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Anti Ice
A new element has been discovered in a hidden vein near the South Pole. Anti-ice is harmless until warmed, when it releases vast energies that promise new wonders and threaten new horrors beyond humankind's wildest dreams. "A major new talent!"--Arthur C. Clarke.
Published
(first published 1993)
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Quite an engrossing tale of an alternative history wherein the English discover in the late 1800s what amounts to anti-matte---from an anti-matter asteroid that crashed into Moon (and a piece of which struck Earth, and remained preserved in the Antarctic ice due to internal superconductivity properties).
Needless to say (which is why I liked it), the story is principally a cautionary tale against massively destructive weapons: hinting that such weapons will lead to global control by some, complet...more
Needless to say (which is why I liked it), the story is principally a cautionary tale against massively destructive weapons: hinting that such weapons will lead to global control by some, complet...more
This is one of Baxter's earlier works - a dip into steam punk before that genre had really properly taken off. The premise is that a C19 British expedition to the Antarctic discovers a strange yellowish icy material which, when heated to room temperature, explodes with tremendous force. However, if kept at sub-zero temperatures, and allowed to bleed off its energy slowly, it is an immense source of energy. It is also (when placed in an artillery shell)an interesting parallel to a nuclear weapon....more
Make that 2 1/2 stars. Honestly, this take of Victorians in Spaaace caused me to have some flashbacks to the Professor Challenger stories, though luckily without falling to the level of The Land of Mist. Sure the science was better and the characters, even though they came across as annoying at times, are consistent with what we find in the literature of the period, but I was more than halfway through the book before I started caring about any of them. In short, I would say that if you are a fan...more
Steam Age SciFi from Baxter. In the 19th Century, the British discover a pile of stuff in the Antarctic. This stuff releases fabulous quantities of energy when it comes into contact with other stuff. A whole transportation economy develops based on the so-called Anti-Ice. And there is a mission to the moon. Fun!
http://www.books.rosboch.net/?p=429
http://www.books.rosboch.net/?p=429
Ok, Baxter should stick around this level. Nice light fiction. No ponderous voyages to the end of time using discredited superstring theories from the end of last month, thank you very much. Got it for 49 cents at the St Vincent de Paul thrift store on Lake Street. Thanks to them also.
I was not impressed with this alternate history. Science is science and physics are physics even in this book and this author gets both wrong. You can not have both 1800's manufacturing abilities and advance levels of metallurgy and manufacturing side by side. The characters are dull and the conversations are stilted.
Space steampunk is just one of those things where I can't suspend my disbelief...
Very Jules Verne-y in style, but also rather preachy. Not worth the effort.
Mar 03, 2012
Jaime
rated it
4 of 5 stars
·
review of another edition
Shelves:
favorites,
le-fantastique
Steampunk before it was ever A Thing! A British Empire and Industrial Revolution super-charged by anti-matter. Great fun.
Jul 02, 2011
Gunner McGrath
rated it
2 of 5 stars
·
review of another edition
Shelves:
science-fiction
The only thing this book has going for it is that it reads very much like an H.G. Wells novel. Otherwise it is mostly boring, with uninteresting characters and both a ridiculous and largely pointless story. Maybe some will be intrigued by a 19th-century-styled science fiction story where the science is actually correct (one must only read The Island of Dr. Moreau to know how easily bad science can render a book laughably terrible), but for me that novelty was not enough to overcome the sheer use...more
Just not engaging. When I was a young teen I probably would have loved it, with the neat alternate-history concepts and technology. But now, decades later, I need more. For example, characters.
Some fun steam punkish stuff.
A good steam-punk homage to Jules Verne and H.G Wells.
Interesting book. Not at all what I expected when I started reading it.
Aug 22, 2007
Justin
rated it
3 of 5 stars
·
review of another edition
Recommends it for:
sci-fi nerds
A quick, fun read.
Apr 19, 2013
Cara Murphy
marked it as to-read
·
review of another edition
Shelves:
science-fiction,
secondhand-or-used
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Stephen Baxter is a trained engineer with degrees from Cambridge (mathematics) and Southampton Universities (doctorate in aeroengineering research). Baxter is the winner of the British Science Fiction Award and the Locus Award, as well as being a nominee for an Arthur C. Clarke Award, most recently for Manifold: Time. His novel Voyage won the Sidewise Award for Best Alternate History Novel of the...more
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Mar 06, 2012 03:03pm