Book 1), Split Infinity (The Apprentice Adept

Anthony seems most at home with settings he can completely create from scratch. He is always entertaining, and this book is no exception. The theme is predictable(a normal man, the underdog, discovers hidden powers and becomes the beloved hero). Knowing how things will end gives you no clues about the ride there, however. Anthony's talent for conveying his seemingly boundless imagination to paper is on full display here. This book is absolutely enjoyable. The reader is fully immersed in Anthony's worlds, and is therefore able to completely escape our own for awhile.

Split Infinity is a futuristic story of Stile, a serf/jockey on the planet of Proton, and his discovery of an alternate dimension in which magic is real. It is the first book in the Apprentice Adept trilogy, one of my personal all-time favorites and my strong recommend for any sci-fi/fantasy reader who has not already discovered them.

Piers Anthony has a rare and magical talent that I thoroughly enjoy. Thank goodness Stile travels between Proton and Phase during chapter breaks or I would never have been able to set down the book for lunch, dinner or bathroom breaks.

Beth Durkee, aka Efran Myles, author of Engaging Enchantment (The Legend of Lord Randall Castle Book 1)

Two worlds, one known as Proton and based on science and logic, the other, Phase is based on magic. On Proton lives a master gamesman, Stile, who discovers by accident how to cross between the two worlds. But what should Stile do when he has someone trying to kill him on both worlds? His only means of survival are his skills as a master gamesman, which Stile discovers is how he will work magic. On Proton he has only one friend, a humanoid robot named Sheen. On Phase, Stile has a unicorn and werewolf as his only friends. His fiends on both worlds try to keep him alive as he tries to uncover the identity of his secret assassin as well as keep his lifestyle on the same on both worlds. I think this is an awesome book! It is great for anyone who has ever wanted to believe in magic. A tale of adventure, with unicorns, sorcerores, and robots. This is a great tale for all ages. On a scale of one to ten, I would give it an eleven.

Although I enjoyed this book, I also thought that it seemed to be written on a lower level than some books I've read. It was kinda like the whole idea was good and original, but the way it was written didn't seem very "top quality". It was like the book didn't fit into an age group category.
But I did like it. Very entertaining. I liked how Anthony wrote a book that included sci-fi and fantasy.

Split Infinity is about a small man named Stile, a serf on the planet Proton. Stile's life is soon threatened, but a female robot named Sheen helps to keep him safe. Stile discovers a gateway to another world called Phaze in which magic exists. Stile meets friends there, including a unicorn named Neysa, a werewolf named Kurrelgyre, and many others. He takes the position of Adept (really powerful magician), the Blue Adept. With his new powers, Stile investigates the identity of his enemy. All the while, Stile has to avoid the attacks in both frames, Proton and Phaze, for he traverses between them at times. A fantastic novel! I suggest that all who enjoy Sci-Fi/Fantasy read this book!

Split Infinity starts out with two premises that I find immensely appealing. The first is future worlds of both technology and magic. The second is a sexy loving robot who is as fully developed as an independent character as any human. I'm intrigued by the idea of interspecies romance (human and robot), and the trilogy that starts with this book explores that idea well. What we have is a sexy, fun, science fiction, magic, fantasy, romantic, adventure story with a lot for everyone who is not a prude. For anyone who feels lovingly shared sex with others not quite like yourself, or a world of casual nudity, is offensive I would have to say to stay away from this book. For everyone else, dive in and have fun!

This is one of the most interesting and unique books that I have read and started my life long love of Piers Anthony's books. The juxtaposition of the world of science with the world of magic and the skill it takes the protagonist to move between the two worlds and solve the mystery of who is trying to murder him in both worlds. Interesting character development of other characters too including Sheen.

Piers Anthony captures your imagination as he throws the reader into this, the first of the Aprentice Adept series.
Utterly stupendous realism in both fantasy and science fiction (at the same time).
Explore not one but two worlds of adventure.

I have a reading disability and it was always very challenging to read anything longer than a short story. However, in 1980 the school library got this book. I found it amazing fast paced story that I completed in a day and night. It completely hooked me and I became a voracious reader.

While the book had a slow start, the book continually got better until the great ending that has me hooked. I was doubting whether or not I was going to read the next two books, but now I am for sure. The idea of balancing a book between Sci-Fi and Fantasy is very cool. However, there is too much in the way of sex and sexual innuendos. The author seems, to me, a very disturbed person. Despite this, the book is a great read.

While I am hardly the expert on the science fiction/fantasy genres, I felt compelled to at least offer an opinion on this book before moving on. My experience in this category of books only goes back a few months when I began reading Robert Asprin (worked through Myth, the Phule series, and Time Scout). Meaning: I have no real basis of comparison.

As a standalone work of literature, this book is highly lacking. While I will most likely finish it due to a personal compulsion for completion (yes, I'm only halfway through and writing about it), I doubt I will continue with the series.

I have never witnessed so much hubris from a character who is so obviously NOT multi-faceted enough to express his flaws. There was one stretch of the book where Anthony kept writing how Stile was "interested in this, and naturally talented!" His ability to pick up women, while not as offensive to me as to some other readers (and I am female) was simply pointless and seemed to almost reflect the author's need instead of Stile's. Couldn't he have given Stile a deeper, more intrinsic draw to continue traveling from one world to the other? 'Oh, I can't stay here, I promised this OTHER girl I'd go back...but I'll come back for you too, because well, you love me too!' Some humility would have been refreshing. Maybe this bites him later in the series, but I will have grown sick of him by then and will most likely never see it occur.

But I digress. To summarize, avoid this book unless you're looking for a quick read without the need for intellectual thought. It's fun in it's own right, but maybe more appropriate for a teenager...in the 80s.

Regular readers of my reviews know that I have been going through a phase of re-reading the books of my childhood and deciding which ones I really want to bring with me into the future. Piers Anthony was a huge favorite when I was 13. Re-reading his books, however, pretty hard for me to figure out why.

I am willing to grant that the first few books of Xanth are genuinely entertaining. I also think that elements of his books are very well done. For instance, in Split Infinity, the concept of the game on Proton is really interesting. I wish that he had kept his attention there instead of his rather noxious obsession with nekked people.

Frankly, the female characters in Xanth are bad enough. Eeping nymphs and scolding harpies, pretty much. But this first book in the Phaze series is repellent. The main character, Stile, sleeps with all the non-human women around him, even though he is not in love with them. This is okay, since they are in love with him. So he is, you know, doing them a favor. Despite being loyal, wonderful and gifted with permanently perky breasts, he isn't in love with them because he can't be in love with a woman who isn't traditionally human. He is horribly insecure, yet possessed with a strange charisma that makes all women want to put out-- even if he is honest (which he always is) about the fact that there is no future. Oh yeah, also, he cannot date women taller than he is. You know, that just doesn't work out. *eye roll*

I really feel kind of bad savaging Anthony's books because they reveal the enlightened approach to gender of a caveman. Talk about shooting fish in a barrel. But-- really-- Split Infinity is actually toxic.

Proton/Phaze is an interesting enough idea that it made me wish that authors did rewrites like film directors do remakes. There is some decent stuff in here, but it only makes it more depressing when confronted with the morass of junk that makes up the rest of the book.

I would not give this to a developing adolescent, even if that is just about the right age level for the view of women. If I hadn't loved this as a child, I probably would have given it one star.

There is nothing else like this trilogy. I've kind of moved on to hard-sf, but these books are simply great. It's one of those books with incredibly vivid mental imagery that grabs you for hours on end. As an added bonus, unlike any of his later non-Xanth books, no adult man has sex with a 12 year old girl. (What the heck is up with that, anyway?

Science world or fantasy world, it isn't much fun to be in the lower classes.

This book has all sorts of stuff, and the title is a reference to the two different sorts of universes therein. The main character is a serf, or member of the underclass in the science based universe. He is exceptional in that he is one of the top players of a complicated Game that is a major part of life there, which basically involves navigating through a series of contests.

Apart from that, someone wants to bump him off.

To be concise, this book rules. To be otherwise; I thought that this book was a very good piece of science fiction with enough of a twist to easily set it apart from some others of that genre. The characters are great; Sheen would have to be my favorite, though. (Who else felt sorry for the poor 'bot? *sniff*) The Phaze/Photon concept was very interesting, and I liked seeing it explored further in the later books of this series.

This fantasy novel by Piers Anthony is genuinely outstanding. It is endlessly creative and inventive. The pace of the book is brisk and the plot is extraordinary. This is a very welcome addition to all fantasy collections.

This was an alll out amazing book. A friend introduced me to the works and talent of Pier Anthony, and now I"ve read quite a few of his books. His ideas are creative and original. Split Infinity was the second book I've read, and I loved it! However there are some very mature sequences in it, and I mean VERY mature. But if one can get past those, then they'll love the book too! Anthony created many comical little puns and connections to our own world.His themes should enlighten anyone who can pick them up and understand. READ SPLIT INFINITY! If you don't like it, fine, but all together I think it was well written.

Oh lord, was this an awful book to read through. I was loaned this book to read from a friend who loved horses and thus the unicorns in the book appealed to her, and she thought since I read science fiction, that this fantasy novel might appeal to me as well. It didn't. I suppose it really isn't fair to judge this book for a reader that's outside the genre of this book, which is definitely fantasy. I think most science fiction readers would stay away from this book based just upon it's chintsy cover of someone fencing with the horn of the unicorn. It's a telling cover of the novel itself. I read this book years ago and it felt dated then so who knows what it's like now (the novel was published in 1980). For those that enjoy fantasy this has all the standards of that genre, unicorns, fantastic settings and magic, etc. Anthony, along with Stephen Donaldson and Anne McCaffrey were very popular fantasy writers of that time, and his idea for his other novel On a Pale Horse, where someone who kills Death takes It's place even made it to one of The Simpsons (Halloween?) episodes, which is when one knows they made it to the mainstream. But this novel is no Lord of the Rings. For science fiction readers, there are other books you would probably want to put ahead on your reading list.

As a side note, for those that are fascinated with horses, which are magnificent animals, that would have a horn but alas unicorns do not exist, read about narwhals which are real, live, existing animals (whales) that have a horn, and a spiral one at that.