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elanna76 's review for:
Dragon's Egg
by Robert L. Forward
We need more sci-fi books like this. There is all I love in a sci-fi book: hard physics, a mind-bending concept of alien life, an optimistic view of the future. I don't want to spoil the fun so I won't go into the details of how the pressure, magnetic field and gravity of the neutron star affect its inhabitants, but if you have some knowledge of physics (and/or of Star Trek LOL) you'll guess what's coming!
I hadn't had such fun since the spider society in Children of Time, and I have to say that the two books are very similar, albeit Dragon's Egg predates the other novel by decades. Forward must have inspired a whole genre, and I am here for it.
The social evolution on the surface of the neutron star is very much modelled on human history - again, pretty much as in Children of Time - and the human characters are quite roughly sketched, but the novel is thoroughly enjoyable nonetheless, especially if you like to be introduced to a different way of experiencing the world, through the eyes of an alien creature. I particularly liked the way Forward gave the Cheela society an original twist about sex, gender relationships and parenthood without making it feel forced. At some stage I was thinking Cheela for few minutes even after putting the book down :)
The biological evolution of the Cheela is also quite fun to witness, at least for a reader like me, quite ignorant in matters of biology and biochemistry. Maybe people with a more solid background will find the science laughable, but I had a helluva time.
I hadn't had such fun since the spider society in Children of Time, and I have to say that the two books are very similar, albeit Dragon's Egg predates the other novel by decades. Forward must have inspired a whole genre, and I am here for it.
The social evolution on the surface of the neutron star is very much modelled on human history - again, pretty much as in Children of Time - and the human characters are quite roughly sketched, but the novel is thoroughly enjoyable nonetheless, especially if you like to be introduced to a different way of experiencing the world, through the eyes of an alien creature. I particularly liked the way Forward gave the Cheela society an original twist about sex, gender relationships and parenthood without making it feel forced. At some stage I was thinking Cheela for few minutes even after putting the book down :)
The biological evolution of the Cheela is also quite fun to witness, at least for a reader like me, quite ignorant in matters of biology and biochemistry. Maybe people with a more solid background will find the science laughable, but I had a helluva time.