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4.29 AVERAGE
4.29 AVERAGE
adventurous
mysterious
tense
slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
No
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
adventurous
dark
emotional
informative
inspiring
mysterious
reflective
sad
tense
slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Complicated
A Deepness in the Sky is the first Vinge novel that I read, and while it lacks the cosmological intensity of A Fire in the Deep, I think it holds up as the superior work.
In the distant future humanity has hit a plateau of development. Human planetary civilizations rise and fall over their century-long cycles, while the interstellar traders of the Qeng Ho skip from system to system in sublight ships, hoping to find a technological civilization worth trading with when they arrive. Just outside of human space is the OnOff star, a stellar anomaly that recently begun crude radio transmissions. The possibility of aliens inspires two great expeditions: a Qeng Ho trading fleet and one from the Emergents, a small interstellar empire that uses a unique form of neurological slavery. What they find is a civilization of giant spiders gone into hibernation, at the threshold of a leap into the information age. It's the most profitable time to arrive, and with the first contact the technological aliens, the value of the prize is infinite.
Above a frozen alien world the fleets collide, nearly annihilate each other in a flurry of nuclear sneak attacks, and the Qeng Ho and Emergents settle into an uneasy unified society. Both sides need each other for survival, and neither trusts the other. The only hope is to last until the locals Spiders develop a tech base that can be bootstrapped to space-flight. Qeng Ho 'peddling' is practically treason to the Emergents, who's use of Focused slaves (people infected with a specialized disease and turned into monomaniacal experts) is anathema to the basic concept of human rights. The Emergents have all the guns, but the Qeng Ho have a secret weapon. In hiding is Pham Nuwen, the legendary founder of the Qeng Ho and a practiced programmer-at-arms. All he has to do is evade the unblinking eye of the most effective police state imaginable, where the will of sadists is backed up by enslaved analysts capable of putting together the pieces of any plans. Meanwhile, the Spiders are facing their own annihilation, with the specter of a nuclear exchange overshadowing mastery of technology that would overturn their long history under the strange OnOff star.
This is a book of slow exploration of three alien societies--even the humans are foreign to us--and then rapid bursts of violent action. Vinge has a real eye for espionage, and the way that slow plans explode into violence and split-second decisions. He uses the multiple points-of-view to maximum effect, revealing how ordinary Qeng Ho see Pham Nuwen's disguise, and the plots of the Emergent dictators. Two technologies, the neurological Focus and the localizers (tiny internet-of-things chips) that Nuwen uses as his backdoor, stand out as some great sci-fi. The Spiders are deliberate cast as twee Victorian Heroic Engineers, a some-what grating narrative choice that is explained in book.
There are some similarities with A Fire in the Deep: Pham Nuwen, an alien society reaching new levels of technology, a Machiavellian antagonist, but this book handles the same themes with greater elegance and style, absent the hoary space-opera-isms of the earlier book.
In the distant future humanity has hit a plateau of development. Human planetary civilizations rise and fall over their century-long cycles, while the interstellar traders of the Qeng Ho skip from system to system in sublight ships, hoping to find a technological civilization worth trading with when they arrive. Just outside of human space is the OnOff star, a stellar anomaly that recently begun crude radio transmissions. The possibility of aliens inspires two great expeditions: a Qeng Ho trading fleet and one from the Emergents, a small interstellar empire that uses a unique form of neurological slavery. What they find is a civilization of giant spiders gone into hibernation, at the threshold of a leap into the information age. It's the most profitable time to arrive, and with the first contact the technological aliens, the value of the prize is infinite.
Above a frozen alien world the fleets collide, nearly annihilate each other in a flurry of nuclear sneak attacks, and the Qeng Ho and Emergents settle into an uneasy unified society. Both sides need each other for survival, and neither trusts the other. The only hope is to last until the locals Spiders develop a tech base that can be bootstrapped to space-flight. Qeng Ho 'peddling' is practically treason to the Emergents, who's use of Focused slaves (people infected with a specialized disease and turned into monomaniacal experts) is anathema to the basic concept of human rights. The Emergents have all the guns, but the Qeng Ho have a secret weapon. In hiding is Pham Nuwen, the legendary founder of the Qeng Ho and a practiced programmer-at-arms. All he has to do is evade the unblinking eye of the most effective police state imaginable, where the will of sadists is backed up by enslaved analysts capable of putting together the pieces of any plans. Meanwhile, the Spiders are facing their own annihilation, with the specter of a nuclear exchange overshadowing mastery of technology that would overturn their long history under the strange OnOff star.
This is a book of slow exploration of three alien societies--even the humans are foreign to us--and then rapid bursts of violent action. Vinge has a real eye for espionage, and the way that slow plans explode into violence and split-second decisions. He uses the multiple points-of-view to maximum effect, revealing how ordinary Qeng Ho see Pham Nuwen's disguise, and the plots of the Emergent dictators. Two technologies, the neurological Focus and the localizers (tiny internet-of-things chips) that Nuwen uses as his backdoor, stand out as some great sci-fi. The Spiders are deliberate cast as twee Victorian Heroic Engineers, a some-what grating narrative choice that is explained in book.
There are some similarities with A Fire in the Deep: Pham Nuwen, an alien society reaching new levels of technology, a Machiavellian antagonist, but this book handles the same themes with greater elegance and style, absent the hoary space-opera-isms of the earlier book.
Better character development than the first novel. The story is a bit narrower in scope, so there's not quite the same sense of wonder the first one inspired in me, but it's very good nonetheless.
One of the best sci-fi books I’ve ever read. The story rivals Fire Upon the Deep and the length and detail in the narrative are incredible. Taking place over a few centuries, the story details two rival human expeditions and their monitoring of the spider-like aliens who live on the only planet orbiting the star OnOff - a strange star which ‘turns off’ every ~30 years into a period of darkness lasting 200 years. The book has many plot threads working in the background throughout which all converge at the end for a very satisfying conclusion which leads into Pham Nuwen’s story in Fire Upon the Deep. Highly recommended if you like space opera and literary sci-fi with an emphasis on alien cultures.
adventurous
dark
mysterious
tense
slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
This had excellent world building, great sweeping drama, and lots of good things. It was also surprisingly dull in places, and I think just dragged on a bit. The ending was really good though. I thought there'd be a closer connection to the first book in the series, but this one seemed very stand-alone.
Smaller scale than usual but the characters really shined. Sci-fi concepts examining the beauty and brutality of humanity. Would watch a 5 season series on Anne Reynolt
Read via NetGalley.
Where do I even begin?
I have never read a Vernor Vinge story before. According to Jo Walton's introduction to this one, this and The Fire in the Deep are basically the culmination of his lifetime's work.
Reading this (admittedly quite long) novel is like reading a trilogy that's been refined down to just one volume. There is SO MUCH GOING ON - and it all works, and it draws you inexorably on. It's not particular frenetic in pace - I didn't feel like I was reeling from one explosion to another - but it's relentless. It's like an avalanche.
Partly this is because although the story takes place over decades, there are several well-placed time jumps. I think this is part of where the 'trilogy refined to one book' feeling comes from. There's nothing extraneous. There are moments of people just being people - being in relationship, having families, relaxing - but they don't feel like padding. It's all adding together to make these characters intensely real.
There are three strands. Two are human: the Qeng Ho, a loosely connected and enormous group of people whose aim is trade; they travel between planets to sell whatever is needed, and call people on planets Customers - not in a taking-advantage kind of way, but in a 'this is what we do' way. Then there's the people known as Emergents, and I wondered about this name for a long time... before I discovered it was because their society is the Emergency, named for a particularly dramatic time in their political history which has had cascading effects on their political and social structures (to become far more authoritarian than the Qeng Ho countenance) and honestly the name tells you a lot about them. These two groups of humans end up working together - much to the dismay and distrust of both sides - as they go to explore an astronomical anomaly. The third strand is the aliens who live on the planet around that astronomical anomaly, who are not bipeds and whose planetary and biological experience has led them to develop in some very different ways from humans... and yet, they are intelligent, and Vinge suggests convergent evolution in a lot of scientific and technological ways.
As I said, there is A LOT in this novel. Love and betrayal and family and war and technology... and then Jo Walton's foreword tells me that if I read The Fire in the Deep it may completely change the way I understand this novel? I'm a bit sad that it took me until now to read this, AND YET reading it at this age was actually excellent.
I'm so glad Tor is reprinting this and I hope it gets a lot of love.
Where do I even begin?
I have never read a Vernor Vinge story before. According to Jo Walton's introduction to this one, this and The Fire in the Deep are basically the culmination of his lifetime's work.
Reading this (admittedly quite long) novel is like reading a trilogy that's been refined down to just one volume. There is SO MUCH GOING ON - and it all works, and it draws you inexorably on. It's not particular frenetic in pace - I didn't feel like I was reeling from one explosion to another - but it's relentless. It's like an avalanche.
Partly this is because although the story takes place over decades, there are several well-placed time jumps. I think this is part of where the 'trilogy refined to one book' feeling comes from. There's nothing extraneous. There are moments of people just being people - being in relationship, having families, relaxing - but they don't feel like padding. It's all adding together to make these characters intensely real.
There are three strands. Two are human: the Qeng Ho, a loosely connected and enormous group of people whose aim is trade; they travel between planets to sell whatever is needed, and call people on planets Customers - not in a taking-advantage kind of way, but in a 'this is what we do' way. Then there's the people known as Emergents, and I wondered about this name for a long time... before I discovered it was because their society is the Emergency, named for a particularly dramatic time in their political history which has had cascading effects on their political and social structures (to become far more authoritarian than the Qeng Ho countenance) and honestly the name tells you a lot about them. These two groups of humans end up working together - much to the dismay and distrust of both sides - as they go to explore an astronomical anomaly. The third strand is the aliens who live on the planet around that astronomical anomaly, who are not bipeds and whose planetary and biological experience has led them to develop in some very different ways from humans... and yet, they are intelligent, and Vinge suggests convergent evolution in a lot of scientific and technological ways.
As I said, there is A LOT in this novel. Love and betrayal and family and war and technology... and then Jo Walton's foreword tells me that if I read The Fire in the Deep it may completely change the way I understand this novel? I'm a bit sad that it took me until now to read this, AND YET reading it at this age was actually excellent.
I'm so glad Tor is reprinting this and I hope it gets a lot of love.
adventurous
hopeful
mysterious
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes