Novel - The Caves of Steel - Isaav Asimov (published in 1954)

Isaac Asimov is one of the most famous science fiction writers of all time. The number of fiction and non-fiction books that he has written number in the hundreds, more than 500 books of different genres. Asimov is mostly famous for his science fiction novels, but he has written a number of others books, almost all of them on science. Along with other authors such as Arthur C Clarke and others such as Robert Heinlein, he was one of the most famous science fiction writers of all time. His most famous legacies include the 3 laws of Robotics (meant to ensure that humans have control over robots) and for the Foundation series of books. For many science fiction readers, Asimov would have been the first author whose books they may have read. He had also won many of the science fiction awards that were there, and one of his short stories, Nightfall was very popular with critics. For those who have read the books, there are many aspects of the books that are not science fiction per se, instead they are a beautiful description of the society of the future.
Asimov was born as a Russian Jew in the period just after the First World War, with the exact date of birth unknown (sometime between 1919 and 1920). When Asimov was very young, his family moved to the United States and settled in New York. During the Second World War, he was working in a Navy station stateside, and joined the Boston University School of Medicine. He started writing short stories in 1939, and also with novels in 1950. Within a couple of years, he also went into writing non-fiction books. Over a period of time, he wrote a large number of books, with an increasing concentration on science books rather than non-fiction. In fact, as he mentioned in the Foundation Series, he had to be literally forced by his publishers to write some of the later Foundation books. Unfortunately, after writing a huge collection of books, many of them incredible books, Isaac Asimov died in 1992.
The Caves of Steel was the first in a series of novels that starred the human investigator Elijah Baley and his humanoid robotic partner, Daneel Olivaw. The book was first published as a series in Galaxy Magazine, over the last quarter of 1953, with the hardcover editing being published in 1954. This was the book that showed a time when travelers from earth (using hyperdrive) managed to colonize external planets. However, these colonizers, over a period of time managed to control disease, developed the science to live much longer and grew very rich, comfortable with robots to help them with their lives. At the same time, on earth, there was a reverse process. Humans retreated into living in large cities of steel (and an aversion to open space or outside), with severe restrictions and control on all facilities, hating those who had gone outside (the Spacers) and hating the control they had on earth, and most of all hating their machines, the robots.

In this setting, Elijah Baley is a policeman, with some of these biases as well. He has a family, and due to his status as a policeman, he has some facilities that others don't have, but there are many that he does not have because of his current rank. And then, a disaster occurs. A Spacer, one who wants people on earth to start going outside again, to other worlds, is killed just inside Spacetown (the guarded location on earth where Spacers live, and where people from earth are only allowed after being disinfected). He has been killed using a blaster, but it is a proper murder mystery since it is not easy to detect as to who did the murder. The disaster and opportunity for Elijah is that his boss, the Commissioner, wants Elijah to take up the murder investigation, and his partner will be a robot who looks just like a human, called R. Daneel Olivaw (the R stands for Robot).

There is no evidence of how the murder occurred and it is now upto Elijah to do all the investigations to figure out why the murder occurred. He has to fight with unknown people, work against an organization that wants nothing to do with Spacers and with robots and is looking to implicate Elijah in a situation where he will be accused of destroying valuable property. How does he do it ? Is he successful ?

Novel - The Naked Sun - Isaav Asimov (published in 1957)

Isaac Asimov is one of the most famous science fiction writers of all time. The number of fiction and non-fiction books that he has written number in the hundreds, more like 500 books. Although Asimov is mostly famous for his science fiction novels, he has written a number of books on science. Along with Arthur C Clarke and others such as Robert Heinlein, he was one of the most famous science fiction writers of all time, most famous now for the 3 laws of Robotics and for the Foundation series of books. For many science fiction readers, Asimov would have been the first author whose books they may have read. He had also won many of the science fiction awards that were there, and one of his short stories, Nightfall was very popular with critics. For those who have read the books, there are many aspects of the books that are not science fiction per se, instead they are a beautiful description of the society of the future.
Asimov was born as a Russian Jew in the period just after the First World War, with the exact date of birth unknown (sometime between 1919 and 1920). When Asimov was very young, his family moved to the United States and settled in New York. During the Second World War, he was working in a Navy station stateside, and joined the Boston University School of Medicine. He started writing short stories in 1939, and also with novels in 1950. Within a couple of years, he also went into writing non-fiction books. Over a period of time, he wrote a large number of books, with an increasing concentration on science books rather than non-fiction. In fact, as he mentioned in the Foundation Series, he had to be literally forced by his publishers to write some of the later Foundation books. Unfortunately, Isaac Asimov died in 1992.
The Naked Sun was published in a magazine between October and December 1956 and was published in a complete form in 1957. It takes off from an earlier novel, the Caves of Steel, continuing with the same societal issues and the same set of characters, exploring the strange forms of society formed on Earth and on one of the Other worlds which was settled by people from Earth, and where society developed in such a way that people avoided contact with each other.

In the Caves of Steel, Elijah Baley was introduced to his partner, the humaniform robot R. Daneel Olivaw. Earth is the cradle of humanity but has started to live in massive caves, cut off from the sunlight, from the open air (in fact, people are almost never exposed to sunlight and would be scared and horrified if they did get exposed to such sunlight). In addition, there are vast powerful new worlds that were settled by people who moved out from Earth. These people are called spacers, who have lived in worlds where all forms of infections have been controlled, where they have eliminated the normal diseases which affect the people on earth. As a result, they have drastically increased their life spans, and also become much more powerful and capable of destroying earth and its people as well. But since they are no longer exposed to these diseases, they no longer have the same kind of immunity, and hence avoid any kind of connection to the people of earth; if they have to meet them, the person from earth needs to be disinfected, and the Spacers wear nose filters as well. Earthlings also have a strong distaste for Robots, not being able to stand being near them. In the worlds that the Spacers inhabit, their populations are far lower, and there is no such distaste for robots. They know how to utilize the robots, and use them for making their life better. However, with these comforts, their need for social interaction decreases, to the extent that on worlds such as Solaria, people live on vast estates, with a large number of robots (approximately 10,000 robots for every one person), and yet cannot stand to be in the physical presence of other people. They meet each other through video interactions and shun the company of others. The population is also controlled for the exact number that is seemed right for each estate. Elijah Baley is now famous ever since he managed to resolve the murder that happened in Spacetown on earth along with Daneel, and hence has been called for the investigation of the murder of a famous fetologist and robotocist, Rikaine Delmarre on Solaria. This assignment is significant, since with the power equations, any failure of Elijah can be very dangerous for Elijah and for Earth, but success can increase the power of those Spacers in favor of Earth. He is again partnered with R. Daneel Olivaw, and now has to work in an environment where many Solarians look down upon him and consider him as an inferior person. The main suspect in the case is that of the wife of Rikaine, Gladia. The book is an interesting murder mystery, set in a time when Elijah cannot even visit the various people involved in the case but has to view them from a distance. Further, he has to delve deeper into the 3 laws of Robotics, and how any changes in these laws can cause murder to happen, and what this means for the future. I really loved the book, and am not going to reveal more of the story. It is a must read from my perspective. I don't consider such a book dated even though it was published more than 50 years back.