Nightwings

This was my first Silverberg novel and while I enjoyed it, it didn't blow me away. A short novel (actually three novellas made into one novel), Nightwings is set in the distant future on an Earth in its “Third Cycle”, where mankind has fallen from a peak of civilisation, through its own hubris, back to an almost medieval level of existence. Everyone belongs to a Guild and each has their own calling, be it Rememberers, Watchers or Fliers.

Our protagonist is a Watcher, one who uses a machine to scan the stars for a possible alien invasion. He travels with Gorman, a Changeling (one of the mutant humans left over from the Second Cycle) and the young female Flier Avluela, whose wings are the Nightwings of the title.

When the invasion comes, Earth is conquered in a single night and the Watcher finds himself redundant, eventually finding his way to Perris and the guild of Rememberers before journeying as a Pilgrim to Jorselm, for renewal and possibly redemption.

Silverberg is a good writer and the vision of an Earth where things and places are half remembered (even place names are misremembered such as Roum, Perry's and the holy city of Jorselm) is well drawn. Being a novel of the late 60s there is a lot of “if we all join together as one people we can heal the earth, man” towards the end. But you can forgive him that as the rest of the novel is an enjoyable, if slight read.