Darwin's Radio (Darwin's Radio #1)

Jun 16, 2009 Ninja Sock Puppet rated it 2 of 5 stars Recommends it for: Ceridwen, anyone else who likes books about plaque

Shelves: authors-i-ve-met

I keep my teeth pretty clean. Though I don't floss as often as I should, I rarely worry about plaque. So you can understand why the prospect of reading an entire book about plaque had me wondering after my sanity. How good could it really be? But with a name like Darwin's Radio, it had to be awesome. Maybe something about how plaque is really a mechanism for evolution and we'd be toothless neanderthals without it.

What's that? Oh, PLAGUE. Sorry.

I don't understand microbiology and genetics, so th...more I keep my teeth pretty clean. Though I don't floss as often as I should, I rarely worry about plaque. So you can understand why the prospect of reading an entire book about plaque had me wondering after my sanity. How good could it really be? But with a name like Darwin's Radio, it had to be awesome. Maybe something about how plaque is really a mechanism for evolution and we'd be toothless neanderthals without it.

What's that? Oh, PLAGUE. Sorry.

I don't understand microbiology and genetics, so there were giant chunks of this book that went over my head. Transposons? REtransposons? Endogenous retro-viruses? I'm sure the hard science was well-researched, and well, hard, but maybe a little pointless for a layman. It might as well have been plaque.

I'm as interested in science as the next guy, but if you need a degree to read a science fiction book then you need an awesome plot. So let's examine the plot:

Well, not much happens in the first three-quarters, between explaining what this bug is and what it might or might not do. You get the sense early on that it might be a little like the Andromeda Strain, without the countdown clock or nukes. So minus the excitement and danger. Let's look at the results from the petri dishes again! Let's correlate data and organize a conference! RUN!

There's sort of a love story, but it's main purpose is to advance the plot and remarkably ends up pulling the characters out of the action. But now I have a really good sense of what it's like to work in the exciting world of mid-level government beaurocrats, so it's not all bad.

There's a bit of psychic dreaming, even though the character having the dreams is very careful to point out that he's not psychic. Even after he meets somebody else having similar dreams. The dreams have no bearing on the plot, other than to show us that this has all happened before and it will all happen again. I get the sense that the dreams are the method our author has chosen to tell the story about how it happened before without having to write it chronologically and spoil the twist. I think it would have worked a whole lot better chronologically to give the book a sense of foreboding and mystery, though. This way, I'm not sure whether the ancient history ever really happened, because those dreams WEREN'T PSYCHIC. Just dreams.

This book could have been half as long. There's a slow and steady build to the climax, which is rewarding, but it could have been faster paced and hung together better. Crowds riot. Why are they rioting? The main characters do not appear to know, and therefore I don't either. I mean, sure, it's the end of the world and I expect people would riot, but people need a catalyst, a seed from which to grow their unrest into full-blown car flipping and murder. The people in charge make bad decisions in spite of the evidence for political reasons. OK, but they appear to understand the ramifications of their choices, which means that politics won't mean squat in a decade. Their excuse is that people are dumb sheep who will riot because they don't understand what's going on. Abortion is a political hot potato. Really?

All that aside, this book had some intriguing ideas and a good plot twist, if you can call the slow revelation over five or six chapters a twist. I got to the end and I was glad that there was a sequel, because after all, life goes on and I want to see the development of these characters now that the BIG ISSUE is out of the way. Especially when publishers are handing out three-book deals like candy.

Just be sure to brush afterwards.(less)

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Jun 19, 2012 Robert rated it 2 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: scifi

So I keep on reading Bear novels, feeling disappointed, waiting a while, then rinse and repeat.

This time I've clarified why I am so ambivalent about this guy: he has fascinating ideas then writes dull books about them. The premise here is an extreme example. Our "junk" DNA turns out to be a collection of emergency rapid-response evolutionary accelerators - and the emergency response has just been triggered. Cue mysterious pregnancies, peculiar facial mutations and a really big scientific mystery...more So I keep on reading Bear novels, feeling disappointed, waiting a while, then rinse and repeat.

This time I've clarified why I am so ambivalent about this guy: he has fascinating ideas then writes dull books about them. The premise here is an extreme example. Our "junk" DNA turns out to be a collection of emergency rapid-response evolutionary accelerators - and the emergency response has just been triggered. Cue mysterious pregnancies, peculiar facial mutations and a really big scientific mystery that turns very political very fast. The detail is very convincing - Bear did a heap of research.

But here's the problem: almost every event of a dramatic nature happens off-stage and the middle part of the book, between the initial scientific drama and the political nightmare at the end bogs down severely. (view spoiler)

There is a theme of the disaster that occurs when science gets forced into the political arena; you only have to look at the climate change debate to know how that goes. It is very realistically handled but develops too slowly. I am reminded of Kim Stanley Robinson. Several of his works deal with science and internal and external politics and how real science is done and I can't help thinking a more interesting novel would have resulted if he had started with the same material.

I acquired Darwin's Children without realising that it was a sequel and then picked up this book subsequently. I will probably read Darwin's Children at some point, since it is lying around and because it really ought to cut to the chase, with the background already painted in with excessive attention to detail but I shall try to resist the urge to buy any more Bear novels regardless of how interesting the premise sounds...(less)

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Apr 12, 2010 Stef rated it 1 of 5 stars · review of another edition Recommends it for: No one

Shelves: geek-talk, investigative, law-medical, misc-creatures, science-fiction, fiction, awful, i-own-it, 1-star, read-2010, environmentalism, evolution, how-did-this-even-get-published, to-swap-for-something-better, bookcrossing

This review has been hidden because it contains spoilers. To view it, click here.

I did not enjoy this book in the slightest.

I probably should have seen it coming, what with the very first sentence of the very first chapter likening the color of the sky backdrop of the alps to 'a dog's pale crazy eye'. Even when, on the very next page, Bear described a frozen waterfall as 'a gnome's upside-down castle' I thought oh, this won't be so bad.

I was wrong. Dead wrong.

First, let's talk about geek talk. I'm a big fan of Michael Crichton, and as such I expect a book's geek talk to be...more

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Sep 21, 2008 Mina Villalobos rated it 3 of 5 stars

The first 200 pages or so of this book are incredibly engaging and interesting. I wasn't put off by the science talk, though there was too much of it -someone who truly understood it would probably find a lot of holes in it, and someone who didn't get it beyond the basics didn't really need to read so extensively about it- but after the first half, the book starts taking a plunge south. I stopped caring about the characters at some point in the middle, the female lead turning into quite a trope...more

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Sep 07, 2007 Dan rated it 4 of 5 stars Recommends it for: fans of hard science fiction

Shelves: sci-fi

Darwin’s Radio is a pleasure for someone who loves hard science fiction, as I do. Here’s the premise: SHEVA, a retrovirus long-buried in our genes, suddenly awakens and begins to attack pregnant women, forcing them to miscarry after three months. But that’s just the beginning – after the miscarriage, these same women spontaneously become pregnant again, this time developing a fetus that’s not quite human. The federal government, led by the science establishment, after first denying the truth, th...more

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Jul 28, 2008 Katie rated it 4 of 5 stars

I liked it. I started it as an audiobook for a long weekend drive up to Eugene and I liked it enough to check out the book and finish reading it once I got back-I thought about finishing it through the cds but that would have taken too long and I HAD to know what would happen. It's really like two books in one. The first part has lots of science and a slower pace, then the book starts to go down an entirely different and unexpected path, raising some interesting ethical issues along the way. The...more

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Dec 28, 2008 Lightreads rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shelves: fiction, science-fiction

A CDC disease chaser discovers a virus that seems to be asymptomatic in everyone but pregnant women, and mass graves in Georgia (the country) and a newly discovered family of forty thousand year old mummies suggest this isn’t the first outbreak. And our heroes -- that CDC disease hound, a successful biologist, and an anthropologist with questionable ethics -- begin to suspect it isn’t an outbreak at all.

Okay, so it’s not actually a ‘read a textbook instead’ science fiction book. I mean, the scie...more

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Nov 30, 2008 Tara rated it 4 of 5 stars

This book was fabulously engaging and well-orchestrated. Despite setting and character shifts at the end of every chapter, it was never difficult to track where on the timeline and geography of the novel I was. The scientific precepts of the book, while fantastic, are not unbelievable and deal with what the author calls subspeciation. The tenet of the book is that evolution is a force of its own - that the human genome gathers information and stores it in what we call 'junk' DNA [ha! biology! I...more This book was fabulously engaging and well-orchestrated. Despite setting and character shifts at the end of every chapter, it was never difficult to track where on the timeline and geography of the novel I was. The scientific precepts of the book, while fantastic, are not unbelievable and deal with what the author calls subspeciation. The tenet of the book is that evolution is a force of its own - that the human genome gathers information and stores it in what we call 'junk' DNA [ha! biology! I know this shit.], and when the species is threatened or overly stressed, certain genes activate to form hitherto unforseen proteins in the male body, which are communicated sexually to a female partner. Both partners then contract what is known as Herod's flu, and the eventual infant has 52 chromosomes [rather than the homo sapiens sapiens 46] - a new species, or subset of species, established in one generation, rather than the more-than-a-million years of trial-and-error Darwin originally proposed. The idea is that a) evolution is going on below the radar, we each carry not just our phenotype, but our own genetic R&D team; b) evolution is a two-person activity - men carry this flu and can communicate it only to steady female sexual partners; c) environmental stresses are experienced by humans as a species rather than strictly on the individual level, because of our social nature, thus programmed responses tend to take on a large base of action.
Bear balances his science and his socialization very nicely in this novel, and doesn't overreach on either front. While there were a few phases where I really wished I had paid more attention to the genetics unit, I understood the science overall, and never had trouble suspending my disbelief for it.
The only thing that bothered me at all about this book was the way Bear developed his female protagonist. Throughout the novel she's shown as brilliant and deductive, a scientist on the brink of earning a Nobel who is always well thought-out and deductive. She's charming and ambitious and her dialogue is both witty and measured. Then, inexplicably, she does the equivalent of a completely insane flipout in the context of the book. For the sake of plot, I won't say what, but man, it's ...an unorthodox choice. and she never thinks twice about it, or considers the consequences. her scientific characterization is totally abandoned in the face of 'omghormonesandLOVE!'. I understand doing some weird things over hormones, but never thinking about them or considering the ramifications of what you're doing? That's the part that usually makes you feel so crazy for doing it - that you have thought about the consequences, and do it anyway. At any rate, it kind of felt like "here's this brilliant and independent female role model who OH SHE FLIPPED HER SHIT. Must be That Time of the Month".(less)

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Apr 08, 2013 Jennifer rated it 5 of 5 stars

Shelves: sf, fiction, favorites

I loved this book. I can't remember exactly when I read it. Many years ago. But I loved it. It was the beginning of my love for Greg Bear. This is hard science fiction, which means it's going to either require or try to teach you some science principles and concepts as a basis for the plot, and this particular plot is all about evolution. Let's face it. This book would have had to really, really sucked to have lost me at this point. But there are a lot of interesting concepts here, speculations...more

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Dec 11, 2012 Hilary G rated it 2 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Ex Bookworm group review:

Well, I could tell right off that I wasn't going to end up thinking Greg Bear was a literary giant. I'm rarely impressed with writers who open with scenery or the weather and he opened with scenery AND the weather, plus a quiz called "Who Knows The Most Mountaineering Words" in which I stood no chance because he knows dozens and I only know about two or three (avalanche, glacier, er …). There were some very curious mad dog similes. Moving along, I learnt that Greg Bear i...more Ex Bookworm group review:

Well, I could tell right off that I wasn't going to end up thinking Greg Bear was a literary giant. I'm rarely impressed with writers who open with scenery or the weather and he opened with scenery AND the weather, plus a quiz called "Who Knows The Most Mountaineering Words" in which I stood no chance because he knows dozens and I only know about two or three (avalanche, glacier, er …). There were some very curious mad dog similes. Moving along, I learnt that Greg Bear is obsessed with rayon (must be an American thing) and – horror of horrors, there was an overstuffed couch!

I don't know how many adjectives and adverbs there are in the English language but he must have used at least half of them. He was compulsive about describing everyone in great detail even if they only had a bit part, but it must have been a replacement for character. I didn't think any of the characters were particularly plausible. I couldn't see Kaye Lang as the clever and conscientious scientist (Rosalind Franklin?) for she was too "Mills and Boon”.

I recognise this style of witing and I dub it "Bestselleresque. Mind you, Bear wasn't linguistically hopeless. After all, he knew LOTS more mountaineering words than me and I thought his scientific explanations were quite cogent (not that I'm a scientist, but that's the point, isn't it?) I thought it quite amusing that one of the cats was called Crickson, presumably after Crick and Watson. Curiously, the other was called Temin, which made me think of Tracy Emin, but I couldn't figure that. I thought his layman term for the new disease – Herod's Flu – was very good. OK so Herod only did for male children, but in a poll taken on Ealing High Street, I bet less than half the respondents would know that. "Darwin's Radio" was clever, if I didn't like anything else about the book, I'd think it was a terrific title.

What did I like about the book? Well – however it was told (Bestselleresque or whatever), it was a cracking story. I find evolution, genetics, the life sciences absolutely fascinating. Darwin is one of my heroes because he exemplifies scientists who don't just discover something, but force everyone else to "undiscover" what they thought they already knew (some, of course, haven't undiscovered the prior theory yet). I was enthralled by the TV dramatisation of the discovery of DNA and the beauty and mystery of the double helix. I was stunned by the map of the human genome. I am vaguely aware of links between things, networks, which pulsate with threats and promises, danger and potential. Retroviruses, resistance to antibiotics, phages, changes in biosystems and fertility patterns. Do I really understand any of it? Not a word, but I thought Bear made the information he presented accessible and plausible so that the reader felt informed rather than awestruck by his or her own ignorance. I thought the story was thrilling, exciting. A new disease (like SARS? like AIDS? like the constantly evolving and adapting FLU? Nature the bioterrorist), new knowledge, a new evolutionary step… and not at all as we had imagined. Time for Darwin and the rest of us to start undiscovering…. I thought Bear had his finger on the pulse of many things – the patenting of genes (what a scandal), the manipulation of the biotech companies, the massaging of information for public consumption. He was dead right that old groups, like the native American Indians, and new groups, like the sacrificial sect (whoever they were), would have their own take on events. Interesting to consider how it would fit in to Christianity, Islam, Buddhism, any religion you care to mention….. I was very moved by the part about the Neanderthal couple and their Homo Sapiens baby. This was the sole man/woman thing that wasn't Mills and Boon.

What didn't I like? Too many threads and not enough sense of the groping towards putting it all together and the eureka of doing so. Too much extraneous stuff. Kaye Lang's husband, Saul, what was he for? And Mitch's Tilde (or ex-Tilde), what was she for? Anybody qualified could have taken him up the mountain. Too many people, too many stories. The scientific story would have stood up well on its own without all the twiddly bits. And, feminists of the world unite in wrath against me, but I couldn't relate to both Kaye Lang, clever scientist headed for the Nobel Prize with Kaye Lang, long-suffering wife, playful lover and mother to a new species. That was Mills and Boon.

I would have liked to see the story handled more seriously. Remember the Ice People? Maggie Gee might have done a job of it. (Incidentally, she had a character called Saul as well, must be a particularly science fictiony name). I'd have liked Kaye Lang to be more like Rosalind Franklin and less like a cross between Diane Fossey and the Virgin Mary.

But as I said, it was a cracking story and a pretty fair attempt at telling it, scientifically speaking. The rest was just padding. I don't think I'll read the sequel, Darwin's Children, because I think it will be less science and more fiction. But I might. The arrival of a new species would be quite interesting, wouldn't it? A bit like the generation gap, but more so.

(less)

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Oct 20, 2012 Klytia rated it 3 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Spesso la domenica pomeriggio la tv trasmette quei film che io chiamo le "catastrofi della domenica": sono film, talvolta a basso costo, con una regia ignorante fatta di zoom compulsivi, cambi di inquadratura repentini e salti di scena con poco senso. L'intera razza umana è sempre minacciata da qualcosa, le persone sono una massa di ignoranti isterici; i politicanti ottusi per i quali la soluzione è spesso la legge marziale, con fucilate sulla folla e campi di concentramento, quando non la bomba...more

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Oct 16, 2012 Kerry rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: 2005, 9, ebooks, sf

This was the October SF Book of the Month for Beyond Reality. I'm the one who nominated, so I certainly needed to read it. After a number of false starts getting hold of it, I finally got a copy from the library (and then found out on Thursday night that a friend owns it and I could have borrowed it from him!)

I gave myself about a week to read it, knowing I'm running a bit slow right now. I was captured by it pretty much immediately and finished it in two days. (Which isn't a bad thing as it gi...more This was the October SF Book of the Month for Beyond Reality. I'm the one who nominated, so I certainly needed to read it. After a number of false starts getting hold of it, I finally got a copy from the library (and then found out on Thursday night that a friend owns it and I could have borrowed it from him!)

I gave myself about a week to read it, knowing I'm running a bit slow right now. I was captured by it pretty much immediately and finished it in two days. (Which isn't a bad thing as it gives me more time to read A Sundial in a Grave: 1610 which certainly is going more slowly.)

The basic premise is that this new disease show us, a kind of flu that affects pregnant women more than men and causes miscarriages. Even more strangely, women who miscarry tend to fall pregnant again swiftly, without needing more intercourse in between. While the CDC and others are trying desperately to stop the pandemic, a small group of people begin to wonder if this is a disease or something else. They believe this is an upgrade, a new step in evolution that has been triggered from instructions in human DNA at a time when it is most needed.

It was a bit depressing to discover how much trouble my brain had working with the science, especially since I did study at least a bit of microbiology at university level, even if I never worked in the field. Still, once I eased back a little and stopped worrying out it, the most important parts fell into place so that I could easily follow the story. For me, that seems to be the trick, let the scientific aspects seep into my head by osmosis rather than study it to the point I could try to sit an exam on the subject.

Bear tricked me on the roles of the main characters, as the one I expected to be the hero wasn't, and the one who looked like being something of an anti-hero turned out to be the hero after all. Bear has faced up to a range of issues, from human development to the idea of respect versus science with relation to digging up human bones, but he doesn't dwell on these too hard, instead letting the characters muse on the subject often without reaching any definite conclusion. Mostly, he focuses on telling the story and lets the reader get as involved or not as they choose in the issues it raises.

I found that the tone of the book - mostly the reaction of the general public - reminded me very much of John Wyndham's Trouble with Lichen, which was interesting, as the topic of the Wyndham novel is very different, but the more I consider it I find the themes to be quite similar. I may need to think about this a little more.

I'm glad there's a sequel that will look at what is different about the new generation of children and I've already got it from the library and need to fit it into my reading schedule.

I thoroughly enjoyed this - reading it when I really should have been resting because I needed to know what happened next - and gave it a 9/10.

[Copied across from Library Thing; 16 October 2012](less)

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Oct 12, 2012 Amber N rated it 5 of 5 stars

Shelves: owned

An interesting look at what might possibly be the next stage of evolution. Greg Bear's Hugo nominee is a wonderful mix of scientific and political thriller as well as a study of human reactions and relationships. Beautifully laid out and written in an interesting manner.

After I finished this book I sat back and thought, my god, I know all about viruses and diseases and retroviruses now. Greg Bear does not dumb down the science to make sure his audience gets it, instead he explains everything sev...more

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Sep 27, 2012 Joe rated it 2 of 5 stars

This sci-fi "thriller" never really worked for me. The basic premise -- there is a virus that allows the human genetic code to undergo a massive change to a higher lifeform -- provides a reasonable basis for the novel, but as a story it never comes together.

The details of the new virus slowly emerge, as more people become infected and scientists start to study it. Instead of building dramatically in the novel, it gets slowly dished out with enough hints as to where it is going that I started to...more

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Jul 29, 2012 Allan Dyen-shapiro rated it 4 of 5 stars

The author did an excellent job of talking to microbiologists, finding out what's truly interesting in microbiology, and then describing it accurately. And I was a microbiologist at one point in my life, so I know of what I speak. The author also recreated the enthusiasm of a rapid-fire conversation between scientists at several points in the book. He did a wonderful job of setting the context for his speculation, educating the lay reader on phage biology before making the leap of what an endoge...more The author did an excellent job of talking to microbiologists, finding out what's truly interesting in microbiology, and then describing it accurately. And I was a microbiologist at one point in my life, so I know of what I speak. The author also recreated the enthusiasm of a rapid-fire conversation between scientists at several points in the book. He did a wonderful job of setting the context for his speculation, educating the lay reader on phage biology before making the leap of what an endogenous retrovirus might do by analogy in humans.

That being said, his central speculation, that human endogenous retroviruses might have been responsible for major leaps in human evolution and may do so again, is almost undoubtedly wrong. However, this is science fiction. Bear creates a world in which that is plausible, and it really doesn't matter that this is not the world we live in.

He also gets the politics plausible most of the time. I've been in the midst of science politics, the leitmotif of conflicting pulls leading to chaos is dead on. He editorializes a bit--the religious are generally bad people whose ignorance causes riots, although, interestingly, he's a bit more nuanced with the Native American religious. The Republicans in Congress are bad, right-wing governors are bad, the military is bad, every paper pushing bureaucrat is bad. Perhaps, but that's not the way to humanize them and write in a nuanced fashion, but that wasn't the tale he was telling.

As good as the hard science fiction aspects, the out-there science speculation, and the Byzantine politics writing is, I don't like his characters. They act often in ways that don't seem like human beings, let alone scientists, would act. I should feel immense empathy for his protagonists, I should care about the romance, I should be terrified in their shoes worried about the world, but I don't.

This gets four stars because it's wonderful idea-driven science fiction. So wonderful that it carried the novel, and I enjoyed it through to the end. It's not character-driven fiction, although it could have been, and would have been stronger for it.(less)

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Oct 23, 2011 manuti rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Otro más leído casi del tirón. Además muy apropiado en los tiempos que corren de gripe A o porcina o nueva gripe. En este caso se llama gripe herodes, y ya os podéis imaginar el porqué.
Una novela que el Times colocó como la 2ª mejor entre las 10 novelas de ciencia-ficción de todos los tiempos. Para hacer la reseña he mirado varias críticas y la mayoría son buenas, y yo creo que se merece 4 estrellas, además me han entrado bastantes ganas de leer otra novela suya: Música en la sangre que creo que...more

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Aug 16, 2011 Daniel Guajardo rated it 2 of 5 stars

La encontré entre una pila de libros que me prestó mi padre hace algún tiempo y que tenía por olvidado. Con el gancho de ser ganadora del premio Nébula (dicen que es el equivalente al Óscar) y finalista del Hugo n el 2000, pues que me di a la lectura gustoso.

El libro es un thriller bstsellereco que llora por la miniserie. La historia es simple y a causa de esa simpleza, el autor arroja toda su capacidad de novelista sobre el lector y desborda con una cantidad abrumadora de spam.

Comienza presenta...more La encontré entre una pila de libros que me prestó mi padre hace algún tiempo y que tenía por olvidado. Con el gancho de ser ganadora del premio Nébula (dicen que es el equivalente al Óscar) y finalista del Hugo n el 2000, pues que me di a la lectura gustoso.

El libro es un thriller bstsellereco que llora por la miniserie. La historia es simple y a causa de esa simpleza, el autor arroja toda su capacidad de novelista sobre el lector y desborda con una cantidad abrumadora de spam.

Comienza presentando a un personaje, luego blabablá, quién amó a quién, pucha que hace frío, y un descubrimiento arqueológico sin precedentes. Luego otro personaje, más blablabá, política de países indoeuropeos, y un descubrimiento forense. Sigue oro personaje, mucho blablablá, y un descubrimiento científico. Y después… casi quinientas páginas de muuuuucho ripio, problemas conyugales, confabulaciones, dolores de un corazón torturado, derrepente una teoría, un atisbo de ciencia ficción, y luego flato tras flato de relleno hasta el desenlace.

Es un infierno de páginas de relleno. Personalmente me atosiga leer una novela donde el autor dedica muchas páginas para describir a un personaje secundario que se muere o que no es un aporte a la historia, los crea y los destruye con el único fin de llenar páginas. Tal vez esos personajes aporten con una pista, pero bien podría haberme ahorrado la lata. Y la historia no se mueve, luego de las primeras cien páginas que enganchan, van trescientas que adormecen y las últimas cien resucitan.

De las quinientas páginas que tiene mi versión de bolsillo, la historia bien podada habría dado para doscientas hojas de puro filete, con personajes robustos y un contexto verosímil. Pero como decía mi abuelita (todavía dice), el que mucho abarca poco aprieta.

Sinopsis (SPOILER): Diversos descubrimientos científicos apuntan a que un antiguo virus escondido en el propio genoma humano, estaría produciendo abortos de fetos monstruosos. Estos fetos, se descubre después, son sólo un intermediario (capaz de producir un óvulo fecundado) entre la madre y el segundo embarazo sin concepción que sucede inmediatamente al aborto. Las autoridades enloquecen, algunos científicos anuncian que los niños que nazcan traerán un virus mortal, cosa que no se prueba pero que genera alarma pública. Y otros científicos más sensatos, entre ellos la mujer que descubrió el virus y que está embarazada de esta criatura, comprenden que se trata de un salto evolutivo con precedentes (de los simios a los neandertal y de ellos al homo sapiens) y deciden escapar.

Para un tipo de gustos complejos como yo que no gusta de perder el tiempo con aserrín literario, resultó un libro aburridídimo. Y NO LEERÉ LA SECUELA.(less)

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Jun 25, 2011 Fred Warren rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: science-fiction

Disgraced archaeologist Mitch Rafelson follows a pair of relic hunters across a glacier to a cave in the Alps that contains an impossible secret.

Biologist Kaye Lang investigates a mass grave near Geordi, in the former Soviet republic of Georgia, and makes a startling discovery.

Officials at the CDC struggle to comprehend a strange new disease killing expectant mothers and their babies.

Three events more intimately related than anyone might imagine. Something is rewriting our genetic blueprint, and...more

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Mar 22, 2011 Paul (formerly known as Current) rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shelves: 2011

Beautiful, brilliant, and conveniently well-off scientist is able to move from the realm of science into that of parenthood successfully surviving suburban unrest fueled by fear and religion and circumventing the worst aspects of totalitarianism. Other characters, rather lost in the background.

An enjoyable story, strongly driven by the social effects of a new virus on the US (and in an adhoc manner, the rest of the world)--this story skirts around the edge of many "outbreak" stories providing a...more

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Jan 12, 2011 Lis Carey rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: f-sf

Young women are getting a virus, which causes them, if they are pregnant, to miscarry. But then they get pregnant again--without sex. Immaculate conception, apparently. Meanwhile, an investigator for the Centers for Disease Control, looking for a disease scary enough to preserve CDC's funding so that it will survive to fight the next big threat, finds evidence of strange massacres that have occurred in different parts of the world over the last fifty years: massacres of pregnant women and their...more

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Jan 08, 2011 Jason rated it 4 of 5 stars Recommends it for: Hardcore Science Fiction readers

A very detailed and hard Science fiction book especially in the first half. Very engaging story line and a interesting look into evolution and the social implications of what could happen in today's time if there was a new take on the human race. As good as the science fiction part of the book was written I found myself wanting more on the social implications and how the government responded to the crisis. How far would any government go to protect the existing human race to the potential threat...more

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Aug 13, 2010 Julia rated it 1 of 5 stars

Shelves: science-fiction

This review has been hidden because it contains spoilers. To view it, click here.

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Jun 10, 2010 Jeff rated it 4 of 5 stars Recommends it for: fans of soft science fiction; medical thrillers; gov't cover up stories

Recommended to Jeff by: James Gunn's 2010 CFSF Summer Intensive

Shelves: science-fiction

There had never been any physical evidence found of how speciation occurred in the human race. Had Neandertals slowly evolved over millennia into Homo Sapiens Sapiens or had evolution jumped directly to the next step in one generation?

Now actual physical evidence had been found in an ice cave in a remote section of the Swiss Alps. That evidence would not only prove that evolution could and would, in stressful times, give birth to the next evolutionary stage but would also give modern humanity th...more

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Nov 13, 2009 Tom rated it 4 of 5 stars

A mass grave in Russia that conceals the mummified remains of two women, both with child--and the conspiracy to keep it secret . . . a major discovery high in the Alps: the preserved bodies of a prehistoric family--the newborn infant possessing disturbing characteristics . . . a mysterious disease that strikes only pregnant women, resulting in miscarriage. Three disparate facts that will converge into one science-shattering truth.

Molecular biologist Kaye Lang, a specialist in retroviruses, belie...more

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Sep 12, 2009 Patrick Gibson rated it 2 of 5 stars

Shelves: science-fiction, lasciate-ogne-speranza-voi-ch-intra

There is a significant amount of science revolving around evolution, genetics, virology, and mutation. Bear crafts a magnificent story about these subjects as they apply to the mass population and how we as humans might react to biological issues. What would humans do if the homo sapiens species was threatened? What kind of politics would unfold in the local and national level? These are some of the most important issues that Bear addresses and chronicles. It is interesting to read about the har...more

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Jun 17, 2009 Ceridwen rated it 2 of 5 stars Recommends it for: mid-level bureaucrats

Recommended to Ceridwen by: Richard

Shelves: abandoned, omg-were-all-going-to-die, sci-fi, stolen-from-richard

I started this one, because the actual book I'm reading is too hard to read when I'm sleepy. So I'm kind of cheating on my actual book, but it's okay, because I still really love it, I'm just looking for something dumb but pretty that won't ask me too many questions. Richard recommended this to me because he knows I'm a sucker for plague narratives. So I start in, and the book is written is in that SF style that's this odd mixture of perfunctory yet florid. The absolute pinnacle of this sort of...more I started this one, because the actual book I'm reading is too hard to read when I'm sleepy. So I'm kind of cheating on my actual book, but it's okay, because I still really love it, I'm just looking for something dumb but pretty that won't ask me too many questions. Richard recommended this to me because he knows I'm a sucker for plague narratives. So I start in, and the book is written is in that SF style that's this odd mixture of perfunctory yet florid. The absolute pinnacle of this sort of prose can be found in anything written by Kevin J Anderson. And when I say pinnacle, I mean that he's the absolute freaking worst, and it makes my eyes bleed big sad drops of blood and hatred just to think about it. Man, I need a tissue.

There, all better. I don't want to say that this is anywhere near as bad as Mr. Anderson's hackery, because it's not. But it's got that third-person, shifting back and forth between points of view thing that you know will snick up into a big conference of meaning or something, and sometimes I just can't bring myself to wade through it to the payoff. So, Richard and I are driving back from the grocery store, and I'm asking him if I should finish reading it, or if I should just go out and read the other book on hold at the library that's been buying me drinks and giving me that look. Eventually, he asks if I just want the synopsis, and then I can decide if I want to experience it for myself.

Richard then gives me a synopsis so funny I nearly drive into oncoming traffic I'm laughing so hard. I can see the oncoming traffic people thinking, “Chicks in minivans, man, who lets them drive?” I wish I could recount the synopsis in full, but I can't. According to Richard the “action” of the book consisted of such scintillating events as: first, they formulate a hypothesis! Then they take tissue samples! The samples are then mailed in for testing at the CDC! Finally, after several weeks of waiting, taking more samples and discussing hypotheses, the results come in and THEIR SUSPICIONS ARE CONFIRMED! Can you believe this? It's the ripping world of mid-level bureaucrats doing field work! Quick, somebody organize a conference! Maybe a continental breakfast will be involved!

Poor hard SF, because the working of science, at least when it comes to disease research, is horribly boring. The trouble is if you dispense with actual science, in plague fiction, and make the hunt for the cure something stupid like finding one monkey that's befriended a tow-headed moppet, a la Outbreak, then everyone cries foul and points out that actual science doesn't work that way at all. Because science is almost always done by mid-level bureaucrats who worry about funding and seniority, and spend countless hours trying to craft a double-blind study that runs for 9-18 months, then the numbers are crunched, samples are sent off to the lab, and the paper gets published, and a bunch of wankers who don't know boo about anything point out that your control group had a disproportionate number of people who play cricket or the wage-disparity thing, and that dickweed at the AP soundbit your comments to make it look like you claimed you cured baldness, and now you have to do another study, which is fine, because that's how science works.

Rollicking, right? I mean, here, right now, in the world, there are ongoing epidemics of very, very awful diseases going on at all times, and if they're not called “swine flu” or “SARS” nobody gives a crap. Or plenty of people give a crap, but for the cure for AIDS isn't going to happen with some lunatic shouting Eureka! and injecting himself with whatever magical potion, and proving to us all that he was Right All Along, but we, in our hubris, Just Wouldn't Listen. I'm sure there will be a double-blind study in there somewhere, or two, and certainly hours upon hours writing grants. This isn't even getting into the exciting world of resource allocation when it comes to preventing ongoing outbreaks, like wrangling for funding for mosquito nets or fighting about condom use and clean needles. Boy, I bet the funding requests to WHO read like a bestseller, I tell you what.

I'm now reviewing the synopsis of a book given to me for comic effect, but whatever. Sounds like Bear decided not to go for the whole monkey-eureka thing, but instead went for the true-to-science thing, which is bold choice, I must say. Go hard SF! Mid-level bureaucrats race to get the samples back, by which I mean wait a month, the samples confirm their suspicions, they get in a pissing contest with the head of the CDC, and politicians ignore their findings, because that's was politicians do. It sounds like there's some silliness with Indian reservations and people rioting, but I wouldn't actually know anything about that, because I didn't read to the end.

Sadly, I think Richard was trying to get me to finish this book, but the attempt backfired. I think I'm now going to slink off to the pages of the other illicit book I have on hold at the library. (less)

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Aug 16, 2012 Melanie rated it 1 of 5 stars

Shelves: science-fiction-fantasy

I'm about half way through and I really wonder if I can continue. This is one of the worst books I've read in a long, long time. It's not that the writing is so terrible, it's that the author either has no idea how evolution works or he just doesn't care. The book is science fiction and one of the tenants of science fiction is that it must at least be possible. It must not break the known laws of the universe. Apparently Mr. Bear is not aware of those laws or he just doesn't care. Evolution is b...more

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Mar 06, 2011 Kathy Bell rated it 3 of 5 stars

Actually 3.5, were that possible on GoodReads.

I really enjoy science fiction with lots of science, and especially evolutionary concepts, so this book appealed to me immensely in theory. In practice, I found myself skipping huge amounts of text so I could move the plot along. The science behind the concept was intriguing and well developed, but the rest of the story dragged on longer than I thought necessary. For those who like their scifi with indepth descriptions of every character and their ev...more

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Dec 25, 2009 Kim rated it 4 of 5 stars

This might be the most engaging sci-fi book I've read in months or possibly years.

Although I had to fight my inclination to edit the book as I read (lots of extraneous details that hinder rather than help, and some clunky habits), the story was compelling enough to keep me reading at a rapid clip.

In present-day end-of-the-millennium, a massive challenge to the accepted theory of gradual evolution threatens the entire human population's ability to understand itself. Bear's managing to take such a...more

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Aug 06, 2012 Scott rated it 4 of 5 stars

I really enjoyed the premise and execution of this story. A leap of evolution takes place in many humans in the form of a virus that is unleashed when ancient human bodies are found in the ice. It kills many of earth's children at birth, but the ones who survive evolve rapidly to have new powers and abilities far beyond "normal" humans. Fascinating idea.

Greg Bear is excellent at using hard science to create his unique brand of science fiction, and this is one of his better books (along with the...more

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