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Undertow

by Elizabeth Bear (Goodreads Author)

3.43 of 5 stars 3.43 · rating details · 264 ratings · 34 reviews

A frontier world on the back end of nowhere is the sort of place people go to get lost. And some of those people have secrets worth hiding, secrets that can change the future–assuming there is one. . . .

André Deschênes is a hired assassin, but he wants to be so much more. If only he can find a teacher who will forgive his murderous past–and train him to manipulate odds and...more

Paperback, 368 pages

Published July 31st 2007 by Spectra

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Jan 10, 2009 Joelle rated it 4 of 5 stars

Disclaimer: This isnt as much a review of the book as it is a report on my enjoyment of the book, and its probably more useful as a way to check on my tastes and quirks than to decide whether to read the book[return][return]It's terribly hard to write a book and I am conscious I couldn't even write something half as good as an awful book. And this book is not awful at all! [return]But this is just to say I hate to criticise someone's hard work, but when I try to write a review books I often end...more Disclaimer: This isnt as much a review of the book as it is a report on my enjoyment of the book, and its probably more useful as a way to check on my tastes and quirks than to decide whether to read the book[return][return]It's terribly hard to write a book and I am conscious I couldn't even write something half as good as an awful book. And this book is not awful at all! [return]But this is just to say I hate to criticise someone's hard work, but when I try to write a review books I often end up thinking about where the book could have been great if only... and then it sounds harsher than it should be.[return]--------------------------------------------[return][return]I started by feeling it was all far too familiar - a world at the edge, lots of people with a past, a corporation exploiting it, natives useful but in-the-way, revolutionaries, a bit of cybernetics, a heavy dollop of quantum... All done very well but not that original, or maybe I have read too many similar books in the past few years. So I was starting to classify as a competent book, very readable, nothing wrong but not that memorable...[return][return]Then I hit the bit that is written from the perspective of the natives and these are *hugely* enjoyable and fascinating. I'm enjoying these so much, and wanting to get more, and this would keep me reading no matter what she puts in between. I hope she keeps this up till the end, even though that could almost be to the detriment of the book (as a whole) since I care less for the human characters and the main plot as a result. But it will make the book memorable for me, that's already certain.[return][return]In the second half of the book things pick up, and the plot gets resolved exactly the way I had guessed it will from the hints in the first half. It moves fast, there's some creative use of language to describe the chaos, and it is fun. [return][return]The end focuses only on the humans and I was disappointed by that, I would have liked more about the natives.[return][return]I'll be reading some more of hers that's for sure(less)

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Jul 28, 2012 Nick rated it 3 of 5 stars

http://idearefinery.blogspot.com.au/2012/04/holiday-reading-four-reviews.html

I have read three of Elizabeth Bear's science fiction novels -- the Jacob's Ladder series -- and I loved them very much. They were complex, fast-paced, and hugely inventive. I want to describe her prose as jagged; it's sometimes a bit challenging, but I really like it. I feel like I need to concentrate when I read her books, to keep track of everything, and that's a feeling I enjoy.

In many ways, Undertow was no differen...more

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Jan 01, 2011 Lightreads rated it 2 of 5 stars

Shelves: fiction, science-fiction

Crunchy SF about the mining exploitation of a planet with a population of amphibious aliens, and corporate wrongdoing, and people who can alter probability with their minds, and redemption, and time forks.

To be fair, this book had the misfortune to intersect my life during a deeply frustrating snowed-in interlude, some bad travel, and today a – let’s just call it the aftermath of New Year’s and leave it at that. So not good context.

But still, meh. There’s a lot of stunt writing here – completely...more

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Nov 09, 2011 Robert Harken rated it 3 of 5 stars

Undertow was a tepid read for me. I'll start with the good. The aliens are frogs that evolved into civilization forming beings. Some reviewers had issue with this choice of animal, but I found the alien behavior and society convincing. The idea of probability engineering is also intriguing. The only other book I have read that touches upon this idea is The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy with the Improbability Drive.

Now here's the bad. Probability engineering in Undertow doesn't live up to the...more Undertow was a tepid read for me. I'll start with the good. The aliens are frogs that evolved into civilization forming beings. Some reviewers had issue with this choice of animal, but I found the alien behavior and society convincing. The idea of probability engineering is also intriguing. The only other book I have read that touches upon this idea is The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy with the Improbability Drive.

Now here's the bad. Probability engineering in Undertow doesn't live up to the idea's potential. Bear attempts to use the concept to shape events in the story, but the effort appears more a sideshow. The two biggest detractors for the book are details and plot.

The alien world is created with a lot of detail. I mean a LOT of detail; so much detail that the pace becomes glacial at times. The problem is not just too much detail, but also awkward, random and misplaced detail. During a pivotal point of action, there is an extended intermission for a scholarly description of an experiment illustrating the wave and particle nature of light. This dissertation is followed by a laundry list of possible events with probabilities of occurrence greater than zero; after which the action is stone cold dead to me. A description of making tea, described literally as boil the water, steep the tea bag, and pour the liquid into a cup, was ostensibly done to showcase Luddite proclivities of a character; however, the message is far from obvious because the passage reads like a recipe. Random technology or cultural references not explained or connected to anything else in the story or setting may have been placed to remind the reader the events occur in a strange and futuristic world, but served only to knock me out of the story. Even the final heat of the moment in the last chapter has a reference to similar plant names used across the many other worlds humans have colonized. I think the setting should have been set before the last chapter. Clearly, Bear has an eye for detail, and there is good detail in the book. I think the author could write a compelling milieu story. For idea or event stories, and certainly in action scenes, she should cut the detail by at least half.

The second major problem is the high bar the author sets by reusing a well-worn plot: humans in conflict with indigenous species over mining a rare element required for hyperspace travel. I first encountered this plot in Dune. I know the story has been used elsewhere. To be successful with the remake, Undertow would need to take the story to dimensions not seen before. I don't think the book achieves that distinction.

The plot does twist sufficiently in the end that combined with the well-drawn aliens and the interesting idea of probability engineering, I am willing to rate Undertow at three stars. I like a balance of story elements; other readers, who prefer immersion in setting over plot, may find this book quite enjoyable.(less)

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Jun 08, 2012 Brett rated it 3 of 5 stars

Good solid SF. The concept of "conjuring", or altering probability by an extrapolation of Schrodinger's observer principle is very interesting. If you aren't familiar with Schrodinger's thought experiment, check out http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Schr%C3%.... It is interesting that Bear takes the thought experiment not as orginally intended (as showing how absurd applying quantum observations to our reality is). Instead, she takes the concept and runs with it. The idea is that an observer can actu...more

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Aug 10, 2009 Kelly rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: audiobook

I've previously read Carnival and Hammered by Elizabeth Bear. I've also sampled short stories by the author. I really enjoy her writing style - and even though the plot of Carnival failed to move me, I kept reading because of the characters, culture and story-telling.

Undertow is somewhat similar to Carnival. It has the world-building and in depth characters I've come to expect from this author, but this time I enjoyed the story more. As I have found is typical with an Elizabeth Bear novel, the t...more

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Dec 06, 2012 Liz rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: books-read-in-2012, own, scifi

I had a hard time focusing on the first 1/3 of this book...either because the author's writing style takes some getting used to or because of the sinus infection I was fighting off. Once things got going, I really enjoyed it, though at times I had to backtrack to figure out what was going on. Some of the dialogue was confusing, since the author has a habit of having a character begin a statement, interrupting it with a description or action of some sort, and then finishing the statement a paragr...more

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Mar 03, 2013 Althea Ann rated it 5 of 5 stars

I'm finding myself having to revise my opinion of Elizabeth Bear. I read her "Blood and Iron" for my book club in 2006, and really didn't like it very much. But I was told, "Her sf is much better than this venture into fantasy" - (I should mention here that I have this vague feeling that I then read 'Carnival', I think around June 2007, but I appear to have neglected to review it and I can't remember it, which is really not good. Although I have another vague feeling that I liked it.) Anyway, so...more I'm finding myself having to revise my opinion of Elizabeth Bear. I read her "Blood and Iron" for my book club in 2006, and really didn't like it very much. But I was told, "Her sf is much better than this venture into fantasy" - (I should mention here that I have this vague feeling that I then read 'Carnival', I think around June 2007, but I appear to have neglected to review it and I can't remember it, which is really not good. Although I have another vague feeling that I liked it.) Anyway, so this month I read 'Undertow' and actually really really liked it. It reminded me of Phyllis Gotlieb's 'Flesh and Gold' - which was one of my favorite books of last year's reading. Like that book, this book deals with the exploitation of a peaceful aquatic race by planetary colonists, but it's definitely its own story.
Greene's World is a planetary backwater, considered to be a peaceful place by many, a place to escape the vicious politics of 'Central,' a way to avoid the past. The main industry is a mining operation, where most of the workers are an aquatic, frog-like native species, generally considered to be sub-human and pre-industrial by the human colonists of the city of Nova Haven.
But the politics of Novo Haven are not so non-existent that there isn't enough work for Andre Deschenes, a pure-business assassin-for-hire, who justifies his work to himself by believing that the people whom he is hired to knock off would be killed by someone else if he didn't do it, likely in a less humane manner.
But when Andre is hired to knock off a woman who is suspected to be involved in trying to foment a revolution amongst the natives - and who also happens to be a close friend of Andre's girlfriend - he is unwittingly drawn into a web of interplanetary politics, hidden exploitation, an unknown alien culture, new technology, and a suspicion that Greene's World is more important than Central has let on - indeed, the very existence of humanity's interplanetary empire may depend on it.
Highly recommended. (less)

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Dec 17, 2007 Brownbetty rated it 4 of 5 stars Recommends it for: SF readers

One sentence: Solid writing, nicely foreign future, good speculative use of the human impact of quantum physics, oddly un-foreign aliens.

I liked that the aliens, "ranids" or froggies in the vernacular, didn't have a species name. They call themselves "people" as most people do. Only the humans called them ranids. They were genderless, and this was done so well that at one point in the book there was what I assume was a spell-checker error and the neutral pronoun 'se' was suddenly 'she' which was...more

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Nov 12, 2012 Scott added it

I have reluctantly adopted the policy of not giving star ratings to books written by the woman I'm dating. ;)

Undertow is not without its weaknesses and suffers a bit from the cramming of several major concepts each worthy of a full novel-length exploration into one brisk book. Even so, the world is richly built, the ideas flow fast and furious, and the proceedings are limned with Bear's trademark intelligence and precision.

This novel makes an interesting triptych with H. Beam Piper's earlier Li...more

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Oct 21, 2008 Tatjana rated it 1 of 5 stars Recommends it for: Die hard Science fiction fans.

Recommended to Tatjana by: Random Pick.

Shelves: fiction

I clearly am not well suited to this flavour of sci-fi. I try... I really do... but it kind of leaves me empty.
Usually I can finish the books, but not this one. Of the fiction I was reading (Anansi Boys, Gunslinger, Nothing but the Dog, etc.), this book was incredibly flat. Usually I hear the voices and see the sites like a movie. There was no humour, no depth, no *life*.I thought I'd try to wake it up with the audio CD. That was much worse. The reader was definitely not my style... and it seeme...more

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Aug 05, 2011 Janne Frösén rated it 5 of 5 stars

Well-written, modern sci-fi. Fast paced plot, interesting characters, future tech and a froggy alien race. The fun part is 2/3rds into the book when the quantum probabilities go crazy in a video flashback writing mode. Recommended!

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Jan 18, 2009 Kristen rated it 5 of 5 stars

Shelves: science-fiction

Q: How do you know when you've read a really good book?

A: When you put it down and go, "Wow."

And then after a few moments' consideration, you say, "Wow."

That would be Undertow.

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Feb 09, 2010 Mira rated it 5 of 5 stars

Shelves: science-fiction

On a planet called Greene's World, run by the Charter Trade Company, a civil war may be brewing between the frog-like natives and the humans. An assassin, a probability conjurer, a data miner, a revolutionary, and a native have big parts to play in the coming storm. The mining operations may be more than they seem, and probability manipulation is out of control...

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Jul 26, 2009 Kariss rated it 3 of 5 stars

We had the probability drive scene with Douglas Adams now we have the Bohr & Heisengerg's interpretation of quantum theory. Plus poor Schodinger's Cat
knows if it is alive or dead.

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Feb 22, 2013 Lian Tanner rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: fantasy, science-fiction

Reminded me somewhat of the early works of Jon Courtenay Grimwood - wheels within wheels and nothing is quite what you expect. I liked it a lot and will seek out more by Bear.

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Jan 03, 2012 Phil rated it 2 of 5 stars

Conjuring = manipulation of probabilities to ensure the desired outcome.

Awesome idea. But aside from using that as an explanation of intersteller transportation (which was actually pretty awesome), the potential was squandered. All conjuring was mentioned secondhand when showing it could have been amazing.

Overall, I think there was a lot that could have happened, but in the end I just felt disappointed.

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Jan 30, 2009 Jessica rated it 3 of 5 stars

I enjoy her fnatasy novels but her sci fi left me wanting more. It didn't make a lot of sense through out the book and then it just kind of ends.

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Nov 27, 2008 Michãel rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shelves: sci-fi

I liked a lot of the plot, but never got attached to any of the characters (except one alien). some interesting ideas, but eh...

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Apr 22, 2010 Lyn rated it 4 of 5 stars

The Matrix meets Little Fuzzies with Bear's usual panache. Engaging, well-paced, and thoughtful. Includes physics.

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Aug 31, 2011 Joy rated it 4 of 5 stars

Interesting world, interesting aliens, interesting science. Nice to see a cautionary tale that takes the shades of grey and complexities of life into account.

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Mar 22, 2009 Jdevoss rated it 2 of 5 stars

Confusing at time, but I listened to it as an audiobook. Sci-fi with a bit of fantasy mixed in.

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Jun 29, 2009 Karen rated it 2 of 5 stars

Not bad -- a little too lawyery...I enjoyed but I find myself forgetting what happened already...

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Sep 12, 2010 Ninal added it

Shelves: aliens, otherplanet, sf

Enjoyable, but felt like a novella's worth of story padded into a novel.

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Feb 02, 2013 Nat rated it 5 of 5 stars

The manipulation of time and alternate realities was amazing!

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Apr 07, 2011 Lladroluv rated it 2 of 5 stars

Sci-fi with Frog people.

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Aug 11, 2011 Susan Chamberlain rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: science-fiction

Elizabeth Bear knows how to build characters and plots without revealing too much information, a tactic that keeps you spellbound. While this was not my favorite of her novels, I liked it very well and would recommend it to anyone who enjoys modern science fiction.

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Jul 08, 2010 Elaine rated it 3 of 5 stars

frog people!

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Feb 10, 2008 Avarice rated it 3 of 5 stars

This was a solidly mediocre read, the characters had some good moments but were largely kind of flat. The plot development was reasonable but not wildly exciting; there were a couple of interesting twists in the tech but nothing really memorable. Check out Dust by this author, however, it kicks the crap out of this one.

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Aug 21, 2007 Michelle rated it 2 of 5 stars

Shelves: sf

Next SF Book Club pick. Started Scardown by this author a couple of weeks ago, and for some reason it didn't hold my interest. I'll give it another try and compare it with this, her latest.

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About Elizabeth Bear

Elizabeth Bear was born on the same day as Frodo and Bilbo Baggins, but in a different year. This, coupled with a childhood tendency to read the dictionary for fun, led her inevitably to penury, intransigence, the mispronunciation of common English words, and the writing of speculative fiction.

She lives in Massachusetts with a Giant Ridiculous Dog. Her partner, acclaimed fantasy author Scott Lynch...more

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