As Memarie Lane would say, this is a 1 day book.  only a couple hundred pages, but i wanted to get a taste of this guy before i got into the whole “Ringworld” mess.

The Good:

Huge fantastic leaps in logic,  the third half of the book was hard to put down.  Good book for a short span, would make a somewhat good movie.   He atatches reality to the fiction all the way down to a biblical example. Very accurate science (for what was known when it was written)

The bad:

descriptively, kinda dry.  The first half of the book kinda dragged on, but is neccesary for the good half.  Not a book to keep you occupied for a long time.  most of the characters are either ugly or nondiscript.  you only see 2 characters develop. (of course, for a good part of the book, there really are only 2)

The book is basicly 2 parts, one a very long time after the other.

SPOILER ALLERT SPOILER ALLERT SPOILER ALLERT

DO NOT READ FURTHER IF YOU WANT ANYTHING TO BE A SURPRISE!!!

starts out in future earth 2040 something. A race called the PAK is described, and 1 of them has a mission: find what happened to a colony planned thousands of years ago, on the outer edge of the galaxy.  Earth is 2 parts.  Flatlanders on earth, and Belters in space.  The PAK scout is alone and shows up in the solar system and grabs one of them, then disappears.  Brennan, the guy grabbed, discovers that earth is a collony gone wrong from the PAK system.  He goes thru the third stage of Humanhood, and becomes PAK

second half of the book is what happened to Brennan as a PAK.  Best part of the book is a long slow space battle between PAK scouts and Brennan.  spectacular concepts, and the best edge of your seat action you can get when it takes months to fight ship to ship, light years away from eachother.  the discription is enough to get you excited, but not so much it locks you into a “must understand” dillusion.

Im going to read a Hammilton novel next, im only half thinking about getting into the Ringworld.

Posted on January 23rd, 2009 by admin
Filed under: Uncategorized