Lord of Light
Future colonists have appropriated Hindu mythology and used technology to become gods. Zelazny's most ambitious novel blends SF and mythology so thoroughly the seams vanish, and Sam's war against heaven is the most stylish revolution in SF.
The large cast carries multiple names and shifting identities, and readers say untagged dialogue makes it genuinely hard to track who is speaking. One names a concrete craft problem: “the general writing style made it hard for me to visualize” the action and fights. Readers without Hindu and Buddhist background report feeling locked out, one wondering “if I knew something about Eastern / Indian religions” it might have landed. A critic flags that Zelazny buries major plot turns as incidental background, so readers miss them, and calls the book “long on ideas and short on plot and character.” It was assembled from separately published novelettes and the seams show.
The case for it and the rest of the canon open with Pro.
