The Dreaming Void-Dan's Pick

[Maggie, space cruisin' for a bruisin']

It's Dan's turn this month, and the poll winner is Dreaming Void by Peter Hamilton
What did you think?

[mark, personal space invader]

I hope people like this one! I quite enjoyed it.

[Anthony]

I liked this one, but as with Pandora's Star / Judas Unchained, you must read the rest of the trilogy to get a sense of closing :)

[Edward]

Have to agree with Anthony. I enjoyed the Void series overall, this and the last being the better of the three. This was my first Hamilton book having read a number of Iain M Banks previously and I was not disappointed, though it did feel a little slow at times. Overall, a good book with some great ideas.

[Scott]

I read this a few years ago and didn't care for it, though some of the ideas were interesting. To be honest, I felt kind of lost. Though it's the first book in a trilogy, it references a larger universe that's been written about in other books of his.

Fortunately I decided to give him another chance and I really liked Pandora's Star. Not sure if I'll come back to these eventually.

[Micah]

I read the entire series and thought it got worse as it went along. I liked the Science Fiction parts, but the whole dreaming void thing just ended up feeling like Hamilton wanted to write a fairly standard fantasy tale but didn't want to jump genres.

To me the blending of those two elements felt forced and unconvincing (no matter how well he ultimately justified it scientifically).

[mark, personal space invader]

I loved the high fantasy elements! my favorite parts of the novel, actually - so if anything, the series improved for me because the third novel is so dominated by the fantasy sequences.

[Micah]

That's the thing: if you like High Fantasy as well as complex high tech SF, then this series is definitely for you. If you're not into High Fantasy, you will be disappointed like I was.

[Scott]

That's probably why I didn't like it. Plus I hate reading dream sequences in general.

[Dan]

I am trying to read this book, but finding it immensely difficult to track the characters and their motivations.

[LindaJ^]

You can't really enjoy Void series if you've not read Pandora's Star and Judas Unchained. I liked the series and I liked the fantasy, especially in the first book of the series.