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The Uplift War (The Uplift Saga #3)

by David Brin (Goodreads Author)

4.0 of 5 stars 4.00 · rating details · 10,372 ratings · 148 reviews

David Brin's Uplift novels are among the most thrilling and extraordinary science fiction ever written.Sundiver, Startide Rising, and The Uplift War--a New York Times bestseller--together make up one of the most beloved sagas of all time.Brin's tales are set in a future universe in which no species can reach sentience without being "uplifted" by a patron race.But the great...more

Paperback, 672 pages

Published June 1st 1987 by Spectra (first published 1987)

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Feb 28, 2013 Megan Baxter rated it 4 of 5 stars

I do not read the way you are probably supposed to. I think this is abundantly clear by now. I sometimes read the back few pages only a short way into a book. I read three books at once.

I don't always start at the beginning of a series.

Sometimes I do, if I think it's important to do so, but if it doesn't look particularly urgent that I start with book #1, I don't worry about it too much. On the other hand, I wasn't trying to start with the third book in this series - I ordered it from the libra...more I do not read the way you are probably supposed to. I think this is abundantly clear by now. I sometimes read the back few pages only a short way into a book. I read three books at once.

I don't always start at the beginning of a series.

Sometimes I do, if I think it's important to do so, but if it doesn't look particularly urgent that I start with book #1, I don't worry about it too much. On the other hand, I wasn't trying to start with the third book in this series - I ordered it from the library fairly carelessly, thinking it was the first.

Once I got it home, I realized it was the third book of a trilogy, but decided to go ahead and read it anyway. Where I found the second book of the second trilogy (the only other Uplift book I've read) baffling, this was much more accessible. It is, as a friend here on Goodreads put it in the comments, Space Chickens Attack the Planet of the Apes.

And it's really good.

Galactic civilization is balanced on a knife's edge. Power is gained by becoming patrons, gaining client races, uplifting them to sentience and starfaring, and having them as more or less indentured servants over hundreds of thousands of years. But then humans came on the scenes, "wolflings," who apparently bootstrapped themselves up into sentience, a feat thought to be impossible.

Not only that, but almost as soon as these inexperienced, unpredictable players made their entrance on the scene, they had the temerity to uplift two client species of their own - chimpanzees and dolphins. Some Galactics support them. Many more want them gone, eradicated, or at least safely ensconced in a client relationship to one of the patron races.

And then the dolphins discover something out there in the stars. I don't know what - maybe it's in the other books? No matter, the very news is enough to entice the Gubru to attack the human-controlled planet of Garth. The Gubru are birds, neuter until they form a triad, and, through a careful dance of power and manipulation, achieve both gender and the status of queen and princes. Each of the triad sent to Garth belongs to a caste - the military, the religious, and the bureaucratic. They jockey for position in the ensuing invasion, and successfully sequester virtually every human on the planet.

But those chimps? They don't matter - the Gubru don't believe they've been successfully uplifted. Until a resistance starts....

The Uplift War manages to juggle issues of startling complexity without ever being dense. The chapters switch to focus on different characters, Gubru, human, and chimp, and the contrasts are well-done and intriguing.

And along the way, he manages to sprinkle some interesting meditations on servitude, on the effects of being indentured on identity, and on gender. Brin frequently has things to say about gender, very quietly, and I love picking them out.

This is a story where Tarzan lives in the Garth jungle, where Cheetah is just as smart as Tarzan, and where everything is, in the end, decided by a practical joke. The races Brin creates are varied and intriguing, and the story both serious and thoroughly entertaining.(less)

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May 04, 2013 Clouds - (¿head-in-the?) rated it 3 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: science-fiction-series, locus-sci-fi, hugo, science-fiction, reviewed

Christmas 2010: I realised that I had got stuck in a rut. I was re-reading old favourites again and again, waiting for a few trusted authors to release new works. Something had to be done.

On the spur of the moment I set myself a challenge, to read every book to have won the Locus Sci-Fi award. That’s 35 books, 6 of which I’d previously read, leaving 29 titles by 14 authors who were new to me.

While working through this reading list I got married, went on my honeymoon, switched career and became...more

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Aug 31, 2009 Tatiana rated it 2 of 5 stars

Shelves: sciencefiction

These Uplift novels are getting better. This time I cared a lot more about the characters, and the writing seemed much smoother and less annoying. The author managed to go more than two or three pages sometimes between changes of viewpoint character, and the action was more streamlined and less choppy.

I loved the character of the ambassador's daughter Athaclena, and how she ended up leading the resistance forces. I liked her species, I liked their intuitive psi sense, the artistic glyphs they br...more

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Mar 10, 2009 Thomas rated it 4 of 5 stars

David Brin is an excellent storyteller and this was quite a fun read. Most interesting are the bits and pieces about the greater workings of Brin's Galactic society, wherein sentience is gained through patron races "uplifting" species into sapientcy (after which they are indentured to the patron race for milliena as part of a billions year-old caste system). Humans (and their pre-alien contact client races, dolphins and chimps) are the only exceptions, having seemlying uplifted ourselves.

The Upl...more

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Feb 16, 2009 Candice Trebus rated it 2 of 5 stars · review of another edition

http://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/fiction_r...

As a sci-fi fan, I grieved over this book, as I discovered it was a Nebula-award winning piece, amongst many other awards, but a wretched and grueling read.
I find out today that what I read was book three of a larger series. That explains my frustration with having to “crash-course” my way through understanding a large part of this book.
The need to create several “galactic” languages is understandable in this futuristic world where the human race has onl...more http://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/fiction_r...

As a sci-fi fan, I grieved over this book, as I discovered it was a Nebula-award winning piece, amongst many other awards, but a wretched and grueling read.
I find out today that what I read was book three of a larger series. That explains my frustration with having to “crash-course” my way through understanding a large part of this book.
The need to create several “galactic” languages is understandable in this futuristic world where the human race has only recently entered a several-billion-year interstellar space travel and galactic organization, but pompous in my opinion, to write out. The rules of introducing a foreign language to the reader are simple: don’t introduce a word that you’re not going to reference later, don’t make the words impossible to pronounce, don’t make the words long, and most certainly make your language memorable. As it stands, there is a glossary of terms in the front of the book, which doesn’t describe half of the statements, glyphs or ideas expressed in this book. Perhaps (I console myself) I would have absorbed more if I read books one and two first.

My final thoughts on the subject are perfectly summed up by my friends at xkcd: http://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/fiction_r...

I have no desire to read any more of this frustrating world or its impossible and un-relatable characters, all of which were poorly described and too-late in developing. The author often spent infuriating chapters describing scenery while I was still having difficulty placing the characters in that scenery. From page one I had difficulty imagining the poorly-constructed alien races, and an even harder time distinguishing between alien names that were too long.
On a social note, the book was “preachy” about understanding the intentions of other races and almost insulting when describing the social order of races (the oldest being the “better off” races).
In closing, I do not recommend this book to any friend or enemy, as it is genuinely disappointing.(less)

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Apr 18, 2013 Dark-Draco rated it 5 of 5 stars

Shelves: favorites, science-fiction-series

The third book in the series takes place around the same time as the previous one. The Gubru decide that the best way to make the dolphins of 'The Streaker' give up their secrets, is to take one of the Earth colonies hostage. They attack the planet, Garth, making sure that the humans are interred on islands and leaving only the chimpanzee clients free to carry on the work of the planet. Only they have misunderstood the bond between the two species. Soon, a guerilla force of chims, one lone huma...more

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Apr 16, 2013 Eric rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: science-fiction

The third book in the Uplift trilogy but as with the other books you can just read each book as a stand-alone. Where the second book focuses on human/neo-dolphin interaction, this one is about humans and neo-chimpanzees, neo-chimpanzees being the other earth species humans 'uplifted'.

I like Brin's style, it's easy reading and I enjoyed it quite a bit more than a lot of the serious sci-fi that is out there. I'm wondering if I should focus more on sci-fi written 20+ years ago.

The Uplift trilogy...more

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Jul 12, 2012 Sean O'Brien rated it 3 of 5 stars

The third installment of David Brin's shared universe trilogy is the largest of the three, and in some ways, is the most ambitious. I quite liked the whole series, though I felt the second novel was the best of the three.

The Uplift War is a sprawling, multifaceted story that is at once grand and mundane in focus. Brin weaves the plans of galactic civilizations together with the individual stories of humans, aliens, and chimps. His novel is a mosaic of stories that come together to a grand finale...more

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Apr 21, 2011 Dylan Harris rated it 4 of 5 stars

I've just read David Brin's Uplift trilogy.

There are adventures that involved me, had me rooting for the heroes and wishing ill for the enemies. They're three good independent stories that are worth the read just for that.

But I want to comment on other matters, as usual. There's somethings about his world that need special mention. So this is the spoiler warning.

A couple of minor points first. Unfortunately, the old whore magic of Psi is important in the story. Yes, reading novels is about wish...more I've just read David Brin's Uplift trilogy.

There are adventures that involved me, had me rooting for the heroes and wishing ill for the enemies. They're three good independent stories that are worth the read just for that.

But I want to comment on other matters, as usual. There's somethings about his world that need special mention. So this is the spoiler warning.

A couple of minor points first. Unfortunately, the old whore magic of Psi is important in the story. Yes, reading novels is about wish fulfillment, but I don't like Psi. It's not creative wish fulfillment, it's the lazy get out of jail free fantasy of a child's "I wish". Having said that, it was also pretty standard in scifi for quite a long period, so Brin's usage isn't something uniquely bad.

Brin also has the misfortunate of old scifi difficulty: the future comes along and wrecks a part of his story. This can't be helped. If your plot needs someone in the future to be unable to find a camera, if your plot needs people to have to find wall phones to communicate with others, you story is going to be bolloxed when the future invents smart phones. The solution lies with the reader, who must suspect another reality, and go back to the day when 'advanced communications technologies' had yet to cede to creative engineering.

No, I'm far more concerned about a couple of other matters in this book. It's too common major flaw is yet more story of plucky superhero humans overcoming incredible odds to bloody the nose of ultra-powerful aliens. Yes, there is something in the story that makes that plausible: the aliens depend on their technobible for everything, and have become stuffy and uninventive, presumptive and arrogant. Yes, the fall is due, yes, they fall, but it's the same plot and atmosphere in many scifi stories, and it's got to be dull.

Too much of the story's movements aren't plucky humans, or preprogrammed aliens, it's luck. Too much of the plot turns on good fortune. Well, that's how it seems to me: it's quite possible I've missed some subtle depth. What's worse, though, is that far far too much of the story is super-human smugness, and it gets on my tits. I'll give Brin, he's got a character that takes the piss out of this, but all the same ... .

Actually, there's so much luck in the trilogy that I suspect there's actually an unseen hand, something that was perhaps going to be revealed in another novel that hasn't been produced. The uplift universe is full of aliens whose cultural history goes back a very long way. Their universe irregularly gets stuffy and then gets kicked up the arse: this time its the humans doing the rear rearranging. But the human success depends so much on luck ... are this universe's mythical old progenitors really still around, perhaps using the humans to do some universe shaking? There are a lot of unanswered questions that would be answered by that.

The problem with that is the core of the tales are always the plucky earth underdogs doing incredible things. The stories would be rather wrecked if it turned out in the unwritten novel that the underdogs were really overdogs, and their stunning plucky victories were inevitable. I can well see why such a story would be a problem. It could only work if the humans turned bad, or maybe the invisible hand turned bad, but divided, and a small "good" faction were able to guide all the other goodies into underdog victory. Not that it matters, David Brin writes his novels, not me, so I'm talking crap.

But, you see, that illustrates one of the strengths of this series: I WANT MORE. Go read the novels, go enjoy them.
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Dec 28, 2012 Stephanie rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: science-fiction

This is the final volume in the first Uplift War trilogy and it is the best of the three in my opinion. This book on the surface deals with one of the older galactic races - the Gubru - and their attempt to find the elusive pre-sentient Garthlings so they can sponsor them and one up Earth who they feel has not earned its patron status.

But it is so much more than that because Brin has woven the best and worst parts of humanity and by association aliens into the story. There are wheels within whee...more

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Aug 09, 2009 Kevin rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

David Brin's best characters are, curiously, always chimpanzees. Charles Dart of "Startide Rising", a self-involved academic, is perhaps my favorite character in all of science fiction, with "The Uplift War"'s Fiben Bolger, an ape of a more heroic mold, a close second.
My only carp about the book concerns the alien Athaclena's constant grappling with metaphors, a diversion which pays no dividends and at times grows head-smackingly literal, as when she engages in some fakeass mind-meld with anothe...more

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Mar 19, 2012 Peter rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Recommended to Peter by: Jeremiah

Shelves: science-fiction

My favourite novel in the Uplift Saga, this book like its sequels focuses on the story of a (relatively) small group of people on a single planet and their part in humanity's struggles in a larger universe. After being a bit unhappy with the superficial portrayal of aliens and their culture in the previous novels, I really enjoyed the deeper exploration of some alien cultures and mindsets in this book. And the Uplift Process again takes center stage in this story as both the very Terran developm...more

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Jun 14, 2013 Onefinemess rated it 5 of 5 stars

Shelves: sci-fi

Let's just get this out of the way first: I REALLY LIKED this book. This trilogy has been the best I've read in a while.

And one of the most frustrating. Frustrating because so many awesomely fascinating things were hinted at in this universe, but there was no touch to do more than prod at them. Cannot wait to start reading the next trilogy.

Last time, I was amazed that I could like a book about talking dolphins as much as I did. This time, it was chimpanzees. People. Earthlings. I love the unity...more

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Dec 21, 2012 Nathan Morrison rated it 5 of 5 stars

It reminds me of a Quentin Tarantino film in that there are multiple perspectives that make up the book. But this is book 3 in the whole friggin Sundiver series. There's a neo-chimp who is basically John McClaine in outer space. Some cool romance with the human soldier Robert and Tymbrimi ambassador's daughter Athaclena. Nothing gross or Avatar-y. Just psychic stuff. BTW, Clenie's dad is the greatest troll of all time. This book is a great action/sci-fi/comedy that I think everybody should at le...more

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Jan 09, 2012 Isabel rated it 4 of 5 stars

Fiben had often wondered how much of the popularity of the thunder dance came from innate, inherited feelings of brontophilia and how much from the well-known fact that fallow, unmodified chimps in the jungles of Earth were observed to “dance” in some crude fashion during lightning storms. He suspected that a lot of neo-chimpanzee “tradition” came from elaborating on the publicized behavior of their unmodified cousins.
Like many college-trained chims, Fiben liked to think he was too sophisticated...more Fiben had often wondered how much of the popularity of the thunder dance came from innate, inherited feelings of brontophilia and how much from the well-known fact that fallow, unmodified chimps in the jungles of Earth were observed to “dance” in some crude fashion during lightning storms. He suspected that a lot of neo-chimpanzee “tradition” came from elaborating on the publicized behavior of their unmodified cousins.
Like many college-trained chims, Fiben liked to think he was too sophisticated for such simple-minded ancestor worship. And generally he did prefer Bach or whale songs to simulated thunder.
And yet there were times, alone in his apartment, when he would pull a tape by the Fulminates out of a drawer, put on the headphones, and try to see how much pounding his skull could take without splitting open. Here, under the driving amplifiers, he couldn’t help feeling a thrill” run up his spine as “lightning” bolted across the room and the beating drums rocked patrons, furniture, and fixtures alike.

"Startide Rising" ended with the dolphin-crewed spaceship Streaker on the run from various warring Galactic races who are all desperate to win possession of the ship and its discoveries. As this book opens, the human and neo-chimpanzee inhabitants of Garth are expecting to be invaded at any moment, as one of the Galactic species has decided to take Garth hostage in an attempt to force the Terragen Council to hand over Streaker's discoveries. With diplomats and other visiting aliens fleeing the planet in droves, the Tymbrini ambassador Uthacalthing and his daughter Athaclena have decided to stay. The Tymbrini are the Terrans closest allies, and are known for their capricious sense of humour and Ambassador Uthacalthing seems to have some devious ploy in mind when he sets off into the wilds of Garth with the ambassador of a species less friendly to Terra in tow.

Garth is a planet that suffered ecological disaster when a newly uplifted predator species who had been granted a lease on the planet reverted to savagery and ran amok, wiping out all the larger native wildlife (although old legends say that some of the mysterious Garthlings may survive in out of the way areas). Now the Galactic Civilisation has leased Garth to the Terrans, who are trying to rebuild the shattered ecology, introducing Terran plants and animals to fill empty ecological niches. The Galactics chose the Terrans for this because of the unusual amount of biodiversity on Earth compared to other planets, but the amount of biodiversity also worries the Galactics, who got the humans to sign an agreement saying that they won't start uplifting any other species.

The uplift of chimpanzees is an on-going process and although humans govern their client species with a light hand compared to the other Galactics, breeding rights are tightly controlled. Only the coveted white card allows unlimited breeding and an unofficial class system has developed among the chimpanzees based on which colour card they have been allocated, and the ethics of uplift are one of the major themes of this novel.
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Apr 02, 2013 Rhianna Tangible rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Since at least 2001 A Space Oddssey the theme of a near-sentient animal group being raised to full intelligence and self-awareness by a more advanced race has been a popular theme in Science Fiction. Brin handles this theme very well. In his entertaining treatment of this theme, this rise to sentience is done with technology but the group being raised or uplifted in this fashion needs to have potential, the raw material to become conscious and thinking creatures. In this delightful, engrossing,...more

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Jun 14, 2013 David Bonesteel rated it 4 of 5 stars

As war rages throughout the galaxy, the bird-like Gubru invade the planet Garth, which is home to humans and their Uplifted client race, the chimpanzees. Cut off from outside help, two young people, one human and one alien, are forced by circumstance to become the leaders of a chimp army in a guerrilla war. There is a lot of action in this third novel of David Brin's Uplift series. So far, each entry has been better than its predeccesor. Brin's prose is frequently clunky, but his story is tight...more

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Sep 04, 2011 Mercurybard rated it 3 of 5 stars

Brin's style is starting to even itself out. The jumps from one scene to the next are fewer and less abrupt. Again, the cast is as full of POV characters as one of Tad Williams or George R. R. Martin's books, but they are easy to keep straight despite the crazy non-human names.

Set roughly at the same time as Startide Rising, this book is more chimp-centric than its companion and the chimpanzee characters are just as richly developed as the humans or alien.

I'm still annoyed we haven't learned ju...more

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Aug 16, 2012 Ian rated it 5 of 5 stars

I decided it was time to reenter the world of Uplift. I love the premise of this series.. Aliens throughout the 5 galaxies have a tradition of finding presentient creatures and uplifting them to join them in the galactic culture. This has been going on for millions of years. Species are found, uplifted, grow, then retire. Then they find humans, who seem to have done it ourselves! They don't trust us..

This book is the 3rd book in the series. I have read the others in the series, long ago, but nev...more

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Jun 10, 2011 Scythan rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: science-fiction, series

All three books I've read in this series have a different "atmosphere". Each book is separate from the others, except for taking place in the same universe and rough timeline. The first book seemed like a lighter read, as if to easily draw the reader into the universe and give a glimpse of what it is all about. The second focused on dolphins on an aquatic world, and the third had a lot of politics that were mostly played out by chimps and gave a lot of detail about the way different species inte...more

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Nov 25, 2008 Jenna rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: science-fiction

It took me a few tries to finish the book, but I'm glad I did. I read this book for my book club, and it led to one of the best discussions we've ever had. David Brin is the Jackson Pollock of science-fiction, he just grabs a bunch of science-y ideas, mixes them all up, and splatters them all over his pages. The finished work is one a little messy, a little cool, and always imaginative and thought-provoking. Uplift War is actually the third in a series by Brin, and I'm really lookin forward to r...more

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Oct 13, 2011 Lianne Burwell rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: sf, reread

Continuing my reread of the Uplift series.

The Uplift War is not a sequel to Startide Rising, it's more of a parallel story. While the Streaker is on the run, along with the secret of what they'd found, some of the Galactic races decided that instead of chasing the dolphin ship, they would attack Earth and it's colonies to force the humans to hand over the information that they don't actually have about the find.

On Garth, a planet that Earth got as a colony because the previous tenants had been r...more

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Apr 20, 2013 Jeff Stockett rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: hugo-award-winning-novels, science-fiction

Wow! This book was super awesome!

I love how David Brin is able to craft a story that is epic in proportion while still giving us characters that we can relate to and care about.

This book takes place on a completely different planet with completely different characters than the first 2 books in the trilogy. Yet, it still continues the same story and allows us to see how the events of Startide Rising had consequences that ripple throughout the galaxies.

I loved the characters in this book. I loved...more

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Nov 13, 2012 Kaitlynn rated it 4 of 5 stars Recommends it for: Sci-fi fans, alien enthusists

Recommended to Kaitlynn by: SomethingAwful

Shelves: sci-fi-fantasy, aliens

David Brin just keeps becoming a better and better writer.

The Uplift War is the third novel of the first Uplift trilogy. It follows the invasion of the planet Garth by the avian Gubru, who seek to hold humans hostage to find more information about the NeoFins and the discovery of the Streaker

The plot is solid. Told from multiple perspectives, both antagonists and protagonists alive, the story unfolds as a wonderful web of relationships and politics. There are multiple twists and surprises. The o...more

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Oct 15, 2010 Bart Everson rated it 2 of 5 stars

Shelves: octavia-sf

I would never recommend The Uplift War to my friends who are skeptical about science fiction. It has too many conventions peculiar to the genre. There are aliens of many races, psychic powers, galactic empires, robots, ray guns and spaceships that travel faster than light. It's all a bit much in a single book if you've never read science fiction before.

Furthermore, this is not an easy read. The pages are peppered with made-up alien words like lurrunanu and tu'fluk. There's also a sprinkling of o...more

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Oct 12, 2011 Dirk Grobbelaar rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: books-i-own, science-fiction, hugo-award-winners

Let’s get one thing straight. The Uplift War is not military science fiction. There is a war, yes, and there are some appropriately war-like moments, but the emphasis is, once again, on the ‘Uplift’ and not on the ‘War’. Arguably, one the greatest strengths of The Uplift War and its predecessors, is the alien element. Brin certainly went the whole hog when he was designing and imagining his Galactics. This is where these books shine. Each alien race has its own culture and corresponding cultural...more Let’s get one thing straight. The Uplift War is not military science fiction. There is a war, yes, and there are some appropriately war-like moments, but the emphasis is, once again, on the ‘Uplift’ and not on the ‘War’. Arguably, one the greatest strengths of The Uplift War and its predecessors, is the alien element. Brin certainly went the whole hog when he was designing and imagining his Galactics. This is where these books shine. Each alien race has its own culture and corresponding cultural oddities, and some of them are quite bizarre. That being said, I had a difficult time of it imagining the Gubru as an intimidating warlike race, despite all their hardware. They always seemed to remind me of oversized chicks, or broilers, or canaries. Tweety with a laser rifle and an attitude?

So, yes, the Gooksyu-Gubru have it in for earthclan. They really want to know what the Streaker spaceship found out in the star-lanes (see Startide Rising), so they set off for Garth (a planet leased by Earth in an attempt to undo ecological harm that has transpired there) on an official ‘crusade’. The galactic politics are interesting and at least come up with some plausible explanations why the aliens don’t just roast earth, which is obviously the grand prize if you think Humans are not worthy of their patron status, and be done with it. The ‘War’ is mostly concerned with the guerrilla efforts of the neo-chimpanzees on Garth to undermine their new, and unwelcome, rulers. Mostly. But this novel isn’t just about the war. It’s also about a lot of other things, most notably a Tymbrimi ‘practical joke’ that goes WAY beyond the average April Fool’s day.

There is a lot of science in here. Biological science, ecological science, chemical science, linguistics, you name it. By the time Brin was writing this, he was apparently feeling comfortable enough with his writing skills and the success of the first two Uplift novels to utilise the kitchen sink approach. Some of the characters are truly delightful, such as the Neo-Chimp Fiben Bolger and Uthacalthing, the Tymbrimi ambassador to Garth.

The novel teeters on a fine edge, yet somehow manages not to topple into the realm of being overly complicated. Well, barring perhaps the Galactic code of conduct and all that. All in all, it comes together nicely. Expect some great twists. But you already knew that, didn’t you, having already read Sundiver and Startide Rising? Oh, and of course, this novel has neo-gorillas!
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Nov 12, 2012 Chloe rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: scifi-fantasy

I have to admit. I'm a little relieved to be done with this series. Wherever I would walk while reading either this book or its predecessor, Startide Rising, people would inevitably look at the cover, glance away quickly, then slowly look back, eyes questioning. "Is that...?" "Yes," I would answer, "those are chimpanzees. Yes, they're in space. No, I am not reading this on a dare." At the end of the day, regardless of how many awards this series has won (oodles), or how detailed and complex the...more I have to admit. I'm a little relieved to be done with this series. Wherever I would walk while reading either this book or its predecessor, Startide Rising, people would inevitably look at the cover, glance away quickly, then slowly look back, eyes questioning. "Is that...?" "Yes," I would answer, "those are chimpanzees. Yes, they're in space. No, I am not reading this on a dare." At the end of the day, regardless of how many awards this series has won (oodles), or how detailed and complex the universe that Brin has created, there is going to be a good chunk of the reading world that will write off the Uplift trilogy the moment they hear the words "chimps in space."

Which is a real shame because this series has one of the best premises in all of science fiction, namely that intelligent life never arises naturally in the universe but is part of a millennia long tradition known as Uplift, in which sapient species are indentured to their patrons for a hundred thousand years before being granted their own freedom to determine their genetic direction. In Startide Rising, Brin focused on one of two species that humans had uplifted, the dolphins, who had stumbled across a derelict fleet that may or may not belong to the long-fabled Progenitors, the species that had set the template for Uplift throughout the galaxy, and sparked a religious war throughout the galaxy.

The Uplift War is set immediately after the events of Startide Rising and focuses on humankind's second client species, the chimpanzees of the human colony world of Garth, a small backwater planet far removed from the conflict tearing the galaxy apart until a race of giant birds known as the Gubru decide to conquer Garth and hold it hostage until Earth decides to share their discovery. Unbeknownst to the Gubru though, humans have not been resting on their laurels after uplifting dolphins and chimps and are involved in a highly illegal gambit to uplift Earth's very own gorillas without incurring the wrath of the galaxy. Caught up in this conflict are the human son of the planet's governor, Robert Oneagle, the mildly telepathic daughter of a Tymbrimi diplomat, Athaclena, and Fiben Bolger, a chimpanzee from the Garth militia, who all find themselves running a ragtag guerilla war (oh trust me, that pun is used widely throughout the book) against the space chickens after the standard military forces are captured and held hostage.

As always it is Brin's eye for detail that makes this book fairly hum with energy. The meticulousness of detail afforded to the Gubru mating dance/policy summit, the Uplift tests that the chimpanzees must master in order to prove that they are actually sapient creatures in the eyes of galactic society, the telepathic bonds shared between father and daughter Tymbrimi- all are so well thought out and detailed that, despite how outlandish the plot description may be, I never once found myself rolling my eyes or doubting the internal logic of the book's world. Brin even addressed my main complaint from Startide Rising and doesn't resort to resolving conflicts out of scene but describes the resolution in very satisfying detail.

This is an amazingly satisfying series that I would recommend to anyone who enjoys thinking about the strange course that adaptation and evolution often take or who enjoy tales set in a fully-rendered universe. I just learned that there is a follow-up trilogy after this one that addresses what happens to the crew of the Streaker from Startide Rising and I know that I will be dipping into them over the rainy months ahead.(less)

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May 23, 2009 Christy rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shelves: science-fiction-and-fantasy

Although the ideas about environmentalism and uplifted species are powerful and the universe that Brin creates is interesting, this book, like the previous two in the series, fails to deliver on its promise. Brin repeatedly raises huge questions about the universe, evolution, sentience, and ethics, and he repeatedly defers them in favor of a more limited plot structure (in the first book, he tells a mystery story; in the second book, he tells an adventure story; and in this book, he tells a stor...more

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May 11, 2009 Tim rated it 4 of 5 stars

The book was much more self-contained than the previous installments in the series. The characters introduced at the beginning of the book were all accounted for at the end of the book, and the conflict encountered in the book was resolved by the time the pages ran out.

The story itself was very interesting and well-done. Brin's imagination and his attention to details are exemplary, even if some of his foreshadowing comes off as weak since the reader doesn't have any intuition about the mind of...more

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May 24, 2010 Ben Babcock rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shelves: own, 2010-read, science-fiction, hugo-winner

David Brin's Uplift Trilogy has not been the easiest series for me to read. I enjoyed Sundiver as a mystery set within a much larger universe. Brin left me hungry for more, but Startide Rising left me bitter and disappointed. What had started with so much potential seemed encumbered by flawed storylines and a myriad of unwanted characters. Hence, I was doubtful of The Uplift War's ability to mollify me.

While certainly superior to Startide Rising, The Uplift War lacks the central protagonist th...more

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About David Brin

David Brin is a scientist, speaker, and world-known author. His novels have been New York Times Bestsellers, winning multiple Hugo, Nebula and other awards. At least a dozen have been translated into more than twenty languages.

Existence, his latest novel, offers an unusual scenario for first contact. His ecological thriller, Earth, foreshadowed global warming, cyberwarfare and near-future trends...more

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