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Hello Out There
Here, together in a single volume, are the two novels that launched Jack McDevitt's reputation as a writer of suspenseful, thoughtful, sense-of-wonder science fiction. Hello, Out There contains The Hercules Text, winner of the 1986 Philip K. Dick Special Award, and A Talent for War. The Hercules Text has been totally rewritten and updated for this edition. Most of us are attracted to the idea that the human race is not alone. Encountering other beings, we believe, will be romantic, exciting, thought-provoking, intriguing. And possibly dangerous. After all, one of our time-honored notions since H.G. Wells is that we may well be perceived by Others as little more than snacks, or subjects for religious conversion, or creatures of such insignificance as to be simply swept aside. No matter, we think cheerfully. We will take the risk. McDevitt suggests the hazards may be far more subtle. In Hello, Out There, contact with alien species forces us to rethink who we are and what we are about. The Hercules Text recounts a clash of wills in which the mere knowledge that someone is out there ignites profound changes in religious, political, and social behavior. In its companion novel, A Talent for War, contact forces us to rethink a cherished mythology, and ask ourselves whether truth might not sometimes demand too high a price. Here are two voyages into the unknown, twin expeditions to demonstrate that when we finally encounter whatever other intelligences Darwin has cast onto the cosmic beach, we may discover that the face looking back at us is our own.
- GenresScience Fiction
669 pages, Hardcover
First published September 1, 2000
180 people want to read
About the author
Jack McDevitt
185 books1,349 followersJack McDevitt is a former English teacher, naval officer, Philadelphia taxi driver, customs officer and motivational trainer. His work has been on the final ballot for the Nebula Awards for 12 of the past 13 years. His first novel, The Hercules Text, was published in the celebrated Ace Specials series and won the Philip K. Dick Special Award. In 1991, McDevitt won the first $10,000 UPC International Prize for his novella, "Ships in the Night." The Engines of God was a finalist for the Arthur C. Clarke Award, and his novella, "Time Travelers Never Die," was nominated for both the Hugo and the Nebula awards.
McDevitt lives in Georgia with his wife, Maureen, where he plays chess, reads mysteries and eats lunch regularly with his cronies.
McDevitt lives in Georgia with his wife, Maureen, where he plays chess, reads mysteries and eats lunch regularly with his cronies.
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Displaying 1 - 10 of 10 reviews
February 10, 2018
Technically, this is only a revew of _The Hercules Text._
This is the revised version of McDevitt's first novel, included, along with an unrevised version of his second (_A Talent for War_) in the two-in-one volume "Hello Out There". somehow, I never got around to reading the original version, so I can't tell you exactly what's revised about it, though from James Patrick Kelly's intro, I gather it is mostly updating plus a change to the ending.
Harry Carmichael is a government bureaucrat at Goddard Space Center, whose marriage is disintegrating. One night he gets a call to get over to the Center - something's up. When he gets there, he is told that a pulsar - an unusual one, a pulsar in the intergalactic spaces - is acting strangely.
Ultimately, of course (this being science fiction) it turns out to be a signal, a signal sent into the void a million-and-a-half years ago by being or beings unknown. A group of world-class scientists is called in to try to decipher it.
But the signal isn't, exactly, what the book's about. It's about the world's response to the signal, and especially that of the U.S. President, whose instinct is to hush things up in case of security or military advantages that may accrue from a race that can manipulate a pulsar to send a signal; it's about the reaction of the world, and especially that of the scientific community, to that hushing-up; and it's about the reaction of the scientists and Harry Carmichael to the whole megilla.
Ultimately the book is about Harry and his conscience, and that's where the climax (which, no, I won't reveal) comes in. Because there is knowledge, both dangerous and useful, in the Hercules Text; and who should be allowed to see it?
Knowledge (as Ambassador Kosh once remarked) is a three-edged sword. It can cut the hand that wields it. Knowledge For Which The World (or The Human Race) Is Not Yet Ready is a real possibility. And there are no unmixed blessings hidden in the Text.
Also, there are no villains in the book. Every character has his or her own take on the proper way to deal with the Text, and their different points of view are cogent, consistent, and honest. What will eventually become of it may be inevitable; but perhaps nothing actually is inevitable. Certainly in McDevitt's hands, there is no Fate, only the interactions of humans exercising their free will.
The ending - the _revised_ ending - is perhaps less than 100% satisfactory, but I suspect that no really satisfactory ending would be possible. The world does not allow real endings, satisfactory or other, except for death. Books must end, and _The Hercules Text_ ends about as well as one could hope for given the complexities it tries to deal with.
This is the revised version of McDevitt's first novel, included, along with an unrevised version of his second (_A Talent for War_) in the two-in-one volume "Hello Out There". somehow, I never got around to reading the original version, so I can't tell you exactly what's revised about it, though from James Patrick Kelly's intro, I gather it is mostly updating plus a change to the ending.
Harry Carmichael is a government bureaucrat at Goddard Space Center, whose marriage is disintegrating. One night he gets a call to get over to the Center - something's up. When he gets there, he is told that a pulsar - an unusual one, a pulsar in the intergalactic spaces - is acting strangely.
Ultimately, of course (this being science fiction) it turns out to be a signal, a signal sent into the void a million-and-a-half years ago by being or beings unknown. A group of world-class scientists is called in to try to decipher it.
But the signal isn't, exactly, what the book's about. It's about the world's response to the signal, and especially that of the U.S. President, whose instinct is to hush things up in case of security or military advantages that may accrue from a race that can manipulate a pulsar to send a signal; it's about the reaction of the world, and especially that of the scientific community, to that hushing-up; and it's about the reaction of the scientists and Harry Carmichael to the whole megilla.
Ultimately the book is about Harry and his conscience, and that's where the climax (which, no, I won't reveal) comes in. Because there is knowledge, both dangerous and useful, in the Hercules Text; and who should be allowed to see it?
Knowledge (as Ambassador Kosh once remarked) is a three-edged sword. It can cut the hand that wields it. Knowledge For Which The World (or The Human Race) Is Not Yet Ready is a real possibility. And there are no unmixed blessings hidden in the Text.
Also, there are no villains in the book. Every character has his or her own take on the proper way to deal with the Text, and their different points of view are cogent, consistent, and honest. What will eventually become of it may be inevitable; but perhaps nothing actually is inevitable. Certainly in McDevitt's hands, there is no Fate, only the interactions of humans exercising their free will.
The ending - the _revised_ ending - is perhaps less than 100% satisfactory, but I suspect that no really satisfactory ending would be possible. The world does not allow real endings, satisfactory or other, except for death. Books must end, and _The Hercules Text_ ends about as well as one could hope for given the complexities it tries to deal with.
November 14, 2008
This is a nifty book. It consists of two novels: Hercules Text and A Talent for War. In an author's note, McDevitt writes that he has updated The Hercules Text from its original edition. It's a fine novel that raises all sorts of interesting issues.
Harry Carmichael is a respected administrator at a site called Skynet that examines space for evidence of other life forms. One day they see evidence that a million light years away, some alien intelligence has manipulated a star's light output in a pattern that can only be described as unnatural. A month later a stream of text from the Hercules nebula is received. Decoded, it consists of some mathematical and geometric symbols, a manual and what appear to be pictures of the beings who sent the message.
The president, worried about what else the message might contain, clamps a lid of secrecy on their facilities, irritating the scientists who work there and who feel that releasing the information can only be beneficial to the scientific community; after all, the humans never been enthusiastic about acting in concert as a species.
The religious community is divided on how to take this incontrovertible evidence that humans are not alone. One priest remarks, "How can we take seriously the agony of a God who repeats His passion? Who dies again and again in endless variations, on countless worlds, across a universe that may itself be infinite?", assuming that God had revealed Herself to the other worlds. And if not, why not? What did this do to human's perception of themselves as the primary focus of God? "If there were any truth at all to the old conviction that the universe had been designed for man, why was so much of its expanse beyond any hope of human perception? Forever.?"
As they learn more about the alien intelligence and begin to obtain information of value to the military, the scientific community begins to lose control of the information, and some of them want to have it destroyed. But they also learn something extraordinary about the intelligence that sent it to them millions of years before.
Harry Carmichael is a respected administrator at a site called Skynet that examines space for evidence of other life forms. One day they see evidence that a million light years away, some alien intelligence has manipulated a star's light output in a pattern that can only be described as unnatural. A month later a stream of text from the Hercules nebula is received. Decoded, it consists of some mathematical and geometric symbols, a manual and what appear to be pictures of the beings who sent the message.
The president, worried about what else the message might contain, clamps a lid of secrecy on their facilities, irritating the scientists who work there and who feel that releasing the information can only be beneficial to the scientific community; after all, the humans never been enthusiastic about acting in concert as a species.
The religious community is divided on how to take this incontrovertible evidence that humans are not alone. One priest remarks, "How can we take seriously the agony of a God who repeats His passion? Who dies again and again in endless variations, on countless worlds, across a universe that may itself be infinite?", assuming that God had revealed Herself to the other worlds. And if not, why not? What did this do to human's perception of themselves as the primary focus of God? "If there were any truth at all to the old conviction that the universe had been designed for man, why was so much of its expanse beyond any hope of human perception? Forever.?"
As they learn more about the alien intelligence and begin to obtain information of value to the military, the scientific community begins to lose control of the information, and some of them want to have it destroyed. But they also learn something extraordinary about the intelligence that sent it to them millions of years before.
February 18, 2023
I've read "The Hercules Text" years ago when the cold war was still around the corner somewhere, and I thought that this was a great novel. Now, more than a decade later, the author re-wrote it in a way that makes me suspect that he liked "Contact" - the movie with Jodie Foster - a lot.
The story itself changed only a little but the surrounding world ... . The original THT had the cold war feeling of paranoia and priorities, politicians playing for global survival with implied threats and unspoken hopes. This new THT is taking place in a world of US hegemony - little threats but no hopes.
In the original the various heroes act within their characters: fanatical, timid, bureaucratic, lovingly ... Harry Carmichael acts against orders but he doesn't go to the President's face to tell him so and offer him a Clintonesque way out ...
The times they are changing, but still it would have been better if Jack McDevitt would have left the original text unchanged. Even the future has a past- and a lot of good scifi novels are products of their age - and one should respect the past and not try to alter or reinterpret it. This way a great novel (5 stars)became just a very good (4 stars) one.
As for the second novel - "A Talent for War" - the title is very hard to understand till one has finished the book and then it doesn't really fit. Overall it is vintage McDevitt: a man searching for clues and the truth, a voyage, danger and adventures. All of it very slowly evolving and sucking the reader in so that he has to finish it. When I closed the last page it was half past one in the morning - but it was worth it.
So my overall judgment: a great book, but if you can get "The Hercules Text" in the original version buy that instead.
The story itself changed only a little but the surrounding world ... . The original THT had the cold war feeling of paranoia and priorities, politicians playing for global survival with implied threats and unspoken hopes. This new THT is taking place in a world of US hegemony - little threats but no hopes.
In the original the various heroes act within their characters: fanatical, timid, bureaucratic, lovingly ... Harry Carmichael acts against orders but he doesn't go to the President's face to tell him so and offer him a Clintonesque way out ...
The times they are changing, but still it would have been better if Jack McDevitt would have left the original text unchanged. Even the future has a past- and a lot of good scifi novels are products of their age - and one should respect the past and not try to alter or reinterpret it. This way a great novel (5 stars)became just a very good (4 stars) one.
As for the second novel - "A Talent for War" - the title is very hard to understand till one has finished the book and then it doesn't really fit. Overall it is vintage McDevitt: a man searching for clues and the truth, a voyage, danger and adventures. All of it very slowly evolving and sucking the reader in so that he has to finish it. When I closed the last page it was half past one in the morning - but it was worth it.
So my overall judgment: a great book, but if you can get "The Hercules Text" in the original version buy that instead.
September 2, 2020
Have now read all of the author's novels. Joined in late so ordered Hello Out There so I could read the first two. Really liked them both. Hercules Text is a terrific first contact novel. A Talent For War gave great background to the novels I've read after it's publication; including, Gabe's disappearance.
February 4, 2019
Review of first of the two novels in 'Hello Out There'. The Hercules Text (revised for this book) .... A first contact story the delves into the quandary of consequences and internal questions to be answer when dealing with a nebulous intelligent deity. Transfer of advanced technology may be the end of Humanity.
The second novel is 'A talent for War' which I read several years ago and did not reread yet, as I remember it was a novel worth reading and rereading.
The second novel is 'A talent for War' which I read several years ago and did not reread yet, as I remember it was a novel worth reading and rereading.
September 3, 2013
This volume collects McDevitt's first two novels, THE HERCULES TEXT and A TALENT FOR WAR. The former, his first, was extensively revised from its 1985 first appearance for this edition in 2000, to reflect the newer computer technologies and political climate. (By now, of course, all of that has changed again, so it can be read as an alternate-history piece for anyone who's too hung up on such continuity.)It's a very thoughtful piece, examining the religious, economic, political, and scientific ramifications of advanced knowledge being given to primitives... in this case, of course, we're the primitives, or the infants presented with a loaded gun to play with as the old saw goes. It was an excellent, thought-provoking debut novel.
The ironically-titled A TALENT FOR WAR is the first book in what became the Alex Benedict/Chase Kolpath series. It's a tale told by Alex, which threw me for a while, but that's probably my fault for reading the first one last. Chase is there as his partner (in more way than one?!?) for much of the book, and the story centers on the two-hundred-year-old mystery of the early days of the Mute war. It's another thought-provoking exploration of myth and heroism and how history can change how events are remembered.
The ironically-titled A TALENT FOR WAR is the first book in what became the Alex Benedict/Chase Kolpath series. It's a tale told by Alex, which threw me for a while, but that's probably my fault for reading the first one last. Chase is there as his partner (in more way than one?!?) for much of the book, and the story centers on the two-hundred-year-old mystery of the early days of the Mute war. It's another thought-provoking exploration of myth and heroism and how history can change how events are remembered.
June 17, 2012
An 'ok' story - a revised edition of 'The Hercules Text' updated for 2000 era political and technology changes. An interesting read but not particularly enthralling. A few nice concepts are presented and as long as you don't dwell too heavily on the implementation details then the technological and theoretical ideas are reasonable sound and researched.
A good read if between books. But some aspects of the story (I think) are still not quite as relevant/effective as they might have been if read in the 80's.
A good read if between books. But some aspects of the story (I think) are still not quite as relevant/effective as they might have been if read in the 80's.
November 8, 2010
A 2-in-1 omnibus edition containing McDevitt's The Hercules Text and A Talent for War. Of the two novels, I felt that A Talent for War was the far better story and would have preferred to read it separately.
While both novels deal with human contact with an alien species, there the similarity ends. They are otherwise unconnected, lumped together by a loose theme rather than any relationship of the story lines.
While both novels deal with human contact with an alien species, there the similarity ends. They are otherwise unconnected, lumped together by a loose theme rather than any relationship of the story lines.
August 7, 2009
Jack's 1st 2 books: 1. The Hercules Text revised edition and 2. A Talent for War the first Alex Benedict novel.
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March 7, 2011Read the first sub-book in early March, 2011.
Displaying 1 - 10 of 10 reviews