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A review by thomcat
Heavy Planet: The Classic Mesklin Stories by Hal Clement
3.0
Read this to satisfy two challenges - Defining SF books of the 1950s AND 1970s. The first (Mission of Gravity) focuses on the Science of Science Fiction - an adventure story about earthly contact with the 18 inch centipedes of Mesklin.
Certain facts (their size, the length of their day, and so on) are discovered over the first few chapters, though contact has been going on for a while before the story opens. Through their journeys, we examine some interesting facts about high gravity worlds and the effects on biology, chemistry, and physics.
Being two difference groups (species), each has their own motivations also, and this comes out well. Barlennan is a savvy trader, the ideal explorer in an unknown land. The human crew is kept busy in an Apollo 13 like scramble to solve various problems.
For the right (technically minded) audience, recommended!
The short stories "Under" and "Lecture Demonstration" were little bits of hard SF, each a minor puzzle and solution. The essay "Whirligig World" is very interesting for the history of the concept and more science behind the world itself -for me perhaps the best part of the book.
Finally, this book also contains the sequel, "Star Light". This had a lot of the same characters, the Mesklinites still scheming and the Humans still solving problems. The setting is different - a new heavy gravity world, with the first exploration contracted out to the Mesklinites. This story suffers for lack of pre-exploration inspection. The humans have plenty of satellites but have made no maps. They've been studying the world for three years but have no idea about temperature or "seasons", and this causes much grief for the explorers. The schemes are more transparent than the first novel also, and humans completely clueless.
If you like the problem solving aspects of Apollo 13 or The Martian and the hard science of a high gravity world, this can be a good set of stories. The first is on many "best of" lists, the latter was nominated for a Hugo, and the collection is a nice assembly. Mainstream science fiction doesn't often have this tech focus anymore, but it is not for everybody. Overall rating - 3 stars.
Certain facts (their size, the length of their day, and so on) are discovered over the first few chapters, though contact has been going on for a while before the story opens. Through their journeys, we examine some interesting facts about high gravity worlds and the effects on biology, chemistry, and physics.
Being two difference groups (species), each has their own motivations also, and this comes out well. Barlennan is a savvy trader, the ideal explorer in an unknown land. The human crew is kept busy in an Apollo 13 like scramble to solve various problems.
For the right (technically minded) audience, recommended!
The short stories "Under" and "Lecture Demonstration" were little bits of hard SF, each a minor puzzle and solution. The essay "Whirligig World" is very interesting for the history of the concept and more science behind the world itself -for me perhaps the best part of the book.
Finally, this book also contains the sequel, "Star Light". This had a lot of the same characters, the Mesklinites still scheming and the Humans still solving problems. The setting is different - a new heavy gravity world, with the first exploration contracted out to the Mesklinites. This story suffers for lack of pre-exploration inspection. The humans have plenty of satellites but have made no maps. They've been studying the world for three years but have no idea about temperature or "seasons", and this causes much grief for the explorers. The schemes are more transparent than the first novel also, and humans completely clueless.
If you like the problem solving aspects of Apollo 13 or The Martian and the hard science of a high gravity world, this can be a good set of stories. The first is on many "best of" lists, the latter was nominated for a Hugo, and the collection is a nice assembly. Mainstream science fiction doesn't often have this tech focus anymore, but it is not for everybody. Overall rating - 3 stars.