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destroy it through the development of a mental shield, and Stor Gendibal, an ambitious young Speaker of the Second Foundation, who also has maintained that Seldon's Plan has been impossibly consistent and that a mysterious third party must be responsible.
A three-way mental battle ensues in which Trevise, who has been selected by Gaia to make the crucial choice for the future of the Galaxy, opts for Gaia's proposal. Branno and Gendibal are sent back to their respective Foundations with their memories adjusted to eliminate recollections of Gaia and the experiences that led to the confrontation but otherwise to believe that each had won. Pelorat stays on Gaia with a young woman he loves (and whom Trevise accuses of being a robot). And Trevise leaves to search for the elusive Earth. Asimov concluded with a veiled promise ("The End [for now]") of a sequel.
This brief summary gives little suggestion of the flavor of the novel. In style it belongs to the 1940s not simply to science fiction's 1940s but to Asimov's 1940s. It is no novel of character not even a Caves of Steel or a Gods Themselves but a discursive novel of ideas, much like the other Foundation stories. As the first extended treatment (140,000 words compared to the 50,000 words of "The Mule" or "Search by the Foundation") in fact the longest novel Asimov had written it hangs together well.
Like the stories that make up The Foundation Trilogy, Foundation's Edge is largely dialogue, like them it contains little action, and like them it is readable, involving, and intellectually complicated. As Jorane Sutt tells Hober Mallow in "The Merchant Princes," "There is nothing straight about you; no motive that hasn't another behind it; no statement that hasn't three meanings," so it is with Foundation's Edge. The suspense of the novel is sustained by repeated examples of motivation within motivation, wheels within wheels. Harlo Branna, for instance, has Trevise arrested on an accusation of treason. But in a personal conference, she reveals that she really wants him to search for the Second Foundation. But as she tells her Director of Security, Liono Kodell, what she really intends him to do is to serve as a lightning rod (Asimov's working title for the novel), leading the Second Foundation to reveal itself.
Similar deviousness lies behind her actions with Compor. Deviousness, however, is common to all the characters. It comes naturally to the Speakers of the Second Foundation, who are revealed in Foundation's Edge as intriguing for power as relentlessly as any non-mentalist. Most important, it is characteristic of Trevise, who is the critical character in the novel, if not, indeed, its hero. Trevise is continually re-evaluating

 
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