I am currently reading

The Evolutionary Void by Peter F Hamilton

Alex — Tue, 07 Sep 2010 12:18:27 +0000

I picked up The Evolutionary Void by Peter F Hamilton with some trepidation. When it comes to reviewing the final book in a series it’s usually a hard job. The expectation that’s built up is difficult to deal with pragmatically. The longer the series, the more of a let down the ending can often be.

That was certainly the case with Hamilton’s Judas Unchained and to a lesser degree the Naked God, which suffered a deus ex machina that was just a bit of a cop out.

Part of the problem is a well plotted story and well realised characters always leave you wanting more. Good action sequences throughout the book leave the reader wanting a climax that is a good or better than what has gone before. It’s certainly a problem Stephen King has wrestled with- far too many of his books are excellent right up to the supernatural explosion of silliness at the end.

So the question I approached the Evolutionary Void with was can Hamilton write a book that brings things to a satisfactory conclusion without the need for a McGuffin or something that seems too out of place?

There were of course plenty of other questions; where Nigel and Ozzie going to appear? What was the role of the SI, would the deterrent fleet be super awesome, which one of the characters we knew would be the Lady in the void and so on and so forth.

Some of the questions were answered, some were answered satisfactorily and one or two had no answer- I expect to see a separate series charting the Sheldon dynasties adventures in another galaxy at some point in the future for example.

It’s been a couple of days since I finished the Evolutionary Void and I’ve been mulling the experience of it over in my head. I like the concept of the Commonwealth. I liked the wormhole based universe of the first two books (Pandora’s Star and Judas Unchained) as much as I hated the last 100 pages and that seems to be what’s missing in this series. The advent of hyper and ultra drive ships has in many senses robbed this universe of the thing that made it more unique that a lot of other science fiction. Characters ping around in high tech space ships with different shielding systems and different speed capabilities in a way that’s almost too computer gamey at times. There is nothing of the differentiation that was apparent in the Nights Dawn trilogy with Voidhawks and normal human ships with their combat wasp weapon systems.

It does all descend into the realm of Star Trek at one point too. The use of replicators is probably the most disappointing aspect of the book. Need your shields upgraded to deal the the photosphere of a sun? Programme the replicators to make the changes. It’s at best weak and at worst a break in the cohesion of the universe.

There are some big reveals that are really well done though (I’ll save these for a spoiler post in a couple of weeks time that will go into a lot more detail) and overall the pacing is a lot better than Judas Unchained. The improved pacing is probably down to an extra volume in this series.

What Hamilton does well is keep the reader on their toes. There are several threads that give the reader the option to speculate on what is going to happen- the Accelerator faction are working hard, the Navy is readying its deterrent fleet, Gore is plotting, Oscar has a team ready, Paula Myo is wondering what the Cat is up to, just who the heck is Aaron and does it matter, Marius and Trobulum have some role to play too. And of course Justine is already in the void itself. Underlying the whole power play in which the universe is at stake is the rather philosophical concept of human evolution. In this instance its the evolution to what is referred to as the post physical, beings of energy, but it does get you thinking on a wider scale too.

It’s a brave book as Hamilton takes his science fiction into the realms of Arthur C Clarke’s 3rd Law: “Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic”, there isn’t as much description of orbital status, Largrange points, and the like as there has been in previous books and things like the deterrent fleet are basically so advanced they might as well be magic. Perhaps it is the Edeard sequences effectively having a “magic” element that make this less jarring than it should have been.

It’s difficult to say more without giving the game away too much but overall it’s a good conclusion to a good series. Some characters are wasted a bit, the universe isn’t quite as interesting as it was in the previous series but I left the book and series feeling very satisfied.

Amazon pricing for the Evolutionary Void by Peter F Hamilton

Alex — Fri, 03 Sep 2010 09:50:07 +0000

Once more, making little sense, the ebook is only £2 cheaper than a 700+ page hardback.

The Evolutionary Void by Peter F Hamilton

Alex — Thu, 02 Sep 2010 07:55:03 +0000

The Evolutionary Void by Peter F Hamilton arrived in the post yesterday. It’s the third and final volume in the Void series, which is itself a sequel to the Commonwealth Saga.

The second volume contained an awful lot of Edeard in the Void and Hamilton has promised the third volume will be more rooted in the Commonwealth. So far this seems to be bearing up, I’m 200 odd pages in and whilst we have been into the void a few times, it’s mostly be for small parts of chapters, rather than a hundred or so pages at a time.

It’s definitely a case of so far so good. I was very disappointed with the way the final book of the Commonwealth Saga panned out, Judas Unchained went a bit Keystone Cops with a car chase and the Planet’s Revenge was just, well, silly. I have hopes with an extra volume in this series things will be concluded to a more satisfactory degree.

The weapons and spacecraft are beginning to get interesting too. The Navy Deterrent Fleet and the Accelerator Ship are both examples of some left-field thinking at the extreme end of where Hamilton’s sci fi has gone before. I approve of this since I was a little disappointed by the appearance of ultra drives over hyper drives and (random letter)-sinks in the previous books. We’re not talking about flying trees here, so Dan Simmons has nothing to worry about, but it is a new direction for Hamilton.

I’ve around 500 pages to go, the view is positive so far, expect a review by the weekend all things being equal.

E-ink under the microscope

Alex — Tue, 17 Aug 2010 13:28:12 +0000

For those of you out there that don’t realise the difference between e-ink and conventional displays, some chap has put a Kindle and an iPad under a microscope. The results are interesting. By interesting I mean “freaky how e-ink mimics actual ink so well.”

You can see the results here

Sony eReader Pocket Edition (PRS300) Price Cut

Alex — Mon, 16 Aug 2010 12:32:43 +0000

It didn’t take long then. Hot on the heels of the new £109 wifi Kindle from Amazon, Waterstones have cut the price of the Sony eReader Pocket Edition to a mouthwatering £99. Other retailers have cut the price but none as low as Waterstones. Get one while there is still stock!

Dracula- Bram Stoker

Alex — Tue, 03 Aug 2010 15:59:36 +0000

This is our August book group read and I’m really flying through it. I am currently reading it on the Kindle app for the iPhone, although I do have a paper copy of it somewhere, I just haven’t been able to locate it.

It’s not the first time I’ve read Dracula, that happened almost 15 years ago when I was a student. Back then I read it in one sitting and could hardly move when I’d finished.

Given its age, its a remarkably accessible book, really easy to read but also packed with genuinely unsettling moments. Dracula climbing lizard like out of his castle window is profoundly unsettling yet there are moments of humour too, as when one of the doctors proclaims, “Chasing an errant swam of bees is nothing to following a naked lunatic.”

I’m about two thirds of the way through but expect to be finished in pretty short order, so expect a more in depth write up then.

3rd generation Amazon Kindles in the UK

Alex — Thu, 29 Jul 2010 09:58:27 +0000

The drive to mass adoption of ereaders took a massive step forward today with Amazon announcing a £109 6inch wifi only Kindle on their UK store. A second version with built in 3G costing £149 was also released but it looks like this is going to drive prices down across the board. Drop the wifi and £20, and it’s almost the dream price for mass adoption.

Asterix Gallus by Rene Uderzo & Albert Goscinny

Alex — Mon, 12 Jul 2010 13:05:31 +0000

Before you get all excited and think Asterix Gallus is an entirely new entry into the rather fabulous Asterix series, you had better know this is a foreign language edition of the first book. So why is it worthy of recommendation or even mention then? Well the language it’s in happens to be Latin.

I was fortunate enough to study Latin for 3 years at school. It was an extra curricula subject, lessons happened before and after school two times a week. And I was terrible at it. Much as I was terrible at German and French. But I did find it interesting and no more so than when I was reading familiar works of fiction translated into the dead language.

To this end, if you are familiar with Asterix, this is worth a punt and if you are studying Latin, it is also worth a read. It is exactly the same as the English language version, all that is different is the text. It wont make you a Latin guru overnight (I still got a GCSE grade D at the subject) but it will help your vocab and trick you into studying when you think you’re not.

House of Sun by Alastair Reynolds- free with SFX!

Alex — Wed, 07 Jul 2010 12:48:37 +0000

As the title says really, if you get hold of a copy of the current issue of popular scifi magazine SFX, tucked away in the final third is a coupon for a free copy of hard scifi writer Reynold’s 2008 novel House of Suns. It’s a special SFX print, but the normal version is still on the shelves at £7.99, so it’s definitely worth a punt. It’s original coupon only for redemption though, so no photocopies.

The cover price of SFX is £3.99 or you may like to entertain this entirely fictitious scenario:

*Enter public library stage left
*pick up SFX
Oooh, a free book coupon!
COUGH *RIP COUGH *RIP*
*pocket coupon
*finish reading magazine
*stroll to Waterstones

Ereaders- US price war hots up

Alex — Tue, 06 Jul 2010 08:24:47 +0000

As I was saying last week, one of the main issues to adoption of ereaders is the price. The device is seen as a gadget in it’s own right and not a facilitator/enabler for the reading of books. I was reading earlier on Techlogg that Sony has cut the prices of its ereaders substantially in response to a price war going on between Amazon and Barnes & Noble with their respective devices.

The device that I’d like to see as the universal format for an ereader, Sony’s 5 inch Reader Pocket Edition has had $20 lopped off the price, bringing it down to $150. This is the smallest price cut in the range- Sony has knocked a whopping $60 off the Reader Touch Edition, which has a larger screen, expandable memory via two different card slots and a touchscreen. Sony are now selling this for $170, which considering the extra features over the Reader Pocket Edition, suggests the price for the more basic device could go a lot lower. Sony selling for what they think the market can tolerate? Probably.

It’s interesting to note that converting in pounds and adding VAT would put the Reader Touch Edition at £132, and the Reader Pocket Edition at £117. These prices are £70 and £30 cheaper respectively than Amazon are currently selling them for.

It’s speculation whether these price cuts will make it to these shores as Sony are notorious for pricing what they think the territory will accept but who knows, we might be closer than we think to an affordable quality ereader over here in good old Blighty.