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A review by hansemrbean
Evolution by Stephen Baxter
3.0
First I have to say that I admire the task Stephen Baxter has undertaken - no less than a cruise through the whole history of primates, from the beginning in the time the dinosaurs have been extinct, to the end of life on earth. He clearly did quite a lot of research to make all these histories plausible, and mostly succeeded, as far as I can say. It just didn't work for me.
The book is written as a collection of stories that happen thousands or millions of years apart each, and so naturally they have no connection save the occasional reference by the author to an earlier story. There is also a background story that happens in the near future, that the author returns to after every few chapters, but it is also only very loosely connected to the rest of the stories. I actually made a pause after each few stories and read something else in between - and I didn't have the feeling that I lost anything.
The first part tells the stories of 8 different primates millions of years apart, from 65 million years ago to 5 million years ago. It is mostly written in the confines of what we know about these times, with some speculation added in (the wildest being about some bipedal dinosaurs with tools and rudimentary cloth, and some kind of proto-language). For me it reads like the script for a documentation on the Discovery channel, which would work well enough. It has both the story of some animal trying to survice, and some background information provided by the author trying to explain its behavior. My problem with that is that are a lot of visual descriptions of animals and plants that I find really difficult to imagine without having at least some pictures available (I may just lack the imagination). Also the idea to tell a story instead of just describing what we know about these times backfired for me, as I'm actually interested in the things we know and how we know them, and it was impossible to tell speculation from facts (or at least hypotheses) in these stories.
The second part is about the development of humans, from 1.5 million years ago to the time of the downfall of the Roman Empire. The stories get more interesting in the sense that the human behavior and interaction gets ever more complex, but the same about facts and speculation applies here.
The third part describes the future and as such is mostly speculation, of course, but is based on some plausibe scenarios. It has been described as depressing and pessimistic by others, but I don't fully agree here - it is just realistic (humanity will not live forever), and while the scenario that the civilization as we know it vanishes rather sooner than later may be on the pessimistic side, it is nevertheless completely plausible and realistic. And there is some optimism at the end...
So, in the end, while this didn't work too well for me, I think this maybe a very interesting book for people with a different perception, and I certainly wouldn't discourage anyone from trying it out.
The book is written as a collection of stories that happen thousands or millions of years apart each, and so naturally they have no connection save the occasional reference by the author to an earlier story. There is also a background story that happens in the near future, that the author returns to after every few chapters, but it is also only very loosely connected to the rest of the stories. I actually made a pause after each few stories and read something else in between - and I didn't have the feeling that I lost anything.
The first part tells the stories of 8 different primates millions of years apart, from 65 million years ago to 5 million years ago. It is mostly written in the confines of what we know about these times, with some speculation added in (the wildest being about some bipedal dinosaurs with tools and rudimentary cloth, and some kind of proto-language). For me it reads like the script for a documentation on the Discovery channel, which would work well enough. It has both the story of some animal trying to survice, and some background information provided by the author trying to explain its behavior. My problem with that is that are a lot of visual descriptions of animals and plants that I find really difficult to imagine without having at least some pictures available (I may just lack the imagination). Also the idea to tell a story instead of just describing what we know about these times backfired for me, as I'm actually interested in the things we know and how we know them, and it was impossible to tell speculation from facts (or at least hypotheses) in these stories.
The second part is about the development of humans, from 1.5 million years ago to the time of the downfall of the Roman Empire. The stories get more interesting in the sense that the human behavior and interaction gets ever more complex, but the same about facts and speculation applies here.
The third part describes the future and as such is mostly speculation, of course, but is based on some plausibe scenarios. It has been described as depressing and pessimistic by others, but I don't fully agree here - it is just realistic (humanity will not live forever), and while the scenario that the civilization as we know it vanishes rather sooner than later may be on the pessimistic side, it is nevertheless completely plausible and realistic. And there is some optimism at the end...
So, in the end, while this didn't work too well for me, I think this maybe a very interesting book for people with a different perception, and I certainly wouldn't discourage anyone from trying it out.