Enchantress From the Stars has a bit of an ambitious high concept, and pulls it off very well. The main 'problem' with the book is a galaxy full of inhabited planets where all the naturally-occurring intelligent life is human, or very nearly so; but paying attention to alien biology would be to miss the point of the book (and in 1970, it was still a somewhat acceptable idea).

The book is a clash between three civilizations, with a viewpoint character from each one. The 'main' story is given by the most advanced civilization, which has a non-interference policy that makes the Prime Directive look fairly tame. They keep keep themselves hidden from 'younglings': civilizations at a less-developed stage than themselves, including several star-faring ones, letting them find their own way, and assert that trying to help only leads to problems and stunted development.

But they do interfere on occasion. Such as here, where a less-developed Empire (I don't think any other name is given) is colonizing a planet with natives that are still at a medieval level of development. The Service sends a small team to scare the Empire off the planet, and leave both cultures to evolve on their own. There are plenty of problems of course, and it makes a good YA adventure, with a certain amount of philosophy and growing up.

The main part that works is each of the three viewpoint character's sections are written differently. They're not announced or otherwise kept rigid enough to ordinarily keep it from being confusing, but the style changes between the three is so marked as to eliminate that problem. The native's point-of-view is by far the most striking, being written with the feel of a lot of medieval tales, and is very successful. The Empire's point-of-view conversely is the weakest, being in a conventional third-person, and being the least frequent, and least involved in the actual plot.

It's a little too obvious with the points that it is making, but the novel does avoid feeling 'preachy', by virtue of the main character always being challenged to thing thinks out herself, so the philosophy is always a dialog. So it maintains a good flow and remains a fun read throughout, with the plot and characters always keeping center stage.

2.5 stars.

2023 reread: A decade later, I still think about this book. That speaks to the strength of the premise, which is an interrogation of the Prime Directive and "any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic." I also remember not liking it, and I hoped that on reread - with adjusted expectations and more willingness to tolerate YA - I'd have better luck.

Nope! This is still intriguing but not very enjoyable. It's such a talky book, and the narrative tricks only exacerbate that while the YA antics fail to alleviate it. I like the bits I like very much (the premise; the fact that "less advanced" stubbornly does not mean "less human; less capable of autonomy" and how that informs the romance), but it feels stilted and strangely dry. Oh well.


2011 review: Elana is a member of an advanced interstellar civilization that studies and protects unadvanced "Youngling" civilizations. When space-faring Younglings called Imperials invade a medieval Youngling planet called Andrecia, Elana becomes involved in an attempt to rescue Andrecia - without endangering either culture, or revealing her own. Enchantress of the Stars is an ambitious book, but not always a successful one. There are three civilizations, three points of view, two narrative styles, a wide-ranging plot and setting all couched within a framing narration, and with so much going on no one aspect is fully realized. Take for example the characters: Elana and her love interest Georyn are admirable, realistically faulted, promising characters, but Elana's narration deadens her own character development by burdening it with excessive explanation; the interaction between these characters is satisfyingly complex - except for the crucial romantic element, which develops too easily and early, and shoulders too many plot points. These aspects are well-intended and the groundwork for their success is laid out in elements such as Elana's naivety and intelligence, Georyn's keen emotional insight, and the unique POVs which accompany each character, but they never quite come to life. This failure makes for an emotionally stunted novel - which is particularly regrettable in young adult literature.

The plot has similar lofty goals and rocky execution. Its ambition and scope is what I loved best in the book, and it makes for a young adult novel that, rather than talking down to its audience, challenges them with difficult concepts of societal and personal maturation. The carefully constructed triple narrative also makes for some strong parallelism and clever plot developments, the sort of which would be unlikely in a traditionally narrated book. But the triple narrative also makes for unfortunate repetition, the plot's tension is destroyed by the framing narration, and in between the lovely parallels and plot points are some pinprick plot holes. Why, for example, do the Imperials consider colonized natives effectively nonhuman if they study - of all things! - their psychology, which is virtually identical to the Imperials' own? Because it makes for a convenient plot point later on, of course - but while such plot holes don't render things entirely improbable, they are enough to make the plot feel more like machination than natural progression, weakening its erstwhile strengths. I nitpick, of course, but that's just my point: I went through Enchantress from the Stars constantly distracted by nitpicking; I was never absorbed by characters or motivated by plot enough to overlook the various weaknesses. It's a laudably ambitious book, intriguing for its premise alone, and at times comes rewardingly close to its goals, but more often than not it made me wish, instead, that I were reading the book that it could have been. I recommend it only moderately, mostly on the basis of what it tries to be.

I recently rediscovered this favorite from my childhood. It seems I have a thing for characters who share my name. It's a beautiful book for the budding scifi lover.

Uma obra de ficção maravilhosa que me empolgou pela sua simplicidade no desenrolar da história, conseguindo apesar disso uma riqueza visionária e profundidade de reflexões e pensamentos através das personagens apaixonantes.

Cada uma delas poderia explorar e ilustrar vários dos aspectos da consciência humana, em várias das suas perspectivas, unindo-se com grande sensibilidade numa cadeia de eventos, manifestos a seu tempo (e não antes), potenciando assim uma expansão de entendimento sobre a essência dos factos. Gerando acções e atitudes que moldam o avanço pelo caminho necessário ao cumprimento de um objectivo conjunto e bem maior.

A história foi crescendo e ganhando espaço dentro de mim, sem qualquer tipo de falhas, libertando sempre pelo meio ideias como “mistério”, “fé” e “amor” na forma de um aroma suave e envolvente, sempre presente, à medida que ia vivendo com as personagens as suas experiências. Entendo-a e faz-me sentido até ao ponto de não a tomar como ficção, e de a sentir bastante real. Tenho a certeza que se tivesse lido este livro há muitos anos atrás, o teria incluído na minha lista de “life-changing books” pois desperta o questionar e a reflexão para certo tipo de paradigmas; mentais, emocionais e até mesmo espirituais.

Have always enjoyed Sci-fi. This was a great look at civilization and progress.

i would hella read this again

in love with the incredibly seemless combination of science fiction and fantasy. the cover art by the dillions lured me in but the vetting of my fav authors kept this book in my shopping cart. i love deconstructing space colonialism. i love pondering paranormal intersections. what a fantastic book to come out of 1970.

highly recommend

How had I never read this book when I was young? It is absolutely brilliant!

Enchantress from the Stars tells the story of three civilizations, one on a level of medieval Europe, another at around the Star Wars Galactic Empire level, and a third that has surpassed even that level, to incorporate not just technology but ESP as well. As a group from the Star Wars level civilization attempts to colonize the planet of the medieval civilization, the highest group attempts to stop them. However, a la Star Trek's The Prime Directive, the highest-level civilization must not reveal themselves to the other two. The story that ensues is part fairy tale, part cautionary tale about colonization, a tale of love, and a discussion of what truly makes a civilization advanced.

I don't want to give away too many plot points because Engdahl's work is too fantastic to spoil, but this book is highly recommended.

First off, this book is well-written. I enjoyed the Science Fiction and Fantasy elements to the storytelling in the book. Let me explain what I mean by that: Elana’s side of the story is told in her own words and she’s on a mission on a youngling planet where the society of native planet dwellers is not as advanced even as we are here in the 21st century, meanwhile Georyn’s story isn’t told in his words, but you get to understand his somewhat naive way that he (and others on his planet) view machinery that makes a lot of noise that can spew fire as a dragon. They are not advanced as a society because they don’t have scientific and mechanical advancements yet. So, their frame of reference is limited to what explanations they can come up with.

In ways, this story reminded me of issues that are dealt with in Star Trek, mainly, the Prime Directive, I.e. the principle of non-interference in societies that are not as advanced as one’s own; however, the author gives it a different name.

There is a lot of concepts and issues that are brought which can give readers a lot to think about.

A book told from three different perspectives, all very different from each other. It was a very intriguing story, that I found to be fun to read. It's about a different planet, some people are trying to colonize while others are working to stop the colonists without being found out. I wasn't completely happy with the ending, but I am glad that they at least gave a good explanation for why stuff happened the way it did.

I wanted to love this. I really did.

Star Trek: Next Gen was my first fandom and love. And this book has a lot in common with Star Trek. There's a "Federation" of planets and the agents have to follow a strict Oath to not interfere in developing societies. (Prime Directive, anyone?) It would seem like this book was made for Trekkies like me.

But alas, I was desperately disappointed. I couldn't believe that this book was only 288 pages. I felt like I was reading it for eons. Some parts were good, mostly the parts told from Georyn's perspective. But there was soooo much philosophizing. Every reason behind every action was explained in excruciating detail. There was no mystery or wonder. It felt like a lecture on ethics and morals.

I have to admit at about the 70% mark I couldn't really bare to read much more so I skipped ahead and read the last 10%. It was fine because that last 10% explained the reason behind every single action that was taken in the previous 20%, so I didn't really miss anything.

This book is, like, on the level where I can't even articulate the degree of wonderfulness that it achieves so I'm sitting here gaping and making indeterminate hand gestures. The review blurb on the back says "It is almost impossible to convey just how good this book is. Please just read it," and, yeah, I'm feeling that now.

Enchantress From the Stars is the perfect blend of fantasy and sci-fi, and the expert positioning of magic and technology, along with the indefinite time setting (past? present? future?) has really interesting implications (philosophical, ethical) for the whole world. I loved the switching between Elana's conscientious and rational (but brilliantly conceived as a teenage girl, of course) personal narrative, and the archaic fairy tale view of Georyn's. It's a book that really makes you think and touches your heart, and gives you the immense pleasure of inhabiting this strange and intriguing and wonderful and often scary new planet for a little while. What more could you want?

So basically if you like stories about magic, or aliens, or the politics of colonization, or romances, or finely drawn character studies... read this book.

[Also, I must mention how gorgeous the cover art is. And it's not too fancy, but I love the inside text layout.]

This is my best-known novel. Though often given to children as young as the 6th grade because it was a Newbery Honor book, it is really intended for teens and is also enjoyed by many adults.

Since I see that long ago I posted a statment here about my book as a "review." i guess I will update it with a couple of facts I wish people knew.

First, for the reviewers who say they disagree with the idea that some cultures are more "advanced" than others, well, so do I, if we are thinking of different cultures on Earth. I have said repeatedly at my website and elsewhere that the book is NOT meant to be an allegory about relationships between cultures on Earth, because everybody on Earth is a member of the same species. It is about the evolutionary advance of entire species, not mere differences among cultures of the same one. Sentient species that evolved on different worlds, if there are any, have existed for different lengths of time; they are separated by many centuries, or millennia, of evolution. Most people would agree that we are more advanced than Stone Age cavemen--and I think someday we may meet species as far ahead of us as we are ahead of humans who lived that long ago. Of course the time frame in the book is shorter to make a story, but the principle applies.

Second, I didn't base the story on Star Trek -- I established the non-interference policy of the Service in portions of the story I wrote in 1957, long before StarTrek existed. But I don't claim to have created it. The main reason I hate to see the Prime Directive spoken of as if Star Trek invented it is that this ties it too closely to science fiction. I believe advanced species really do have such a policy, because if they didn't, the worlds of all the sentient species in the universe would end up as mere copies of the oldest one, without a chance to mature on their own. The Prime Directive ahouldn't be considered a part of any fictional universe, but rather as a theory of why SETI hasn't detected any messages from superciviilzations and why there aren't any aliens here in UFOs.