Here is a book with a violent, dangerous protagonist at its heart. It took me nearly the entire book before I could find Gully Foyle in some way sympathetic, through a wild assortment of adventures with cliffhanger escapes exchanging zinging dialogue with supporting characters who mostly make their own impression on the reader even in the face of Foyle's furious drive. He does some monstrous things along the way which anyone would find hard to forgive, and yet by the end, where the survival of Earth comes to the fore and he makes an ethical choice from a place of unequaled power I found I have to feel a little admiration for what he's become. There is a payoff on the book's (American) title there too which felt fresh and audacious to me.

After over sixty years, there are bound to be a few passages which jar, but I thought it was actually going to be worse. There are some bits of description which were unexpectedly lyrical, especially when I think of what else was being written in the Golden Age of science fiction, fresh out of its pulp origins.

The audio narration helped me enjoy the story, I think, even through some of the most difficult and strange dialogue scenes.