Ivory

August 5, 1988
In novels like Santiago and The Dark Lady , Resnick has shown a talent for spinning wild and woolly tall tales of the spaceways that recall the narrative poems Robert W. Service wrote about another frontier. Resnick's latest space opera covers 7000 years between the 19th century life of the legendary, mammoth Kilimanjaro Elephant and the interstellar search for its sacred ivory by Bukoba Mandaka, the last of the Masai. Mandaka hires obsessive researcher Duncan Rojas, who ferrets out of computer files episodes in the massive trophy's flight through the hands of gamblers, collectors and thieves, kings, politicians and alien artisans. This is another enjoyable Resnick yarn in which the inventive, colorful storyteller sustains a romantic vision of human destiny.

July 30, 2007
First published in 1998, this episodic novel showcases Hugo-winner Resnick's strengths and weaknesses. Thousands of years in the future, after most wildlife on Earth is extinct and humans have spread to distant stars, the last descendent of the Maasai tribe hires a researcher to locate the massive tusks of the Kilimanjaro Elephant. The search dominates the book, showing the passionless scholar's growing identification with his employer's quest as it echoes the elephant's spiritual journey toward the sacred mountain, but most of the book consists of vignettes about the various entities who have possessed the tusks. Resnick's fluent writing and respect for African cultures and wildlife make for some smoothly ironic glimpses of people who imagined they "owned" the ivory, but several pieces are facile little gimmick stories, clever enough for fast reading but essentially just filling gaps in the tale's chronology. Overall, this is a very pleasant read that just misses being truly memorable.