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Venus #1
Venus of Dreams
Iris Angharads, a determined, independent woman, sets herself one massive goal: to make the poison-filled atmosphere of Venus hospitable to humans. She works day and night to realize her dream, with only one person sharing her passion, Liang Chen. It seems impossible to make Venus, with its intolerable air and waterless environment, into a paradise, but Iris succeeds. And in doing so, she also creates a powerful dynasty, beginning with her first born, Benzi Liangharad.
536 pages, Mass Market Paperback
First published January 1, 1986
12 people are currently reading
427 people want to read
About the author
Pamela Sargent
162 books208 followersPamela Sargent has won the Nebula Award, the Locus Award, and has been a finalist for the Hugo Award, the Theodore Sturgeon Memorial Award, and the Sidewise Award for alternate history. In 2012, she was honored with the Pilgrim Award by the Science Fiction Research Association for lifetime achievement in science fiction scholarship. She is the author of the novels Cloned Lives, The Sudden Star, Watchstar, The Golden Space, The Alien Upstairs, Eye of the Comet, Homesmind, Alien Child, The Shore of Women, Venus of Dreams, Venus of Shadows, Child of Venus, Climb the Wind, and Ruler of the Sky. Her most recent short story collection is Thumbprints, published by Golden Gryphon Press, with an introduction by James Morrow. The Washington Post Book World has called her “one of the genre's best writers.”
In the 1970s, she edited the Women of Wonder series, the first collections of science fiction by women; her other anthologies include Bio-Futures and, with British writer Ian Watson as co-editor, Afterlives. Two anthologies, Women of Wonder, The Classic Years: Science Fiction by Women from the 1940s to the 1970s and Women of Wonder, The Contemporary Years: Science Fiction by Women from the 1970s to the 1990s, were published by Harcourt Brace in 1995; Publishers Weekly called these two books “essential reading for any serious sf fan.” Her most recent anthology is Conqueror Fantastic, out from DAW Books in 2004. Tor Books reissued her 1983 young adult novel Earthseed, selected as a Best Book for Young Adults by the American Library Association, and a sequel, Farseed, in early 2007. A third volume, Seed Seeker, was published in November of 2010 by Tor. Earthseed has been optioned by Paramount Pictures, with Melissa Rosenberg, scriptwriter for all of the Twilight films, writing the script and producing through her Tall Girls Productions.
A collection, Puss in D.C. and Other Stories, is out; her novel Season of the Cats is out in hardcover and will be available in paperback from Wildside Press. The Shore of Women has been optioned for development as a TV series by Super Deluxe Films, part of Turner Broadcasting.
Pamela Sargent lives in Albany, New York.
In the 1970s, she edited the Women of Wonder series, the first collections of science fiction by women; her other anthologies include Bio-Futures and, with British writer Ian Watson as co-editor, Afterlives. Two anthologies, Women of Wonder, The Classic Years: Science Fiction by Women from the 1940s to the 1970s and Women of Wonder, The Contemporary Years: Science Fiction by Women from the 1970s to the 1990s, were published by Harcourt Brace in 1995; Publishers Weekly called these two books “essential reading for any serious sf fan.” Her most recent anthology is Conqueror Fantastic, out from DAW Books in 2004. Tor Books reissued her 1983 young adult novel Earthseed, selected as a Best Book for Young Adults by the American Library Association, and a sequel, Farseed, in early 2007. A third volume, Seed Seeker, was published in November of 2010 by Tor. Earthseed has been optioned by Paramount Pictures, with Melissa Rosenberg, scriptwriter for all of the Twilight films, writing the script and producing through her Tall Girls Productions.
A collection, Puss in D.C. and Other Stories, is out; her novel Season of the Cats is out in hardcover and will be available in paperback from Wildside Press. The Shore of Women has been optioned for development as a TV series by Super Deluxe Films, part of Turner Broadcasting.
Pamela Sargent lives in Albany, New York.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 36 reviews
April 23, 2024
Check out my full, spoiler free, video review HERE. This is a well written book that covers social, interpersonal and gender themes. Set in the future when humanity is struggling with global warming and starts to terraform Venus. The main character Iris was born into a female run agricultural industry, but she seeks more in life than just farming and wants to work on the Venus project. As the story progresses, Iris gets to go to Venus and becomes part of a conflict between all the political factions that are at play. Great story if not a bit slow at times, I think I’ll keep reading into the trilogy.
August 15, 2012
I read this and the sequel, Venus of Shadows when I was at university and remembered enjoying it. Now that the trilogy is complete, I've decided to try it again so I can read the final book intelligently.
Very good read. The characterization and world building were excellent. Some of the dialogue seemed stilted but all in all a good book. I think what kept me interested is the way Sargent crafted the main character, Iris. Iris is "real". That is, she is not a perfect character and at times Sargent is quite ruthless with her. As the story goes on, Iris' flaws are readily apparent: she is faithless, grasping, self-centered, and egotistical. She uses people, refuses to take responsibility for her part in the responses others have to her behavior and is just generally not a person I would choose to hang around with. She is just that bad.
The thing is, the story is good enough to carry you through to see her get better. Oh Iris is still quite flawed, but by the end of the book, she is more willing to accept her flaws and at least try to be a decent human being. She grows. She changes. She matures.
I appreciate that in a human being and in a character. I look forward to re-reading the next in the series.
Very good read. The characterization and world building were excellent. Some of the dialogue seemed stilted but all in all a good book. I think what kept me interested is the way Sargent crafted the main character, Iris. Iris is "real". That is, she is not a perfect character and at times Sargent is quite ruthless with her. As the story goes on, Iris' flaws are readily apparent: she is faithless, grasping, self-centered, and egotistical. She uses people, refuses to take responsibility for her part in the responses others have to her behavior and is just generally not a person I would choose to hang around with. She is just that bad.
The thing is, the story is good enough to carry you through to see her get better. Oh Iris is still quite flawed, but by the end of the book, she is more willing to accept her flaws and at least try to be a decent human being. She grows. She changes. She matures.
I appreciate that in a human being and in a character. I look forward to re-reading the next in the series.
March 3, 2013
A big long family-saga type book. The narrator's mother has ambitions to become mayor of her agrarian village and to leave a successful farm to her daughter. However, her daughter insists on spending all of her free time studying online, with dreams of becoming part of the ambitious project to settle Venus. She is rebellious and bitter about her mother's failure to understand her dreams - but when she succeeds, after great effort, she in turn doesn't understand her son, who feels that the Venus Project is all a big PR scam set up by the Earth government, who doesn't understand that cooperating with the more technologically advanced people who live in artificial space habitats would be the more sensible way to go.
Well done, interesting book, but it didn't grab me enough to make me go seek out the sequels.
Well done, interesting book, but it didn't grab me enough to make me go seek out the sequels.
May 3, 2025
I'm disappointed in myself for sticking it out to the end. It's a dull book. It has some decent ideas, but these points are drawn out way too long. The ending is about as much fun as a deflating balloon.
It's written in the "communism can work" vein, a la The Dispossessed which is also hard to swallow. No matter how much the elites piss on the workers, the workers just keep trekking along. "We're all in this together." It gets quite sickening that any systemic shortcomings of communism are explained as only the failing of any particular individual...which is why communism always fails, right?
The narrator isn't the worst, just pretty bad.
It's written in the "communism can work" vein, a la The Dispossessed which is also hard to swallow. No matter how much the elites piss on the workers, the workers just keep trekking along. "We're all in this together." It gets quite sickening that any systemic shortcomings of communism are explained as only the failing of any particular individual...which is why communism always fails, right?
The narrator isn't the worst, just pretty bad.
January 28, 2015
Similar to "Shore of Women" the first book in the Venus Trilogy by Pamela Sargent tackles issues of sex, gender, power, and authority. Set over 600 years in the future, the Earth has come under control of Islam but not in the form we think of today, not even close to what you might think of in the post-9/11 western world.
The story is told primarily through the eyes of Iris, a woman living in an agricultural matriarchy of current day Midwest America whose desire for education put her at odds with her family and the society they live in. Even though the book is split into 5 parts, the first 1/3 of the entire page count is spent on Iris's childhood and stubborn pursuit of education.
For a few chapters our focus changes to Chen, a worker on the Venus Project, a multi-century terraforming plan for the planet Venus, the planet whose light Iris was born under. I actually found the change to Chen's experiences jarring. That jarring switch in viewpoint happens with at last four other characters and was the least satisfying aspect of the book for me. I would have preferred staying with Iris as far as we could in the novel.
The story follows Iris's life from a child through her education, marriage, motherhood, and finally her work for decades on the Venus Project. Through her encounters we discover how the Earth functions, not terribly well, sort of medieval in many ways, and how this grand project for another planet is really straining humanity in terms of resources and spirit. Sargent does a very good job making these often incongruous aspects seem plausible. From time to time the hard science elements are expanded upon but in a generally interesting way though hard science fans will find it lacking.
The story is told primarily through the eyes of Iris, a woman living in an agricultural matriarchy of current day Midwest America whose desire for education put her at odds with her family and the society they live in. Even though the book is split into 5 parts, the first 1/3 of the entire page count is spent on Iris's childhood and stubborn pursuit of education.
For a few chapters our focus changes to Chen, a worker on the Venus Project, a multi-century terraforming plan for the planet Venus, the planet whose light Iris was born under. I actually found the change to Chen's experiences jarring. That jarring switch in viewpoint happens with at last four other characters and was the least satisfying aspect of the book for me. I would have preferred staying with Iris as far as we could in the novel.
The story follows Iris's life from a child through her education, marriage, motherhood, and finally her work for decades on the Venus Project. Through her encounters we discover how the Earth functions, not terribly well, sort of medieval in many ways, and how this grand project for another planet is really straining humanity in terms of resources and spirit. Sargent does a very good job making these often incongruous aspects seem plausible. From time to time the hard science elements are expanded upon but in a generally interesting way though hard science fans will find it lacking.
March 7, 2013
When I was a kid, Pamela Sargent wrote some (what would be called now) YA scifi that I loved. And then I kind of forgot about her. But I picked up this trilogy from the 80's about a multi-generational family terraforming Venus. The characters were interesting and had a lot of depth, and it was just the kind of scifi I like, which was more about society building rather than technology -- but society building in outer space, on Venus, which is an interesting variation on the usual Mars colony books. (Mars was already taken by a humankind offshoot called the "habbers" who prefer to keep it in its natural state).
xx-dnf-skim-reference
April 14, 2020https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/...
Very disappointed. Read Tara's comment in the above buddy read for why this book was wrong for her, and for me.
That said, I have no idea if it isn't the perfect start of a wonderful trilogy for someone else.
I have enjoyed some shorter works by Sargent.
Very disappointed. Read Tara's comment in the above buddy read for why this book was wrong for her, and for me.
That said, I have no idea if it isn't the perfect start of a wonderful trilogy for someone else.
I have enjoyed some shorter works by Sargent.
November 12, 2018
This book is an interesting thing. It's well-written, well-constructed, and on a classic S/F topic: Terraforming. But it's also a dystopian story. Take the optimistic '50s view of the future and scientific advancement, and lay on top of it the post-60s misanthropy—well, on the one hand you could get "Futurama" or HHTTG, which don't have to make sense—but in her more serious, skilled hands Pamela Sargent gives us the epic story of Iris Angharads, a little girl on the (matriarchal) prairie who sees an escape in the terraforming project of Venus.
Dystopic books tend to suffer because the necessary conditions for dystopia usually produce flat, unlikable characters. And after we're introduced to Iris as a girl, the bulk of the book consists of her being unlikable. But Sargent's legerdemain is considerable: We're rooting for Iris. We want to like her. But we also want her to succeed, and so we understand the choices she makes. Even if we wince when she chooses tragically, we can't really be sure she's doing the wrong thing any more than she can (except in retrospect).
The kernel of optimism here is that The Project, while in part a scheme for enriching and enshrining the controllers of Earth, seems destined to ultimately break away from it. Also, our heroine's character arc is considerable, and by the end she's attained considerable wisdom and something very much like love. And you do end up liking and admiring her, for all the circuitousness of her journey.
Dystopic books tend to suffer because the necessary conditions for dystopia usually produce flat, unlikable characters. And after we're introduced to Iris as a girl, the bulk of the book consists of her being unlikable. But Sargent's legerdemain is considerable: We're rooting for Iris. We want to like her. But we also want her to succeed, and so we understand the choices she makes. Even if we wince when she chooses tragically, we can't really be sure she's doing the wrong thing any more than she can (except in retrospect).
The kernel of optimism here is that The Project, while in part a scheme for enriching and enshrining the controllers of Earth, seems destined to ultimately break away from it. Also, our heroine's character arc is considerable, and by the end she's attained considerable wisdom and something very much like love. And you do end up liking and admiring her, for all the circuitousness of her journey.
Read
January 12, 2011When I was nine or ten years old, the film version of Jesus Christ Superstar showed up on my black and white television. I liked the music and was confused by the tanks and American soldiers showing up in place of Roman centurions, but what i remember best was a scene in which Caiaphas or Pilate — some official anyway — looked out on the crown of Jesus' supporters and sang about how "There must be more than 50,000" of them.
Thing is, Jesus Christ Superstar was made on the cheap (or looked to be) and, unless my memory utterly fails me, that "crowd" was much closer to fifty people than it was to fifty thousand. At that age, such a discrepancy utterly shattered my suspension of disbelief, no matter how good the music.
Unlike a film's, a novel's crowd scenes are limited only by power of the author's imagination, which is one reason why there are a great many epic science fiction novels but very few epic science fiction movies.
So it is particularly strange that the scope of Pamela Sargent's ostensible epic, Venus of Dreams, feels every bit as small as that crowd dancing on the sands of the Judean desert. A 500 page novel about terraforming the planet Venus, that takes place over decades, ought to be a sweeping and complex tale encompassing science and culture, technology and politics, with a large (if not necessarily larger-than-life) and representative cast of characters throwing light on societies and mores other than our own.
Venus of Dreams manages none of these things. Instead this confused mess of a novel begins as an unconvincing bildungsroman, awkwardly transitions into an even less convincing story of political intrigue and ends with an utterly improbable attempt at revolution against a government we never really understand in the first place.
Click here to read my cranky review in full.
Thing is, Jesus Christ Superstar was made on the cheap (or looked to be) and, unless my memory utterly fails me, that "crowd" was much closer to fifty people than it was to fifty thousand. At that age, such a discrepancy utterly shattered my suspension of disbelief, no matter how good the music.
Unlike a film's, a novel's crowd scenes are limited only by power of the author's imagination, which is one reason why there are a great many epic science fiction novels but very few epic science fiction movies.
So it is particularly strange that the scope of Pamela Sargent's ostensible epic, Venus of Dreams, feels every bit as small as that crowd dancing on the sands of the Judean desert. A 500 page novel about terraforming the planet Venus, that takes place over decades, ought to be a sweeping and complex tale encompassing science and culture, technology and politics, with a large (if not necessarily larger-than-life) and representative cast of characters throwing light on societies and mores other than our own.
Venus of Dreams manages none of these things. Instead this confused mess of a novel begins as an unconvincing bildungsroman, awkwardly transitions into an even less convincing story of political intrigue and ends with an utterly improbable attempt at revolution against a government we never really understand in the first place.
Click here to read my cranky review in full.
September 27, 2017
Bookworm Speaks!
Venus of Dreams
by Pamela Sargent
****
Acquired: Amazon.com
Series: The Venus Trilogy (Book 1)
Paperback: 384 pages
Publisher: e-reads.com (December 1, 1999)
Language: English
Subject: Science Fiction
****
The Story: Iris Angharads, a determined, independent woman, sets herself one massive goal: to make the poison-filled atmosphere of Venus hospitable to humans. She works day and night to realize her dream, with only one person sharing her passion, Liang Chen. It seems impossible to make Venus, with its intolerable air and waterless environment, into a paradise, but Iris succeeds. And in doing so, she also creates a powerful dynasty, beginning with her first born, Benzi Liangharad.
The Review: The author of this book is described as a feminist and truth-be-told, it shows for almost the entire first half of the text. The planet Earth described in this book is a world quite different from the one we know. It takes five-hundred years in the future and the planet Earth is controlled by a new order. Order and control and the keywords to remember here.
The main problem with this is that the reader never really goes into much detail about how this world came to be and how it actually functions. The best kind of world building is the kind that takes place in the background with little to no expository passages. This book actually does have a lot of exposition. The problem is that it is the explanation of what is going on inside of the character heads. With a world that is so very different from our own, the reader could really use a little explanation.
Iris comes off as a very selfish character. Bookworm knows that the author was most likely attempting to portray the plethora of expectations placed upon women regarding parenting, lifestyle choices, and child rearing but that seems like a product of the older style of feminism born from the radicals of mid-century America, of which the author is most likely a product of. Iris, though seems to push away people who love her in the name of her ambition. Even though this is a world ruled by Islamic technocrats, that is a distinctly western viewpoint, particularly of the feminist viewpoint.
Bookworm couldn’t help but feel sorry for Iris’ husband and son for being practically at the mercy of Iris’ personal ambitions and never really knowing the woman for who she was. She appears to be rather wishy-washy and unsure about the prospect of personal relationships. Iris want’s to be loved but she seems reluctant to give out love it return. Her husband is mostly used for sex.
The topic of sex comes up very frequently. Half the time a character talks seems to be broaching the topic of who or what they will spend the night with. Bookworm knows that this was probably meant to espouse the “sexual liberations” movement condoned by many feminist ideologies, but it gets very tedious after a while. The reader doesn’t even get to read the sex! It is all implied!
Something Bookworm has noticed in a great many works of fiction: Editors and publishers are perfectly fine with a graphic description of a knight being devoured by a dragon or a space trooper being torn to shreds by bullets but when it comes to said knight or soldier going to bed with some pretty woman or handsome man…”woah! man!!! Kids could be reading this! Just go write another scene where a man is bifurcated by a chainsaw.”
A Double Standard?
Perhaps.
Frustrating? Especially in regards to this novel?
Definitely.
Bookworm believes that this book and ultimately perhaps, this entire trilogy was trying to hard to pull off what was done in Dune or Game of Thrones. A grand sweeping epic that spans generations with great societal and political pressure ultimately told through the limited eyes of a handful of characters. In the end, though, what we see through said limited gazes seems mostly concerned with the possibility that all love is doomed to failure. For a world named after a goddess of beauty and love, relationships don’t seem to work very well on the planet Venus.
Relationships seem to be the core of this novel. Interpersonal conflicts and marital troubles seem to take center stage for the first half of the novel and remain so throughout the text. Save perhaps for the pre-epilogue final act.
One relationship that the author shoves down the reader’s throat almost continuously is the ongoing conflict between the ruling authority of Earth, the Islamic Muhktars and the Habbers, a faction of humanity who dwell in space based habitats, hence the name. Habbers possess advanced technology that could greatly aid the Venus Terraforming Project but they are viewed with suspicion by the populations of Earth and Venus. They believe that the Habbers want to take over or something like that. This book was desperately lacking exposition into who this solar system of the future actually moves, functions, or even how it came to be.
The best guess is that the Muhktars view the Habbers and their technology as a threat to their well-ordered society. It is never made clear. Politics is a notoriously dense and complex topic and the people on the ground rarely know the whole story. If the author was attempting to convey this to the reader, Bookworm can safely say that they failed in this endeavor. Many times, Bookworm found themselves saying, “Shut up about the Habbers already!” or “Just go to war and be done with it!” What is politics without a war or two here and there.
Final Verdict: While possessing some interesting ideas and world building and not a small amount of emotional eloquence, this book is ultimately undone by biting off more than it can chew. Trying too hard to be both intimate and epic at the same time and never quite accomplishing either.
Rating: Three Symbols of Venus of Five
thecultureworm.blogspot.com
Venus of Dreams
by Pamela Sargent
****
Acquired: Amazon.com
Series: The Venus Trilogy (Book 1)
Paperback: 384 pages
Publisher: e-reads.com (December 1, 1999)
Language: English
Subject: Science Fiction
****
The Story: Iris Angharads, a determined, independent woman, sets herself one massive goal: to make the poison-filled atmosphere of Venus hospitable to humans. She works day and night to realize her dream, with only one person sharing her passion, Liang Chen. It seems impossible to make Venus, with its intolerable air and waterless environment, into a paradise, but Iris succeeds. And in doing so, she also creates a powerful dynasty, beginning with her first born, Benzi Liangharad.
The Review: The author of this book is described as a feminist and truth-be-told, it shows for almost the entire first half of the text. The planet Earth described in this book is a world quite different from the one we know. It takes five-hundred years in the future and the planet Earth is controlled by a new order. Order and control and the keywords to remember here.
The main problem with this is that the reader never really goes into much detail about how this world came to be and how it actually functions. The best kind of world building is the kind that takes place in the background with little to no expository passages. This book actually does have a lot of exposition. The problem is that it is the explanation of what is going on inside of the character heads. With a world that is so very different from our own, the reader could really use a little explanation.
Iris comes off as a very selfish character. Bookworm knows that the author was most likely attempting to portray the plethora of expectations placed upon women regarding parenting, lifestyle choices, and child rearing but that seems like a product of the older style of feminism born from the radicals of mid-century America, of which the author is most likely a product of. Iris, though seems to push away people who love her in the name of her ambition. Even though this is a world ruled by Islamic technocrats, that is a distinctly western viewpoint, particularly of the feminist viewpoint.
Bookworm couldn’t help but feel sorry for Iris’ husband and son for being practically at the mercy of Iris’ personal ambitions and never really knowing the woman for who she was. She appears to be rather wishy-washy and unsure about the prospect of personal relationships. Iris want’s to be loved but she seems reluctant to give out love it return. Her husband is mostly used for sex.
The topic of sex comes up very frequently. Half the time a character talks seems to be broaching the topic of who or what they will spend the night with. Bookworm knows that this was probably meant to espouse the “sexual liberations” movement condoned by many feminist ideologies, but it gets very tedious after a while. The reader doesn’t even get to read the sex! It is all implied!
Something Bookworm has noticed in a great many works of fiction: Editors and publishers are perfectly fine with a graphic description of a knight being devoured by a dragon or a space trooper being torn to shreds by bullets but when it comes to said knight or soldier going to bed with some pretty woman or handsome man…”woah! man!!! Kids could be reading this! Just go write another scene where a man is bifurcated by a chainsaw.”
A Double Standard?
Perhaps.
Frustrating? Especially in regards to this novel?
Definitely.
Bookworm believes that this book and ultimately perhaps, this entire trilogy was trying to hard to pull off what was done in Dune or Game of Thrones. A grand sweeping epic that spans generations with great societal and political pressure ultimately told through the limited eyes of a handful of characters. In the end, though, what we see through said limited gazes seems mostly concerned with the possibility that all love is doomed to failure. For a world named after a goddess of beauty and love, relationships don’t seem to work very well on the planet Venus.
Relationships seem to be the core of this novel. Interpersonal conflicts and marital troubles seem to take center stage for the first half of the novel and remain so throughout the text. Save perhaps for the pre-epilogue final act.
One relationship that the author shoves down the reader’s throat almost continuously is the ongoing conflict between the ruling authority of Earth, the Islamic Muhktars and the Habbers, a faction of humanity who dwell in space based habitats, hence the name. Habbers possess advanced technology that could greatly aid the Venus Terraforming Project but they are viewed with suspicion by the populations of Earth and Venus. They believe that the Habbers want to take over or something like that. This book was desperately lacking exposition into who this solar system of the future actually moves, functions, or even how it came to be.
The best guess is that the Muhktars view the Habbers and their technology as a threat to their well-ordered society. It is never made clear. Politics is a notoriously dense and complex topic and the people on the ground rarely know the whole story. If the author was attempting to convey this to the reader, Bookworm can safely say that they failed in this endeavor. Many times, Bookworm found themselves saying, “Shut up about the Habbers already!” or “Just go to war and be done with it!” What is politics without a war or two here and there.
Final Verdict: While possessing some interesting ideas and world building and not a small amount of emotional eloquence, this book is ultimately undone by biting off more than it can chew. Trying too hard to be both intimate and epic at the same time and never quite accomplishing either.
Rating: Three Symbols of Venus of Five
thecultureworm.blogspot.com
October 25, 2023
BLUF: I've long said I prefer a character-driven story. Turns out plot is pretty important, too.
As a science fiction take on the long goodbyes of immigrant diasporas, this is mildly interesting. But it's billed as a book about the extremely dangerous task of terraforming Venus. Unfortunately, it's mostly long-winded character development, and the characters aren't particularly interesting. There isn't a single bit of on-page danger or conflict* greater than people disappointing one another or worrying they'll disappoint one another or thinking about how others have disappointed them until page 312. In a book about the extremely treacherous task of terraforming Venus.
After that, we largely go back to people wondering about their own emotions until the denouement.
Sargent does do a good job of depicting the internal conflict of the main character, of her guilt over how her ambition takes precedence over her loved ones; I'm not nearly as single-focused as Iris, but I can relate to the feelings of guilt over not spending more time with my kids or wife. And Sargent also develops two extremely poignant scenes-- one with young Benzi and one much later with Iris-- but sufficient character development to create those poignant scenes could have been done much more briefly.
A couple of tangential thoughts:
1. The depiction of Iris's homeland's matriarchal society is well done. Sargent seems to have thought through how an agrarian matriarchal society would work rather than simply flipping male and female roles from a stereotypical patriarchy.
2. Characters are constantly thinking about how "resources" are tight without that, prior to the movement to Venus, actually being depicted. I mean, there are robots to guide guests to their rooms in hotels instead of just letting them find it themselves; this is not a poor society. At one point, I was expecting there to be a reveal that "lack of resources" was just a lie the Mukhtars used to control the population but, if that was the case, it was never revealed.
3. The majority of the populace is illiterate and innumerate, but I don't think Sargent really thought through the ramifications of that, particularly the latter. Everybody seems keenly aware of their quantity of credits and Iris's mother going over accounts by looking at charts rather than calculating numbers seemed both flimsy and an afterthought.
There're some interesting, sketchily-explored concepts that still make me consider reading the sequels. Sargent is, I think, one of the earlier speculators of the development of a human hivemind (though it's in its early stages in this book). And I'd like to know more about the Habbers and their great leap forward both socially and technologically.
But in looking at reviews of the rest of the trilogy, it looks like it's just more of the same, so I'll likely be passing.
*I should note there is
As a science fiction take on the long goodbyes of immigrant diasporas, this is mildly interesting. But it's billed as a book about the extremely dangerous task of terraforming Venus. Unfortunately, it's mostly long-winded character development, and the characters aren't particularly interesting. There isn't a single bit of on-page danger or conflict* greater than people disappointing one another or worrying they'll disappoint one another or thinking about how others have disappointed them until page 312. In a book about the extremely treacherous task of terraforming Venus.
After that, we largely go back to people wondering about their own emotions until the denouement.
Sargent does do a good job of depicting the internal conflict of the main character, of her guilt over how her ambition takes precedence over her loved ones; I'm not nearly as single-focused as Iris, but I can relate to the feelings of guilt over not spending more time with my kids or wife. And Sargent also develops two extremely poignant scenes-- one with young Benzi and one much later with Iris-- but sufficient character development to create those poignant scenes could have been done much more briefly.
A couple of tangential thoughts:
1. The depiction of Iris's homeland's matriarchal society is well done. Sargent seems to have thought through how an agrarian matriarchal society would work rather than simply flipping male and female roles from a stereotypical patriarchy.
2. Characters are constantly thinking about how "resources" are tight without that, prior to the movement to Venus, actually being depicted. I mean, there are robots to guide guests to their rooms in hotels instead of just letting them find it themselves; this is not a poor society. At one point, I was expecting there to be a reveal that "lack of resources" was just a lie the Mukhtars used to control the population but, if that was the case, it was never revealed.
3. The majority of the populace is illiterate and innumerate, but I don't think Sargent really thought through the ramifications of that, particularly the latter. Everybody seems keenly aware of their quantity of credits and Iris's mother going over accounts by looking at charts rather than calculating numbers seemed both flimsy and an afterthought.
There're some interesting, sketchily-explored concepts that still make me consider reading the sequels. Sargent is, I think, one of the earlier speculators of the development of a human hivemind (though it's in its early stages in this book). And I'd like to know more about the Habbers and their great leap forward both socially and technologically.
But in looking at reviews of the rest of the trilogy, it looks like it's just more of the same, so I'll likely be passing.
*I should note there is
June 19, 2020
Climate change and other factors have impacted civilization on Earth. There is a greater emphasis on farming and other less advanced areas, but there is also technology both in the home with computers somewhat more advance than ours and developments in space. Earth has a project to terraform Venus, while "habbers" have build society in space habitats independent of Earth.
The book centers around the life of Iris. At the beginning, she's an 8-year-old girl living in a farming community in what had been Nebraska. Most people in farming communities consider farming and small communities the center of life, and therefore don't have formal schooling. Iris has a real desire to learn, using a computer to explore areas of interest. She becomes fascinated with the Venus project. This disturbs her mother and others who see this as a pointless waste. But her efforts result in getting government financial assistance to take internet classes, and later a scholarship to go to college. She gets a job as a climatologist on a space station orbiting Venus.
There, we see various people like her: driven, devoted to the Venus project, and hoping to see the day people colonize Venus. We also see administrators, workers committee members and others involved in "office politics" and trying to advance their position and role in the project. We also see conflicts between those in the Venus orbits and the Earth authorities who don't provide the project with the desired resources. And there are the issues with relations between Earth and the habbers. The habbers have more advanced technology, some of which they make available to the Venus project, but they aren't trusted and are considered to have different goals than Earth. Earth authorities partly rely on the prestige of the Venus project, the Venus project depnds on the help of the habbers, but Earth refuses to admit their dependence and lesser capabilities. Meanwhile, those working on the project in the Venus space stations are impatient, restless and even rebellious over the resulting difficulties...
The book centers around the life of Iris. At the beginning, she's an 8-year-old girl living in a farming community in what had been Nebraska. Most people in farming communities consider farming and small communities the center of life, and therefore don't have formal schooling. Iris has a real desire to learn, using a computer to explore areas of interest. She becomes fascinated with the Venus project. This disturbs her mother and others who see this as a pointless waste. But her efforts result in getting government financial assistance to take internet classes, and later a scholarship to go to college. She gets a job as a climatologist on a space station orbiting Venus.
There, we see various people like her: driven, devoted to the Venus project, and hoping to see the day people colonize Venus. We also see administrators, workers committee members and others involved in "office politics" and trying to advance their position and role in the project. We also see conflicts between those in the Venus orbits and the Earth authorities who don't provide the project with the desired resources. And there are the issues with relations between Earth and the habbers. The habbers have more advanced technology, some of which they make available to the Venus project, but they aren't trusted and are considered to have different goals than Earth. Earth authorities partly rely on the prestige of the Venus project, the Venus project depnds on the help of the habbers, but Earth refuses to admit their dependence and lesser capabilities. Meanwhile, those working on the project in the Venus space stations are impatient, restless and even rebellious over the resulting difficulties...
May 13, 2019
The matriarchal Life on the plains of Nebraska weren't what Iris Angharad dreamed of. She dreamed of joining the hand-picked teams that were working to terraform Venus. When she finished her farm chores, she linked to lessons on her screen: biology, chemistry, hydroponics. Her hard work paid off and the government of Earth paid for her lessons. The boy she met, sent to her village to make repairs in the town hall, shared her dream. They became bondmates and parents at the age of 16. (!) Now, Iris leaves her child with her mother and studies in the (Venus) Islands Institute in Caracas, where she will be prepared, if she can cut it, to live in the upper atmosphere of Venus, and work with others to make the domes on Venus' surface that will sustain Humans until the planet's surface can support humans.
This book is really about human politics, and how they stand in the way of accomplishing the tasks that an assembled team is working on. The characters, as other reviewers commented, are not likeable. So it makes the reader wonder: what did Ms Sargent set out to do here? Still and all, I enjoyed it for its world-building theme, as that's what I dreamt of when I was young: that we (Americans) would be going to Mars. Ha!
This book is really about human politics, and how they stand in the way of accomplishing the tasks that an assembled team is working on. The characters, as other reviewers commented, are not likeable. So it makes the reader wonder: what did Ms Sargent set out to do here? Still and all, I enjoyed it for its world-building theme, as that's what I dreamt of when I was young: that we (Americans) would be going to Mars. Ha!
September 9, 2022
An extraordinary story grounded in the kind of realistic situations (given the setting) and realistic characters doing things that real people would do.
Some find the characters 'selfish'. I found them convincing. Sometimes they are selfish, sometimes they are not. Often, they are motivated by complex webs of influences and ideas. Iris can be insufferable sometimes, mostly when she is acting like her mother. Both can be loving, caring and motivated to work hard at what they believe in.
The story branches out from a coming-of-age to the grander scale of space opera. Even the ending, its complexities, the balance of 'winning' and 'losing', the dressing up of reality by the powerful to suit their ends - Earth is ruled by a dictatorship, but at times it is benevolent, at times stretching its ability to influence. This ends up with a very unique and complex political situation.
Not sure how a sequel could follow this up, but I'm confident it can.
Some find the characters 'selfish'. I found them convincing. Sometimes they are selfish, sometimes they are not. Often, they are motivated by complex webs of influences and ideas. Iris can be insufferable sometimes, mostly when she is acting like her mother. Both can be loving, caring and motivated to work hard at what they believe in.
The story branches out from a coming-of-age to the grander scale of space opera. Even the ending, its complexities, the balance of 'winning' and 'losing', the dressing up of reality by the powerful to suit their ends - Earth is ruled by a dictatorship, but at times it is benevolent, at times stretching its ability to influence. This ends up with a very unique and complex political situation.
Not sure how a sequel could follow this up, but I'm confident it can.
July 1, 2023
This was a bit of a slog. I enjoyed the first part of the book where Iris is growing up in the Plains. Her family are farmers, but she is more interested in academics which she gets through a computerized tutor. The society is largely female, with wandering males who come through periodically and are used by the women for sex. Once Iris moved out, I found the book to be less interesting, probably because I didn't empathize with the characters. I may come back to the series since I bought both books 1 & 2 for $1.99 each, but with less expectations.
March 23, 2020
More thematic depth and nuanced character development than a typical sci fi novel, while still retaining classic sci fi action and drama and cool ideas. Okay, to be more straightforward, at the risk of sounding stereotyped, I would say the writing benefits from a feminine perspective and values, while still having the adventurous macho traits of the usual sci fi, such as the cover art, which didn't reference anything I actually came across in the novel.
February 28, 2019
I am on chapter 26 of 35 and am stopping. Every family in this novel undermines its members. The characters spin internal dialogue of self-doubt and ponder evidence of how others think poorly of them. For every 10 pages of character angst there is one page of plot development. Couldn't the author add one redeeming character?
December 13, 2016
Venus of Dreams, in my opinion, was a study of humanity. It was bittersweet and there was hubris. I liked how the societies had developed and changed, which was different from most science fiction I’ve read.
March 2, 2020
Loved this whole series, so fun
June 30, 2020
There were good moments, but it was too much of a slog and waaaay more depressing than I thought it was going to be going in.
November 24, 2023
Too much focus on sexual politics and culture and failed relationships on Earth and Venus - not enough about the Habbers and actual Sf content about the project for my taste.
July 8, 2025
Very thorough worldbuilding, but it's a terribly depressing one and I didn't feel like being in it anymore after the rape scene in her dorm room. I didn't finish this.
August 10, 2024
A plodding story. This is just the first volume of 3, and this one spans over 650 pages. Not sure I'll be willing to dive into the remaining 2 books of the trilogy. I wish that authors would use a more succinct style. In my mind, unless you're James Clavell, there are few stories that require more than 600 pages, let alone 3 volumes to tell the tale.
June 17, 2024
Note from June 2024 after reading the summary on Goodreads: this book is absolutely not about what the teaser text says it is about. Someone must have updated that for modern audiences. This book isn't even about terraforming Venus. Weird. It's certianly not about one woman's brave struggle to terraform Venus. It's a mess.
Original review:
I am a bit disappointed by this book. I really like Pam Sargent: she edited the Women of Wonder Anthologies, and the introduction to the Classic Years anthology was full of interesting information and analysis. One of her more recent short stories really got me. I found this book at a sci-fi convention and was really excited about it.
The world is interesting: in the future, after some obligatory big die-up, the world is ruled in a global empire by Muslims who dominate and manage every level of society through an intense bureaucracy. There are very interesting social conventions and gender roles. The main character Iris is considered odd for flouting these conventions and wanting to learn.
Iris's journey through life, her victories, and her mistakes are worth reading about. However, I can't recommend this book if you're looking for a good plot. There is something like a plot that abandons the characters in favor of getting them embroiled in politics. I wanted to see Iris succeed and she just kinda well... doesn't. The book doesn't really set up what that success would mean, other than settling on Venus, so I guess the ending was sort of surprising. However, there were other problems. Much of the last half of the book relies on a betrayal that is not set up at all. I just didn't get it, and kept thinking I would by the end, but didn't. I might need to reread the book to get it, but that's not a good reason to reread. YMMV.
Original review:
I am a bit disappointed by this book. I really like Pam Sargent: she edited the Women of Wonder Anthologies, and the introduction to the Classic Years anthology was full of interesting information and analysis. One of her more recent short stories really got me. I found this book at a sci-fi convention and was really excited about it.
The world is interesting: in the future, after some obligatory big die-up, the world is ruled in a global empire by Muslims who dominate and manage every level of society through an intense bureaucracy. There are very interesting social conventions and gender roles. The main character Iris is considered odd for flouting these conventions and wanting to learn.
Iris's journey through life, her victories, and her mistakes are worth reading about. However, I can't recommend this book if you're looking for a good plot. There is something like a plot that abandons the characters in favor of getting them embroiled in politics. I wanted to see Iris succeed and she just kinda well... doesn't. The book doesn't really set up what that success would mean, other than settling on Venus, so I guess the ending was sort of surprising. However, there were other problems. Much of the last half of the book relies on a betrayal that is not set up at all. I just didn't get it, and kept thinking I would by the end, but didn't. I might need to reread the book to get it, but that's not a good reason to reread. YMMV.
July 24, 2022
Considering how much I disliked the previous book by Pamela Sargent, I’m not sure why I read this one. That said, this was an interesting read. Not a fun one, or a very gripping one, but it actually was better than I expected.
I disliked Iris - actually, I disliked most people in this book, and the ones I didn’t dislike were cardboard props. The only one I really liked and found myself rooting for was Liang Chen.
Too much dystopian politics and scheming and using people for me, I’ll be avoiding Pamela from now on.
I disliked Iris - actually, I disliked most people in this book, and the ones I didn’t dislike were cardboard props. The only one I really liked and found myself rooting for was Liang Chen.
Too much dystopian politics and scheming and using people for me, I’ll be avoiding Pamela from now on.
May 12, 2012
I pulled this out of my bookshelf in my campaign to reread my old sci-fi books. The themes are strongly tied to the issues raised by the women's movement at the time. It will be interesting as the story unfolds to see how it looks on what I just noticed is the 25th (give or take) anniversary of the book's publication.
Okay, I finished it. After the first section it goes downhill fast. The main problem is with with main character, Iris. She was an unfeeling(?), ambitious person who used people (I guess). But it took me half the book to figure this out, that is, if I'm even reading her correctly. Not because Iris was complex, but because of the wishy-washy way in which she was written. Her husband Chen would have made a far more interesting main character.
As far as world-building, the farming community where Iris grew up was very interesting and captured my attention. But once she left for Venus, the book because very blah. There wasn't anything particular unique: it was a sort of generic story of a) terraforming and b) one group oppressing another group.
I finally finished the book only to discover it was a trilogy. I have no desire to read books #2 and #3.
Okay, I finished it. After the first section it goes downhill fast. The main problem is with with main character, Iris. She was an unfeeling(?), ambitious person who used people (I guess). But it took me half the book to figure this out, that is, if I'm even reading her correctly. Not because Iris was complex, but because of the wishy-washy way in which she was written. Her husband Chen would have made a far more interesting main character.
As far as world-building, the farming community where Iris grew up was very interesting and captured my attention. But once she left for Venus, the book because very blah. There wasn't anything particular unique: it was a sort of generic story of a) terraforming and b) one group oppressing another group.
I finally finished the book only to discover it was a trilogy. I have no desire to read books #2 and #3.
January 10, 2015
I'd give this book three and a half stars if possible - it was a very enjoyable read at times, although it did also drag at points. Although the plot of the book is centered around the gradual terraforming of Venus, the book as a whole is much more socially oriented science fiction. The world-building was interesting and thoughtful, but not unusually compelling. What really stood out in this book was the portrayal of psychological and familial dynamics. The protagonist, Iris, fights bitterly with her mother to escape her small town and pursue greater things on Venus, yet we see essentially the same dynamic repeat itself with Iris's son and his dreams of moving beyond Venus. The problems in Iris's relationships were also powerfully portrayed; it is a rare sci-fi book that combines epic terraforming and space exploration with a close and realistic examination of painful and dysfunctional relationships. Looking forward to reading the rest of the series when I get a chance.
March 14, 2016
I picked this book up because I thought the cover was super rad and it only cost $2.50 at a used book store. I did not expect it to be this good or engaging. The writing is a little rough at times and could use another edit, but the story is really great. I expected some cheeseball overly optimistic hardcore scifi about exploration and terraforming. Instead, this book gets super dark and political, covers a lot of stuff about polyamory really well, and is pretty much all about how your dreams can be bad and destroy your life.
Luckily I also picked up the next book in the series because it was only $1, so I'm excited to be able to continue.
Luckily I also picked up the next book in the series because it was only $1, so I'm excited to be able to continue.
May 21, 2012
2.5 Stars - Started well and then went downhill from there. By the end, I was just wishing that everyone would die. I did not care about any of the characters. I actively disliked them. I guess I was expecting more on the terraforming of Venus ala Red Mars. I'm just glad it's over.
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February 19, 2013this book, as almost all of Sargent's work, is impossible to find.
she is such a prolific feminist sci-fi author, it's truly a pity she isn't better known!
she is such a prolific feminist sci-fi author, it's truly a pity she isn't better known!
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