Blood Music

Nov 14, 2011 karen rated it 3 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: the-end

(dude, you seriously want an audio version of this??)

so i read this because bird-brian told me to.

i don't know that i am the best person to review sci-fi books. i have zero background in the genre, but for whatever reason, brian thought it would be amusing if i reviewed this.

so i will try.

soooo - okay - quick plot for you plotty folks out there - genius bad boy scientist gets fired from job for meddling with mammalian cells and conducting experiments outside of his job description. before he...more

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Apr 21, 2011 Paul rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: sf-novels-aaargh

FRANKENSCIENCE AND MIRTH

In Greg Bear's funny and creepy and REALLY insane story, the rogue scientist invents a virus which... goes viral. Well, what did he expect? That it would stay where he told it and just watch tv? It develops intelligence. Learns the art of conversation. Says stuff like

WORDS communicate with *share body structure external* is this like *wholeness WITHIN* *totality* is EXTERNAL alike COULD DO WITH A BEER

No, sorry, I added the last bit. Anyway, the virus eats New York which t...more

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Aug 21, 2007 Lasairfiona Smith rated it 1 of 5 stars · review of another edition Recommends it for: Those that love horrible writing. I mean bad.

Shelves: dontbother

I can't decide: should I burn this book because it is the most horrible piece of trash I have ever read or should I frame it?

Why is this book so horrible? It is because the concept is so _cool_. I couldn't put it down because it is just neat that a virus could become sentient! There is also some cool (though completely bogus) science and theory on observations of time. The only character worth caring about is the virus!

But I had to wade through bad sentence structure, useless characters that you...more

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Feb 14, 2012 David Nichols rated it 2 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Unfortunately, this book does not improve the short story upon which it is based; the main characters are either unsympathetic or two-dimensional, and Bear doesn't provide more than a glimpse of the world created by the Blood Musicians (so to speak). Also, the book's title just doesn't work with the "In My Pants" game.

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Mar 13, 2011 Peter added it · review of another edition

Eerie.: With an apocalyptic vision at its heart, Blood Music is escapist reading with high drama, though its excitement has been somewhat muted by time and the magnitude of the real events which have transpired since its publication in 1985. Here a genetic experiment goes awry, and the whole world is endangered. .

Though only seventeen years have passed since its publication, the book feels old--eerily so. Gene therapy is now a reality. The Soviet Union, which here rattles its nuclear sabers in a

...more

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May 17, 2013 Nathaniel Morgan rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

I read the short story when I was in my teens and adored it even though I found it absolutely terrifying. The novel takes the basic premise and extends it hugely, adding new depth and making it a bit more metaphysical. It's one of the best science fiction books I've read in years and has the same headache inducing mind-bending scope as Olaf Stapleton's Starmaker, even though it's confined solely to our earth and set in modern times.

The story concerns the accidental creation of sentient bacteria...more

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Nov 11, 2012 Kevin Rubin rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

"Blood Music" was a great sci-fi novel. I'd seen it around for years, but never gotten to picking it up and reading it.

It begins with a genetic research scientist, Vergil Ulam, and his personal research done at the lab where he works. He's brilliant, but not entirely ethical, although he doesn't see it that way, he feels he's entitled to what he does, for instance, he sees no problem hacking into a university's computer to fake his academic record, because he knows he's capable of the job he's d...more

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Jul 25, 2012 Jeff L rated it 3 of 5 stars · review of another edition

A researcher at a biotech company recodes intron sequences and releases intelligent cells that begin replicating on their own.

At one level the book trots out the usual mad scientist and runaway technology storyline. Bear knows this as he has a scene in the early going similar to the ,em>Bicycle Thief where the director teases the audience into thinking the bicycle is about to be stolen only to casually back away. Bear's scientist, faced with having to destroy his engineered cells, is trying t...more

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Jul 26, 2011 Nicholas Barone rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Usually, I am not a fan of the results of taking good short stories/novellas and making novels out of them. This is part of the reason it has taken me so long to get around to reading Greg Bear's Blood Music, based off of the award winning short story of the same name. Bear does not simply flesh out and pad his excellent short story (in which a young biochemical researcher develops a way to make blood cells intelligent, and then when his employers demand he destroy his work, decides to preserve...more

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May 05, 2010 Christina rated it 1 of 5 stars · review of another edition

This novel really irked me, for several reasons. I think my primary complaint is in the characters - they were undeveloped, unrealistic, and clearly vessels for the science and story rather than dynamic individuals. I didn't care about any of them, except for maybe the intelligent cells themselves.

It didn't help that the plot was slow-moving and required a lot of suspension of disbelief. I don't know enough about hard science to judge the likelihood of any of this novel's events, but from a laym...more

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Sep 03, 2009 Patrick Gibson rated it 3 of 5 stars · review of another edition

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

Not excellent--but not bad. Blood Music is the story of a brilliant but troubled and careless scientist named Vergil Ulam, who accidentally creates cells capable of high-speed learning and intelligent growth. The cells teach themselves to evolve and remember, and adapt their environment. They are an intelligent species, and Vergil loves them, calling them noocytes. Until his work is uncovered and shut down. Knowing the immeasurable value of, and acting on personal love for, his cells, he injects...more Not excellent--but not bad. Blood Music is the story of a brilliant but troubled and careless scientist named Vergil Ulam, who accidentally creates cells capable of high-speed learning and intelligent growth. The cells teach themselves to evolve and remember, and adapt their environment. They are an intelligent species, and Vergil loves them, calling them noocytes. Until his work is uncovered and shut down. Knowing the immeasurable value of, and acting on personal love for, his cells, he injects them into his own bloodstream, with the hope of being re-hired elsewhere, where they can be removed and studied. Before he can, however, Vergil starts to slowly change (well, of course!). His eyesight, health, and even sex life improves. Then his body starts to change. The noocytes have studied and begun adapting their host's body. And they have learned of the outside world. In a matter of weeks, an intelligent plague sweeps across North America, entering and assimilating humanity, changing the very landscape, terraforming the body and all living things around it into something profoundly alien and new. How do you stop an intelligent plague? But the noocytes have a plan of their own, and the Universe at its most fundamental will be affected by it. This has on of the most exalting, dazzling endings to any science fiction novel I have ever read. The story itself is immensely powerful, and a chance for Bear to point out the ridiculousness of our current opinion of the body's cells, and the quality of elan (explained in the book: the body is worth, and has power equal to, ten trillion of its component parts: its cells) that supposedly rules them. As said in the introduction, "Which of our generations will come to disagree?" The short story that was the novel's basis won, quite deservedly, the Hugo Award for Best Science Fiction Short Story of the Year. As always, Greg Bear's characterizations, especially of Vergil Ulam, are moving and haunting, showing the human side of the next step of Man. The premise of the story is a stimulating, fascinating one, the writing is elegant, the character's shine, and the science is indefatigable. But the premise of the story is one that immediately wounds character continuity; the story leaps from well-written character to well-written character, but there is no feeling of the interconnectedness of their individual situations, although the epic weight of what is occurring is continuously palpable. The story is told from the character's-eye-view except at the very beginning and end, and so, can seem to jump and start occasionally, but the beauty of Blood Music, and the essential triumph of the spirit that ends it, is no less poignant and exalting. The premise is fascinating and legitimate, the writing polished, the characters moving. Some scenes lend themselves to special effects that would be absolutely thrilling on the big screen, the story carries all the poignancy of a plague-type story such as Outbreak. It asks very fundamental questions of what we see as reality.(less)

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Aug 07, 2012 Scott rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

This is the first book I read by Greg Bear and, after reading several of his books over the years, this one still stands among his best. What I loved about this story was the science and biology of it. As we venture into the world of quantum physics, nanotechnology and cybernetic implants, a variant of this story starts to become more and more plausible.

The concept of this book is that nanobots are injected into humans to fight illness and disease, but soon the nanobots become self-aware and see...more

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Oct 07, 2010 Roger Loran Bailey rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

This is really a pretty fascinating book. It could be classified as a science fiction thriller with the kind of excitement that makes you keep wanting to turn the next page to see what happens next even if you do have responsibilities that must be attended.
A biotech scientist does some bioengineering on his own lymphocytes and somehow endows them with high intelligence. Yes, they are individual cells that are each and every one self aware and conscious. When he injects them back into himself th...more This is really a pretty fascinating book. It could be classified as a science fiction thriller with the kind of excitement that makes you keep wanting to turn the next page to see what happens next even if you do have responsibilities that must be attended.
A biotech scientist does some bioengineering on his own lymphocytes and somehow endows them with high intelligence. Yes, they are individual cells that are each and every one self aware and conscious. When he injects them back into himself they set up a civilization in his body. Imagine many many millions of fully conscious intelligent creatures in a person's body communicating with one another and sharing what they learn. Well, it doesn't take long until they start performing a bit of bioengineering of their own on the scientist's body. Then when they migrate out of his body and start colonizing the surrounding world the real fun starts. They reproduce until they number about a trillion billion individuals. The two small words trillion billion represent a number that is actually hard, if not impossible, to grasp, but imagine that many many individual intelligences communicating and collaborating with each other and imagine them being curious about the nature of the universe around them. I suppose you can guess that humanity is left in the dust. The word dust can be read as perhaps a bit more than metaphorical too. It is unfortunate that Greg Bear was unable to convey what their motives become and what they are up to, but, really, could any writer do that? He is good, though, at conveying the utter strangeness that us mere human intelligences would make of what they would do. Try this book out. The implications are amazing.
I will add, though, that the book is a little outdated. At the time of the writing there was a lot of concern in the news about the supposed dangers of bioengineering and I am sure that Bear had that in mind while he was writing. If he was writing it now he would probably make his lymphocytes nanobots instead. Also, the World Trade Center plays a prominent role in the story. Well, I'm sure you know what happened to that. However, don't let its age disuade you from reading this page turner.(less)

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Jan 11, 2013 Arax Miltiadous rated it 3 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Recommended to Arax by: Elena emmanouil

Περίεργο βιβλίο.. Θεωρείτε σκληρή Ε.Φ από μερικούς..
Εγώ πάλι βρέθηκα αντιμέτωπη με ένα αρκετά πρωτότυπο σενάριο που με έκανε να συλλογιστώ το παράδειγμα του Αϊνστάιν καθώς και κάθε ιδιοφυΐας, να συνειδητοποιήσω για άλλη μια φορά - μέσα από την ιστορία του βιβλίου- πόσο αχρείαστο και περιοριστικό είναι στην διάνοια το ανθρωπινό σώμα. Πως όταν και αν ο άνθρωπος καταφέρει να σπάσει τους περιορισμούς της αντίληψης και αποκτήσει πρόσβαση πέραν του δεδομένου 8% του μυαλού και της νοημοσύνης του, αντιλ...more Περίεργο βιβλίο.. Θεωρείτε σκληρή Ε.Φ από μερικούς..
Εγώ πάλι βρέθηκα αντιμέτωπη με ένα αρκετά πρωτότυπο σενάριο που με έκανε να συλλογιστώ το παράδειγμα του Αϊνστάιν καθώς και κάθε ιδιοφυΐας, να συνειδητοποιήσω για άλλη μια φορά - μέσα από την ιστορία του βιβλίου- πόσο αχρείαστο και περιοριστικό είναι στην διάνοια το ανθρωπινό σώμα. Πως όταν και αν ο άνθρωπος καταφέρει να σπάσει τους περιορισμούς της αντίληψης και αποκτήσει πρόσβαση πέραν του δεδομένου 8% του μυαλού και της νοημοσύνης του, αντιλαμβάνεται την ολότητα του εαυτού του με το σύμπαν.. και την ανάλογη μικροπρέπεια του "εγώ" του, έναντι του - για να μην πω την ψευδαίσθηση. Αυτό που απορρόφησα πέραν του σεναρίου, είναι ο εξαιρετικά καλογραμμένος και αξιοποιημένος λόγος και μια προσπάθεια εύστοχων Περιγραφών που πάραυτα... υστερούν λίγο. Δηλαδή σαν - χωρίς να ξέρω σίγουρα, απλά εικάζω πως- ο συγγραφέας συνέλαβε την ιδέα και όλες τις τεχνικές της εξειδικευμένες λεπτομέρειες μα υστερούσε φαντασίας και καλλιτεχνικής λεπτομέρειας στις περιγραφές αυτού του ασύλληπτα όμορφου που προσπαθούσε να μας μεταφέρει.
Βρήκα τον χαρακτήρα της Σούζι λίγο άσχετο, δηλαδή ποια η χρησιμότητα της στο όλο σενάριο? Ο Βίρτζιλ πάλι, που ήταν και ο δημιουργός, ατελή και ελλειπτικό ενώ των άλλων τριών διασωθέντων - της μητέρας του Βίρτζιλ και των διδύμων εντελώς περιττούς.
Φυσικά όλα αυτά είναι λεπτομέρειες από ερωτήματα που δεν απαντήθηκαν, Ο χαρακτήρας του Μπέρναρντ ισοσταθμίζει και με το παραπάνω... Όπως και η περιγραφές των Νοοκυττάρων. Δεν ξέρω τι να σας προτείνω, είναι βιβλίο ιδιόρρυθμο. Μου άρεσε, αν και δεν ξέρω αν θα αρέσει και σε...σας! :) (less)

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Feb 24, 2012 Neal Asher rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

As expected I did very much enjoy this. I love the idea of transformations like the ones in this (telegraphed right from the start) and wasn't disappointed with them. The book went from a bit of genetic manipulation to quantum mechanics and rewriting the laws of physics, with an interesting spin on how those laws are formed. It also dealt with immortality, and I'm a sucker for that. One teensy little problem, however. This book suffers from what I'll call 'the slide rule effect'. Some of the old...more

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Aug 07, 2012 Bill added it · review of another edition

I actually read this book when it was originally published in 1985, and was reminded of it last week by an article in a boingboing.com series called "enthralling books." I remembered that I had loved it back then, but could only remember the barest central premise, and had lost most of the details of the story, so I decided to give it another go. Luckily, I still have the copy I bought from the Science Fiction Book Club!

The story opens with misfit scientist Vergil Ulam conducting secret experime...more I actually read this book when it was originally published in 1985, and was reminded of it last week by an article in a boingboing.com series called "enthralling books." I remembered that I had loved it back then, but could only remember the barest central premise, and had lost most of the details of the story, so I decided to give it another go. Luckily, I still have the copy I bought from the Science Fiction Book Club!

The story opens with misfit scientist Vergil Ulam conducting secret experiments at the Genetron research labs in La Jolla. He's been busted before, but when he approaches the brilliant and internationally respected scientist, Michael Bernard, under the mistaken impression that he has arrived at Genteron in response to the message Vergil sent him regarding his personal research, he is finally dismissed from the lab. In desperation, he injects the experimental cells he'd been working with into his bloodstream in order to smuggle them out. Unfortunately, he needs to find a lab environment somewhere to continue his research, but his job search is less than fruitful. As a result, he's unable for several weeks to remove the cells, which he believes have gained a measure of intelligence from his experiments, from his system. Based on the changes in his body, his general health, and his brain activity, it appears that the intelligent cells are somehow transforming him. He involves his longtime doctor friend, Edward Milligan, by asking him to run a series of tests, the results of which are alarming.

From this point, the story becomes more and more bizarre as this new life form spreads and transforms pretty much everything on the continent. When the microscopic intelligences learn to communicate with their hosts and learn about humans and the world, both entities have much to gain by cooperating in the transformation of life as we know it.

The novel is compared in the dust cover notes to such classics as Clarke's Childhood's End and Sturgeon's More Than Human, and I cannot argue. Like both these masterpieces (two more of my favorites, by the way,) this story is all about growth and transformation, and where the human race is going next.(less)

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Jan 09, 2012 Karin rated it 2 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: science-fiction, creepy, dystopia, post-apocalyptic, transhumanity, hugo-nominee

This review has been hidden because it contains spoilers. To view it, click here. I am having a hard time describing this book, so bear with me. You know that place where an author takes a left turn into crazy-town? It's an easy place to get to and a difficult place to do well. I, personally, prefer when an author takes us to The Land Beyond Reason, also known as Pure Imagination and a suburb of Science Fiction, slowly, so slowly that it feels like a logical progression. This book is not like that. It takes a hard left to crazy-town about a third of the way through when our u...more I am having a hard time describing this book, so bear with me. You know that place where an author takes a left turn into crazy-town? It's an easy place to get to and a difficult place to do well. I, personally, prefer when an author takes us to The Land Beyond Reason, also known as Pure Imagination and a suburb of Science Fiction, slowly, so slowly that it feels like a logical progression. This book is not like that. It takes a hard left to crazy-town about a third of the way through when our unlikeable Protagonist 1 (Virgil) is murdered by his dull friend who is just trying to save the world (sortof).

Protagonist 1 was playing around in the lab and made intelligent cells. He injected himself with them. They proceeded to transform him and, being trillions of intelligent beings with little concept of the scale on which we live, explore the world by getting in the water and being generally unavoidably contagious. Fairly quickly all of North America has succumbed to noocytes and is a wasteland except for 20 or so people who for some reason (even though they had surely destroyed millions of similar people without such reservations) had kept alive until they had learned to work with these people's unusual biochemistry. We follow four of these people. We also follow Bernard, Protagonist 2, who flew off to Europe to have himself quarantined and who is transitioning very slowly. It turns out that the noocytes don't kill everyone. Once they had learned how, they actually assimilate those people who become noocytes.

There is also another hard left when the noocytes turn North America into some sort of huge biomass and another when they stop nuclear bombs from going off by distorting the rules of the universe temporarily (did I mention that so many information processing beings so densely located are able to affect the very fabric of the universe?) and _another_ when the noocytes transition to existing on a quantum level and _*another*_ when having the noocytes on a quantum level is threatening to rip the earth apart and BAM! the book ends.

Speaking of the book ending, when you exist on a purely informational level one of the millions of copies of you will spend time a sort of thought holodeck where you will redo your regrets in macro-life.

After reading this book I was mostly left saying, "huh? Why did I just read this?" It gets two stars instead of one because had I known the nature of the book I would have not read it at all, but knowing the nature of the book I can understand why other people would want to read it.(less)

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Aug 07, 2011 Tera Nikolaos added it · review of another edition

Excellent work of cyberpunk / sci-fi. I didn't realise until after I'd finished reading that this book was written in the mid 80's - it's 'near future' style felt just as ominous to me today as it may have felt 20 years ago (though this may be due to my only very basic understanding of the science involved).

Very movie-like narrative, having just watched Stephen King's 'The Mist' the day before starting to read this, I could easily envision this as a film. The language used when describing landsc...more

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Feb 04, 2012 Frank rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: science-fiction

I thought this was a very good apocalyptic novel with a large helping of science thrown in. This novel was originally published in 1985 and in some ways it was very prophetic although somewhat dated. It's the story of a genetic experiment gone wrong resulting in the end of the world as we know it. The book was sometimes quite eerie to me, especially the scenes taking place in an empty New York City and a devastated World Trade Center with images very reminiscent of 9/11 including the collapse of...more

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Nov 15, 2011 06MirandaH rated it 3 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Meh. I figured I'd read it because of the shiny stuff on the cover. Part of the book was cool, and I couldn't wait to find out what happened, and others less so. I wasn't fond of this book, because it felt like a short story blown into a regular story. The ending disappointed me, and I was pissed because all the main characters kept dying. Seriously. I'd learn to begrudgingly tolerate one character, and then 12 pages later they would be dead. Whoop-de-doop. But it's not the worst book I've ever...more

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Apr 17, 2011 Don rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: sf

Great, great story which has an incredible premise at its heart - that genetic engineering might produce intelligence in body cells. Bear develops this speculation very credibly, with the science of microbiology weaving an account of RNA proteins and chemcial changes being the basis for conveying information between the trillions of lymphocytes that course through our bloodstreams.

The emergence of the new intelligent life form assumes the form of a catestrophic plague, sweeping across North Amer...more

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Mar 09, 2009 Alexandra rated it 1 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Blood Music starts out so well that I had high hopes of it being a thoroughly riveting read...sadly, however, it quickly devolved into my going 'wtf?'

This is clearly a case of a short story having been stretched way too thin and spun into a dreadful novel, with the excellent concept coming at the start, and then? Less than half way through the initial story stops and is supplanted by a whole other story and set of characters that, well, quite frankly have little if nothing to do with how this o...more

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May 14, 2013 Travis rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

This novel was suggested to me by a sadistic prick who I thought was my friend. Turns out he wanted to see if the concept would bother me. Joke's on him. Loved the book. The story itself was original and unlike anything I'd read before. The concept of a man-made apocalypse where the end of the human race comes in the form of an intelligent virus that ultimately rebuilds the likes of humanity is so far out of the box it's no wonder many light readers are thrown into abysmal attacks on sentence st...more

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Mar 04, 2012 Kevin Beale rated it 3 of 5 stars · review of another edition

This was the first biopunk sci-fi book I've read, so I have to say I was a little disappointed that what little biology did crop up was pretty simplistic (in some cases flat-out wrong) and served mostly as just an initial premise. The writing wasn't that great either, but I tend to give sci-fi books a little leeway when it comes to literary quality and value them moreso on the novelty of their ideas. In that regard the book did fairly well by my standards -- it made me think a lot about biologic...more

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Feb 27, 2012 Chris rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: science-fiction

The book starts with Vergil I. Ulam, a whiz-kid scientist working for a California-based technology firm. The company’s developing biochips, human-computer interfaces that meld within the body to perform medical research and treatment—medical nanotech. But this amazing line of developments doesn’t interest Vergil; he’s floating on by phoning in his genius intellect. In the meantime he’s using the firm’s lab to do his own research: providing human cells with the capacity for sentience and memory....more The book starts with Vergil I. Ulam, a whiz-kid scientist working for a California-based technology firm. The company’s developing biochips, human-computer interfaces that meld within the body to perform medical research and treatment—medical nanotech. But this amazing line of developments doesn’t interest Vergil; he’s floating on by phoning in his genius intellect. In the meantime he’s using the firm’s lab to do his own research: providing human cells with the capacity for sentience and memory.

When the company finds out and orders him to get rid of it all, injects himself with his test subjects in order to keep the experiment going. The cells then start changing him, fixing him, learning and growing… creating the music that pulses within his blood. Things get out of control—or begin a chain of rapid human evolution, depending on your point of view. I’m torn between reading it as the evolutionary transcendence of humanity and a living plague of thinking cells, because Bear pitches both of the ideas more-or-less as equals.

The second section is a edge-of-your-seat techno-thriller as it dawns on the world what Vergil’s done: he created a living, thinking plague, which begins to assimilate North America into a collective consciousness and reform the landscape. One of Vergil’s bosses, Michael Bernard, becomes the centerpiece: he’s infected, but flees to a clean room, and continues to study himself and communicate with his cells. Apocalyptic, fast-moving, still lots of good hard science… it’s damn good, and worthy of a Hugo. The action heats up, things spiral out of control, the Soviets make an appearance and I was hard pressed to stop reading. My only criticism here is that it recaps some of the first section early on. When I get a recap of what happened ten-twelve pages ago, the first act feels even more like tacked on scaffolding.

The third section slows down, expanding the cast of characters into survivors of the bio-plague. (It’s as if Bear recoiled from creating something so epic in scale, and toned it down to become more manageable.) The novel moves away from Cold War politics and the rapid buildup of fear and action, becoming more subdued and cerebral. Most of this act follows a young girl wandering an abandoned Manhattan, taking up residence in an empty World Trade Center, and a pair of country bumpkins who run into Vergil’s (remember him?) mother. While the empty Manhattan is haunting, and Bernard’s exploratory dialogue with his cells is fascinating, the plotlines feel (again) tacked on: we didn’t meet half these characters before, and have little vested interest or knowledge.

I have to say, all criticism aside, this was an amazing book. The ides behind it curdle my blood (har): you can’t defend against cells, and there’s something terrifying about having thinking organisms living in, and altering, your body. Even if you read the ambiguous ending as an evolutionary leap creating a utopian shared mindscape, you have to admit, it’s a pretty creepy leap of faith to accept these cells’ changes. Blood Music is a solid performer on best-of lists and collections, and earns every right. Its second act is some of the most compelling prose I’ve ever read; every chapter ends on a cliffhanger or otherwise keeps you reading, drawing you further into the narrative. The third act introduces a lot of great insight into the situation, as we get a real glimpse of how the cells work and what they’re doing.

(Full review found here.)(less)

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Jan 31, 2009 Robert rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

This novel surprised me with how enjoyable it actually was. The title and cover conspired to give me the distinct impression of "generic SF."

A more up-to-date look at the worries of genetic engineering, "Blood Music" moves from an "Andromeda Strain" bio-thriller into speculation of physics and the nature of reality. It manages to do so smoothly, and without invoking any mystical hand waving, which adds greatly to its effect.

A solid read, and one that would sit well with anyone who enjoys near...more

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Apr 19, 2010 Viktor Rumanuk rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Blood Music begins as Vergil Ulam, a “rogue” biotechnologist, creates lymphocytes, a type of white blood cell, that become sentient, self-organizing into their own civilization inside Ulam’s body. Of course, the newly intelligent organisms soon escape the confines of Vergil Ulam and begin infecting the world, with disastrous results for mankind. Blood Music is thoroughly intriguing, suffering only from a few shallow characters towards the end of the book. Flaws aside, the concepts discussed in B...more

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Aug 07, 2007 Abe rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: science-fiction

My first of many (and still my favorite) Greg Bear book. This guy is good!

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Feb 07, 2010 Geoff rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: sfmw

The novel begins following maverick biotechnologist Vergil Ulam, and his 'after-hours' creation of lymphocytes capable of passing information between one-another. His research is considered too dangerous, but rather than destroy his work, he injects his masterpiece into his bloodstream - their only chance for survival. This leads to the evolution of intelligence in the noocytes (from the greek word for mind, 'noos'), and they begin to rapidly multiply and evolve further. Vergil begins to notice...more The novel begins following maverick biotechnologist Vergil Ulam, and his 'after-hours' creation of lymphocytes capable of passing information between one-another. His research is considered too dangerous, but rather than destroy his work, he injects his masterpiece into his bloodstream - their only chance for survival. This leads to the evolution of intelligence in the noocytes (from the greek word for mind, 'noos'), and they begin to rapidly multiply and evolve further. Vergil begins to notice some changes in himself, and can 'hear' the noocytes in his blood as a kind of music (thus, Blood Music). Before long, the nano-scale invaders have altered their own genetic material, can spread from one host to another, and are capable of communicating with their hosts. I won't detail any more of the story in depth to avoid spoiling it for potential readers, but in general, the rest of the novel follows a few characters on their (mostly) separate journeys through a world in metamorphosis.

This novel was originally published as a short story by Bear in 1983, winning the 1983 Nebula Award and 1984 Hugo Award for best novelette. The short story covers (approximately) the first half of the novel, and this can be seen in the story as a rather abrupt change of perspective at the halfway mark. The first part focuses on Vergil Ulam's development of the noocytes and the personal effects they have, whereas the latter focuses on several other characters - some of whom played a minor part in the first half - and examines the environmental effects of the expansion of the noocyte civilisation and their interaction with (and treatment of) humans. The latter also uses a multiple-person point of view, jumping quickly from one character to the next to tell their separate stories as time progresses. The novel is also separated into several phases - interphase, anaphase, prophase, metaphase, telophase, and interphase. These phases are based on the phases in the cell cycle, and are a metaphor for the separation of the noocyte civilisation from humanity. Themes and concepts covered are: biotechnology and nanotechnology, consciousness, the anthropic principle, evolutionary transcendence, noospheres, and genetic memory.

Some readers may find the abrupt change at the end of the first half a little off-putting, and Bear probably had no choice but to keep the development of the characters in the second half brief, in order to maintain the novel's fast pace and suspense. The use of the multiple-person point-of-view did not come across as unfocused in any way, but instead does a great job of telling of different characters' experiences in the story's changing environment.

On a scale of 1 to 10, the 'sci-fi hardness' of this novel would be around 7 (with 1 being 'very soft' and 10 being 'very hard'). I am not a biologist, but I found all aspects of the nature of the noocytes as described by Bear to be believable and convincing. I feel the novel has barely 'aged' at all since its original publication; if anything, it has become much more 'real' because the themes in the story are much more existent, and the feelings conveyed are much more palpable than they were 25 years ago.(less)

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Apr 27, 2013 Christine rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

LOVED this book! Fantastic story-line, loved the characters, was written in a way that could be understood by readers not so science-jargon savvy. Was leant to me by a friend and I will definitely be buying a copy and re-reading. Was a realistic sci-fi novel, loved the descriptions of the plant life and the different organisms, would love to see this book made into a movie the imagery would be just amazing. This book made me want to explore the sci-fi genre more deeply. I inhaled this book, I co...more

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