And call me conrad pdf

And where Justin was, Jake was going to be as well. Conrad — or should it be Draco now? He could manage two passengers if there was no hurry or stress, but three was asking for trouble. Harry looked down at his plate and sighed mournfully.

The press were bound to want a piece of the Boy Who Lived, and by all accounts Professor Snape wasn't likely to put too much effort into hiding him. Amy and Draco shuffled and dismally failed to suppress smirks.

Xander raised an eyebrow at Harry, who went bright red. It took Xander an embarrassingly long time to realise Harry meant he'd been sexiled from his own dorm room. Harry had been living in the thing for months, and anyway it was ridiculously comfortable for a tent. Carpets, seriously? Harry looked torn. You're definitely allowed to goof off after defeating the Big Bad. It's in the contract.

Buffy insisted. He shoved half a sausage in his mouth and stood up. They certainly seemed to be enjoying themselves. He paused and reconsidered. She nodded. He and the others turned to see Mike sitting with a girl Xander vaguely recognised. Michaela, that was it; Amy's best friend and John Paul's little sister. Oh boy, was this going to be messy. Amy's father had put his mug down and was on his feet in seconds.

Somehow she had managed to get away with no more than bruising and being drenched in snake blood, which Conrad had magicked off her quickly anyway. Mike looked up at Conrad, who was hovering uncertainly nearby, and extended an arm to pull him into the hug. He looked at Harry, who was starting to look a little panicky. Oh yeah, the whole Statute of Secrecy thing. Xander put a restraining hand on Harry's arm to stop him doing anything stupid, and turned to Amy.

Both choices had their risks: not knowing about the things that go bump in the night could get you just as dead as trying to help out. Before Amy had a chance to respond, there was a cry of "Amy!

He practically launched himself at her, trying to hug as much of her as he could. Did you get all the bad wizards? We caught all the important bad wizards.

I'll tell you all about it, but first I need to talk to Michaela, OK? I need to tell her about everything that's happened since just before you came to live here. That could take a while too. Xander tried to keep a poker face; he'd asked Mike to slip extra breakfast cereal in after seeing just how much the wizards had got through. She sounded very different now from the confident mother of a minute earlier. Xander had faith in her all the same.

How comes Dune remains better known? Once again in my opinion Dune is more accessible - and there is nothing wrong with it. Zelazny is acquired taste in the sense that his writings are more subtle. This would be the reason I do not recommend getting to know Zelazny with this book.

If you are familiar with him and have not read this one: what are you waiting for? Me, I will be busy for the next couple of hours kicking myself for not reading this one earlier.

To reduce the sense of guilt somewhat I went ahead and added all of his major works I missed so far to my to-read shelf. I am still sad the genius of science fiction died so early. We, the readers, are poorer because we will never read the stories he could tell, but did not have time to. A moment of silence please After all I said above can you guess the rating? It should be obvious. View all 17 comments. Post apocalyptic earth is being toured by an alien, whose species helped save us after we mostly blew up our home.

It doesn't hurt to know something of Zelazny. If you've never read his work before, I wouldn't suggest starting with this one. Probably the Amber series, starting with Nine Princes in Amber is the best. There the editors have published the novel in its original form in 2 parts, a novella. Besides some words from Zelazny himself, they have also included explanations at the end of each which explain many most? They did quite a good job of it. In expanding this to a novel, Zelazny didn't really add all that much to it - nothing that matters too much.

If anyone ever wants to do a group read of this, please let me know. I would absolutely LOVE to. View all 3 comments. Feb 16, Algernon Darth Anyan rated it it was amazing Shelves: Instead of exploring the intricacies of the Hindu Pantheon, this time the author goes "Do you not see a convergence of life and myth, here, during the last days of life on this planet? Instead of exploring the intricacies of the Hindu Pantheon, this time the author goes for the classical Greek mythology.

For this reason, children born at that time are not of human blood. They are called the kallikanzaroi. Ideally, they look something like those guys with horns and hooves and all, but they don't have to. They could look like me, my parents decided — if they were my parents.

So they left me on a hilltop, to be returned. Born under a bad sign, Conrad tries to make the best of the hand Fate has dealt him. Either though a godlike intervention or as a by-product of radiation from a nuclear war that has destroyed the planet, Conrad has become an immortal, a sort of Earth spirit that has refused to abandon his home when the rest of the human survivors of the cataclysm have fled to the stars, to become refugees on the planets ruled by the more advanced Vegan civilization.

With his mutant genes, Conrad has inherited also some of the sly intelligence of his ancestor Odysseus, enabling him to switch identities and trick databases from pinpointing his real age.

Known at various times as a kallikanzaroi, a terrorist, a mutant, a changeling, Nomikos, Karaghiosis, Ozymandias "I walked on through the mess time makes of greatness. Important one. Wants to write about what's left of Earth.

So I've got to show it to him. Conrad and the rest of the humans who refused to go into exile, some of them also hiding supernatural powers, are too poor to to survive without Vegan handouts, yet too proud to become third rate immigrants for the aliens. So they roll down the red carpet for Cort Myshtigo and assign Conrad to find out what the deal truly is. The Vegans would like to get the home world problem off their hands. Sure, they want to visit it. It is instructive, sobering, humbling, and downright frightening for them to come here and see what can be done to a world.

The journey through the broken down Earth, filled with Hot spots of radiations, mutant beasts and myths roaming the deserts of North Africa and the rocky hills of Peloponnese is instructive, sobering, humbling and downright frightening for the reader, too.

Conrad discovers that an assassin or two has infiltrated his party and is forced to act as the alien's bodyguard even as he decides if it would not be better to kill the damn tourist himself. There's a lot of action in this short story, and wily tricks played by the Greek on his companions "Born to knot a tiger's tail, that is the saying for people such as you.

The forces of final disruption were already goose-stepping amidst the ruins, arms upraised Like Antaeus he draws strength from the land and he may yet guide us towards an Earth reborn. I don't want to spoil the outcome of his confrontation with homegrown terrorists, alien spies and reawakened mythological bests, but I recommend you try this intense post-apocalyptic story for yourself. May 10, Stuart rated it it was amazing Shelves: post-apocalyptic , fantastic-weird , new-wave-sf , favorites.

So how could this slight page Ace paperback David, if you will rival a Goliath like Dune? He reluctantly accepts an assignment to show the sights of old earth to a Vegan journalist named Cort Myshtigo who is writing a book on human civilization. However, from the start there are a number of suspicious aspects, as a number of tour members have associations with a rebel human group called the Rad Pols Returnists , determined to wrest control of the Earth back from the Vegans.

Moreover, the bodyguard Hasan is also a well-known assassin and it becomes clear that he has been hired to kill the Vegan for political reasons. However, Conrad himself conceals a very mysterious past, and some suspect him of being Karagiozis, a revolutionary Greek who fought against the Vegans as a terrorist. He also seems to have very detailed knowledge of events hundreds of years in the past, as well as superhuman strength and fighting skills.

Who is this mysterious figure, and why is he acting as a tour guide to the Vegans? Is he opposed to the Vegans or not? What are their plans for Earth? They both feature devastated far-future Earths roamed by mutants and adventurers, and strong and overt references to Greek myths like Orpheus and Eurydice and the satyr god Pan.

The prose is playful, lush with bizarre imagery and casual literary references, and flits from scene to scene with abandon. He wanted to inject a healthy infusion of literary allusions and allegory to the tumultuous social upheavals of the s. College students were interested in Asian mysticism, psychology, mythology, alternative lifestyles, and were at the same time reacting against the Vietnam and Korean Wars, the Establishment, and most of all the constant threat of nuclear destruction at the touch of a button.

However, unlike the undisciplined self-indulgence of The Einstein Intersection, the storyline and characters of This Immortal were extremely well developed, especially the narrator Conrad. In particular, I liked his complex relationship with Hasan the Assassin, as they find themselves on opposite sides regarding the Vegan Myshtigo, but maintain a code of honor that is unshakable.

People, I have outlived. Athens and I have changed together, somewhat. Mainland Greece is mainland Greece, and it has not changed for me. Try taking it away, whatever you are, and my people will stalk the hills, like the chthonic avengers of old. You will pass, but the hills of Greece will remain, unchanged.

We would lose it in the end. It was written that humanity was to be the cats and dogs and trained chimpanzees of the real people, the Vegans. And in a way, it was not such a bad idea. Perhaps we needed someone wiser to watch over us, to run our lives.

We had made a shambles of our own world during the three days [a limited nuclear exchange], and the Vegans had never had a nuclear war. They operated a smoothly-efficient, interstellar government, encompassing dozens of planets. Whatever they did was aesthetically pleasing. Their own lives were well-regulated, happy things. Why not let them have the Earth?

And why not be their coolies too? Give them the old ball of mud, full of radioactive sores, and populated by cripples. Why not? However, he quickly shakes this off, recalling: But I had lost my Cassandra, my dark witch of Kos, to the mindless powers which move the Earth and the waters.

Nothing could kill my feelings of loss. It seemed further away, somehow insulated behind glass, but it was still there. Not all the pipes of the East could assuage this thing. I did not want to know peace. I wanted hate, I wanted to strike out at all the masks in the universe.

Earth, water, sky, Taler, Earth gov and office, so that behind one of them I might find that power which had taken her and make it too know something of pain.

I did not want to be at one with anything that had harmed that which was mine, by blood and by love. For just five minutes even, I wanted to be Karagiozis again, looking at it all through cross-hairs and squeezing a trigger.

Oh Zeus of the hot red lightings, I prayed, give it to me that I may break the powers in the sky. I listened to the audiobook narrated by Victor Bevine, and his deep and rich voice is the perfect vehicle for the world-weary philosophical musings of Conrad.

View all 16 comments. Sep 29, Ivana Books Are Magic rated it it was amazing. This Immortal aka And Call me Conrad is a science fiction novel that manages to be subtly philosophical, delightfully funny and wonderfully poetical.

Written from the protagonist's a point of view, this novel is set in the future in which the human race is dominated by aliens known as Vegans.

Conrad's long life isn't fully explained, it might be a consequence of a mutation or ju This Immortal aka Conrad's long life isn't fully explained, it might be a consequence of a mutation or just a mystery.

There is also a possibility, hinted in the novel, that Conrad is the Greek god Pan. Like many of Zelanzy's protagonist, Conrad poses super human abilities. In many ways, Conrad reminded me of Corwin from the Amber chronicles- a reluctant sort of Byronic hero.

Dune went on to become the best selling science fiction novel and This Immortal seems to have remained in its shadow. It's a shame for it really is a fine novel. Undoubtedly, This Immortal is quite a different novel from Dune.

It's much shorter than Dune and the plot is not as developed. Moreover, the world building is not nearly as complex. However, this novel has a lot to offer to its reader. It is a novel that can be read both as fantasy based on Greek mythology and science fiction if you prefer to rationally explain the super powers and monsters with radiation and mutation. Conrad is a charming and eloquent narrator, a rogue protagonist with an old soul, the type Zelanzy will develop more fully in his other works and novels.

In addition, there is a philosophical aspect to this novel. Like many great science fiction novels, This Immortal questions what it is to be human. Contrasted with an alien life form, our narrator has an opportunity to comment on humanity. Who is better suited to fight for humanity and reflect on it than a man who is centuries if not more old? This Immortal would be worth reading for humour alone, even if for nothing else. It is abundant in clever lines worthy of Oscar Wilde.

A five star read for sure. View 2 comments. Shelves: mythology , post-apocalyptic , aliens , fiction , science-fiction. But I am more open to fantasy now, and, besides, this one is science fiction, and a delightful one at that.

The setting is a post-nuclear apocalyptic Earth where the remaining humans, numbering only in a few million, are divided between those who live a utopian life under the support of an advanced alien race from Vega and those who inhabit the wastelands under primitive conditions. Our hero, Conrad, heads up a government division devoted to preservation of human cultural sites and artefacts which is granted a lot of power because of the the prospect of economic benefits from tourism.

He gets tapped by his boss to organize an inspection of cultural resources and ecological status around the world for an important alien named Myshtigo, starting with Egypt. He hopes to discourage the Vegans from involvement and interference in the work of restoration and rehabilitation of Earth. Conrad is surprised by how much he likes the Vegan and is torn by conflicting motivations when he begins to suspect that members of his own security may be part of a plot to kill him. It slowly emerges that Conrad has many secrets about his past.

Because of genetic treatments, he has the privilege of indefinite long life and special physiological advantages that contributes to his superior warrior capabilities. He has had important roles with the rebel movement under different identities over hundreds of years of history. In sum, he approaches demi-god status. And at one point when he learns that his home island where he lives with his love Cassandra is sunk like Atlantis by an earthquake, his berserker rage is on the order of that of Roman gods, taking most of his party to restrain him from destroying everyone in sight.

Either way, it was a well written, engaging, and satisfying tale for me. Time for more Zelazny! View all 4 comments. Jan 18, Stephen rated it it was amazing Shelves: easton-press , 6-star-books , , supermen , award-winner-hugo , audiobook , mythstories-and-legends , award-nominee-hugo , sf-apocalyptic-and-post-apocalyptic , science-fantasy.

I just re-read this classic by Roger Zelazny and I was very impressed. Not quite as good as Lord of Light then again how many books are , but still a smart, well written and original science fiction story combining elements of post-apocalyptic science fiction, alien travelogue and mythic fiction. Humanity has joined the civilization of the Vegans, a race of blue-skinned aliens who now own much of Earth's real estate and have set up "vacation resorts" in order to tour the ancient attractions of Earth.

The story is told by Conrad Nomikos aka Konstantin Kallikanzaros and many others a man of "indeterminate" age with a very colorful past that he'd rather not talk about. Conrad is asked to give a tour to of Earth ruins to a Vegan VIP who may have an ulterior motive for taking such a tour.

The rest is a superb ride that is all Zelazny. Zelazny's imagination is amazing, his writing is excellent and Conrad is a great character. Bottom-line, this is a true classic, a great story and a lot of fun. This Immortal was Zelazny's first novel and tied with Dune for best of the year the year it appeared.

It's a true classic. It showcases all of Zelazny's strengths: mythic influences, lyrical writing, memorable characters, and a fast-paced plot with so many twists and turns and surprises that the reader is left amazed at how he made such a hodgepodge of points into a brilliant and cohesive narrative.

It's an expansion of And Call Me Conrad, which remains a great short version in its own right. I This Immortal was Zelazny's first novel and tied with Dune for best of the year the year it appeared.

I first read it years ago and listened to this fine recording on a recent long trip; it holds up just as well today! Dec 10, Becky rated it it was ok Shelves: , disappointing , apocalyptic-types , science-fiction , mythology , reviewed. I wish that I could give this book a higher rating, I do. But as it is, I think that "It was OK" sums it up perfectly for me. This was my very first Zelazny, and it may not have been the best one to start with. But I just love post-apocalyptic books, and I had wanted to read this one since I heard that it was one.

I won't let the fact that this didn't get a higher rating turn me off of Zelazny though. First, I was under the im I wish that I could give this book a higher rating, I do.

First, I was under the impression probably misguided that this would be a kind of "touring the blasted wasteland of the post-nuclear world with a member of the alien Overlord race, who may or may not be trying to wipe out the survivors -- and Conrad is the only one standing in the way" book. That's what I got from the description on the back of the book, anyway: What with the Three Days of War and decades of Vegan occupation, Earth isn't doing too well these days.

Indeed, all that seems to be left for us is selling off our heritage to the blueskins bit by bit. That's why Conrad Nomikos, Minister of Culture, Arts and Monuments, is tagged to play the part of native guide when one of these superior beings pays a visit to our backwater planet - and finds himself acting as the haughty alien's bodyguard as well. But should he? He says that the purpose of his visit is to write a travelogue, but it is entirely possible that the real reason the Vegan is here is to write finis to the Human race.

So, I was kind of surprised to find that this is very much in the background for most of the story. It seems that a lot of other, barely related, themes take over the story. This book is very heavy on the Greek symbolism and mythology this being one of the themes that I feel took over the story , and perhaps it's just me, but I didn't feel like it was very accessible to someone who is not well-versed in Greek history and mythology.

Granted, I know that this is a short-coming on MY part, because I do not expect authors to dumb down or over simplify their work to cater to lazy people who refuse to learn something. But I do have a basic knowledge and understanding of Greek history, and I still did not get a lot of the references. And this was kind of distracting for me. I feel like I read a book with every other sentence written in invisible ink.

Even the dialogue made me feel that way. I love dialogue. Seller: Half Price Books Inc. Used - Hardcover Condition: Good. Connecting readers with great books since Customer service is our top priority!.

Anderson, Poul, Simak, Clifford D. Item in good condition. Textbooks may not include supplemental items i. CDs, access codes etc. Anderson, Poul; Simak, Clifford D. Seller: GF Books, Inc. Satisfaction Guaranteed! Book is in Used-Good condition. Pages and cover are clean and intact. Used items may not include supplementary materials such as CDs or access codes. May show signs of minor shelf wear and contain limited notes and highlighting. Used - Hardcover Condition: Fair.

Condition: Fair. Independent family-run bookstore for over 50 years! Buy with confidence! Book is in acceptable condition with wear to the pages, binding, and some marks within. Used - Hardcover Condition: Very Good. Condition: Very Good. Light to moderate shelf wear. Clean pages. Published by Library of America , No Jacket. Item is in good condition.

Some moderate creases and wear. This item may not come with CDs or additional parts including access codes for textbooks. This may not have a dust jacket. Photos are stock pictures and not of the actual item. Book is in very good condition with minimal signs of use. Anderson, Poul", "Simak, Clifford D. New - Hardcover Condition: new. Quantity: Poul Anderson, Clifford D.

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