The novel is not only a rousing fantasy adventure story, but a philosophical exploration of the relationship between material reality and the abstract concepts through which humans struggle to understand it.

The result was an imbalance between stability and instability in the universe, freezing the ship in time and rendering unstable its connection to the reality inhabited by the reader.

In a study of fantasy and science fiction literature, William Sims Bainbridge (1986: 136) explained: "The author uses evocative language and intense images to convey a sense of the marvelous and mysterious.

It is Kenton's fate to intervene in the frozen cosmic struggle between Ishtar and Nergal, to fall in love with Sharane, and to gain Klaneth as his mortal enemy.

The book builds tension through the device of letting Kenton's tie to the ship periodically become so weak that he falls back, unwilling, to his New York home.