treacherous journey that ultimately led to his own demise. Show Less
Subjects
Language
Original publication date
1974
ISBN
0450046850 / 9780450046858