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2012 Book Review #93: A Fire Upon the Deep
Title: A Fire Upon the Deep
Author: Verner Vinge
Genre: Somewhere between hard SF and space opera
Thingummies: 5
Synopsis: A spaceship fleeing the ancient evil they have unleashed crashes on a medieval planet occupied by hive-minded wolves. But the refugees may have the only cure to the Blight consuming the universe, leading to a desperate rescue attempt across the stars.
Thoughts: There is one particular scene in this book, the terrifyingly sudden fall of a thriving civilization, that just had me muttering "Wow. Wow." under my breath on the train.
Vinge has taken what any sane person would have made into two separate books and woven them together into a surprisingly coherent whole. One book is the exploration of a fascinatingly developed race of small hive-minded creatures. This isn't a Borg or Bugger-style repeat; these are groups of four to eight individuals that act as a unit, and the society built up of many of these packs. It's brilliantly developed, and yet the young refugees cast up among them bring a touchingly human element to the mix.
Meanwhile, there's a frantic flight across the universe with the fate of thousands of species in the balance (dozens of entire star systems and races are annihilated in the process). It's a similarly fascinating portrait of an incredibly rich galaxy of races and individuals, some of whom go back millenia, at all different stages of technological development. Tied in is a horrifyingly accurate representation of the absolute worst tendencies of the internet, as a thriving, teeming information-based meta-civilization suddenly finds itself under attack and nearly eats itself from the inside out.
The protagonists in each story are sufficiently attention-catching that each time Vinge rips us away from one setting, I was disappointed. Yet within two pages, I was thrilled to be back with this new set of characters again.
There are a couple minor logic flaws that only become apparent in retrospect. There are a couple big confrontation scenes that he strategically cuts away from, which feels a little like cheating. And the ending is suitably catastrophic, without being a complete downer. But overall, it's one of the more dazzling displays of science fiction virtuousity I've read this year.
Author: Verner Vinge
Genre: Somewhere between hard SF and space opera
Thingummies: 5
Synopsis: A spaceship fleeing the ancient evil they have unleashed crashes on a medieval planet occupied by hive-minded wolves. But the refugees may have the only cure to the Blight consuming the universe, leading to a desperate rescue attempt across the stars.
Thoughts: There is one particular scene in this book, the terrifyingly sudden fall of a thriving civilization, that just had me muttering "Wow. Wow." under my breath on the train.
Vinge has taken what any sane person would have made into two separate books and woven them together into a surprisingly coherent whole. One book is the exploration of a fascinatingly developed race of small hive-minded creatures. This isn't a Borg or Bugger-style repeat; these are groups of four to eight individuals that act as a unit, and the society built up of many of these packs. It's brilliantly developed, and yet the young refugees cast up among them bring a touchingly human element to the mix.
Meanwhile, there's a frantic flight across the universe with the fate of thousands of species in the balance (dozens of entire star systems and races are annihilated in the process). It's a similarly fascinating portrait of an incredibly rich galaxy of races and individuals, some of whom go back millenia, at all different stages of technological development. Tied in is a horrifyingly accurate representation of the absolute worst tendencies of the internet, as a thriving, teeming information-based meta-civilization suddenly finds itself under attack and nearly eats itself from the inside out.
The protagonists in each story are sufficiently attention-catching that each time Vinge rips us away from one setting, I was disappointed. Yet within two pages, I was thrilled to be back with this new set of characters again.
There are a couple minor logic flaws that only become apparent in retrospect. There are a couple big confrontation scenes that he strategically cuts away from, which feels a little like cheating. And the ending is suitably catastrophic, without being a complete downer. But overall, it's one of the more dazzling displays of science fiction virtuousity I've read this year.
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I personally like Deepness even better, though the aliens in this book are much cooler conceptually. I think I'm the only one I've met who does, though -- possibly because I read the books in backwards order? I'll look forward to hearing what you think.