This 1956 book is often mentioned as one of the books that inspired Gibson and other cyberpunk writers. Also called Tiger! Tiger! in England, it has many of the characteristics of cyberpunk novels...takes place centuries in the future, the rise of megacorporations, use of cyber-enhanced bodies, telepathy, dystopian outlook. And then there is the most important new concept in the book, what Bester called jaunting. 
 Jaunting is named after a fictional research scientist who, in the novel, accidentally discovers teleportation when he suddenly, in a moment of panic, "jaunts" over to the fire extinguisher after a lab accident. Eventually everybody learns to jaunt. If you don't like the weather, jaunt to somewhere warmer...don't like your job, leave it and jaunt away to a job somewhere on another continent...don't like your family, leave and jaunt somewhere else. Jaunting has its limitations. You can only jaunt around different points on the planet/satellite you are currently on. No one has been able to jaunt from planet to planet (space jaunting). To jaunt you have to have actually seen, actually be able to picture in your mind, your landing point. Some people can only jaunt a few miles, others farther. There are ways and schemes used to block jaunting and, in one of the weirdest parts of the book, in kind of a futuristic, chastity-belt-kind-of-way, the rich and powerful lock their women up in rooms so that they can't jaunt or be jaunted to. Even with these limitations, jaunting changes everything. Social order, politics, economics. It eventually brings about unrest and war between the inner planets which includes Earth (Terra) and the outer planets/satellites of the solar system (the O.S.) 
 Before writing this novel, Bester worked for a few years as a comic book writer, of Superman, etc. Which makes sense because The Stars also reads like a very stripped-down space opera with its political intrigue and drama and far-flung travel across different worlds. You can almost see the BAM!, BANG!, POW! in the way that Bester writes his climatic scenes. The action throughout the novel is fast-paced and mostly non-stop. There are no wasted words or long explanations. 
 (view spoiler)[ The Stars tells the story of Gulliver "Gully" Foyle, a lowly space man, the Common Man, not particularly intelligent or ambitious. He is motivated enough though to stay alive stranded for months, in space, barely existing, after his space ship and all the crew except him, are destroyed by what he later learns is O.S. After months of this existence, he has reverted to just a thinking animal, only being able to do enough, think enough, to stay alive. 
 "Gully Foyle is my name 
 And Terra is my nation 
 Deep space is my dwelling place 
 And death's my destination." 
 With his hope of rescue dwindling, Gully finally is able to signal a passing ship, the Vorga, owned by the megacorp Presteign. But inexplicably, the Vorga, although noticing the Nomad, deliberately decides not to rescue him and continues on. This pisses Gully off. And this anger awakens him, gives him purpose (and he later learns, allows him to space jaunt). Gully finds his way to finally repair the Nomad enough to limp to an unknown lost cult-like settlement somewhere on an asteroid where they forcibly tattoo his whole face with fierce tiger strips and the name of his ship NOMAD across his forehead. From there, Gully sets off to exact revenge on Presteign but he is largely ineffectual, especially because of his appearance, and he is captured. He eventually escapes and from there Gully remakes himself, educates himself, surgically hides his tattoos and cyber-enhances his body and from there he sets off on a year-long campaign to find out who on the Vorga gave the order to not rescue him, no matter who he has to kill, abandon or step on, so that he can exact his revenge. But Gully is also pursued by the powers that be of both the inner planets and the O.S. because of the shipment of pyrE (a super explosive secret compound that could turn the tide of the war) on the Nomad and now in Gully's possession and also because of his ability to space jaunt. Gully does sort of win at the end, although by then, Gully is a changed man and his decisions at the end are no longer that of a thinking animal but of a driven, purposeful man. He takes the pyrE and this new found wisdom to the masses. 
 "Take a war to make you spend. Take a jam to make you think. Take a challenge to make you 	great. Rest of the time you sit around lazy, you. Pigs, you! All right, God damn you! I challenge 	you, me. Die or live and be great. Blow yourselves to Christ gone or come to me and I make you 	great. Die, damn you, or come and find me, Gully Foyle, and I make you great. I give you the 	stars. I make you men!' (hide spoiler)] 
 I very much liked this book. It had a very confusing but interesting chapter on what it would be like to have synesthesia (a real life condition I hadn't heard of before I read this book). I see why The Stars is often mentioned by other lover's of science fiction as one of their favorites. It was fast-paced, mostly action driven, a commentary on the driven/the tiger men/the compulsive men/the captains of industry vs. the common man, and ultimately the story of one man's redemption and of hope for the human race. 
 "Gully Foyle is my name 
 And Terra is my nation 
 Deep space is my dwelling place 
 The stars my destination."