Hugo & Nebula Awards: Best Novels discussion
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A Deepness in the Sky
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Kateblue, 2nd star to the right and straight on til morning
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Antti wrote: "An excellent book, though very different from FITD. I would recommend this to anyone who loved Children of Time: Tchaikovsky obviously has read DITS, probably several times."Hmm … while Children of Time is one of my most loved SF books of all time I nearly didn't make it through DITS. So I'm not sure the recommendation works ^^', it definitely didn't for me. I liked FUTD, but I was rather frustrated with this second book.
Allan wrote: "A Deepness in the SkyI plan to read this book in May, following onto our November group read of A Fire Upon the Deep. It will not likely be a group read for awhile, as ..."
I am interesting in reading it as well. I will probably be able to start the reading in a week or so, as I need to finish a couple of books first.
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I'll give it a shot in about a week. Have to finish two other books.
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I started it a couple of days ago. I read the first 100 pages or so, not bad so far.
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Kateblue, 2nd star to the right and straight on til morning
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See, Necot, my problem is, I don't want to read books that are "not bad so far" after 100 pages. I know our goal is to read all the H&N winners and nominees, but I'm not sure that "not bad so far" is good enough to bother . . .
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Kateblue wrote: "Necot wrote: "I started it a couple of days ago. I read the first 100 pages or so, not bad so far."See, Necot, my problem is, I don't want to read books that are "not bad so far" after 100 pages...."
I understand what you mean; on the other hand, it is a 700-or-so-pages book, and, like in a Fire Upon the Deep, the story is building up quite slowly. Let's say that after having read 100 pages, I find it worthy to invest time in the next 100 pages.
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The manhunt extended across more than one hundred light-years and eight centuries. It had always been a secret search, unacknowledged even among some of the participants.
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I'm 100 pages in, and enjoying it so far. The only thing that bugs me is the time words: Ksec and Msec are not at all intuitive.A couple questions: Who was "the Man" and what is his significance?
Was there a physical explanation given for the On/Off star?
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Maybe it is due to my active work with computers, but kilo and mega (1000 and 1'000'000) were quite intuitive. The problem is their conversion. They are 17 min and 11.6 days
There is quite a lot about the man later, but from the previous volume you may recall his ultimate fate (which happened AFTER this novel), an ultimate tragedy, as Jo Walton wrote in her review on Tor.com
Yes, the units of time feel quite inconvenient. For having a rough idea of the order of magnitude involved I just keep in mind that:1Ks ~ 15 minutes and 1Ms ~ 10 days.
Regarding your questions: I am pretty sure we will get the answers in the rest of the book.
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I’m 100 pages in myself and really enjoying it. The suspense grows, as you start to realize what’s going to happen, and you’re just waiting for THAT moment to crash down. Although I don’t think it’s a sequel, and the events are grossly different, there’s an inkling of similarity, but I can’t really pinpoint it.
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They are:
http://www.tor.com/blogs/2008/07/deep...
http://www.tor.com/blogs/2011/01/so-h...
http://www.tor.com/blogs/2011/09/a-fi...
I plan to read the final volume of trilogy soon. It has nominated only for Locus, but if anyone wants a buddy read, please say so
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I may be in a minority, but I found it a bit of a slog, having read it soon after "A Fire upon the Deep". The planetside story was awesome, the space part could have been shorter.
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Gabi had the same sentiment in her review IIRC. I enjoyed the longer version, but maybe because several other SF reads failed to impress me and here was so much stuff
I finally bought this book, I'll be starting it within the next few weeks i think. I loved the first one, very different from anything else I've read.
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I have just finished to read it. It was pretty good. I liked very much how each faction had been characterized with its own culture and philosophies. Also the characters were pretty interesting. I liked in particular the middle parts of the book, where the plot really started to develop. However I found portions of the final chapters a bit too predictable: I had the feeling that the author made some events occurr just for the sake of appeasing the reader, without other logical justification.
I'm about halfway now, alternating with other books. It's still good. A couple of questions:Who is Cindi and why is she so important to Pham? Was she a potential love interest? What is she supposed to represent? Some kind of innocence?
Who is Zamle Eng? We get very little info. Just a generic name for betrayal, basically?
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It is a bit of a spoilers, so (view spoiler)
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I really enjoyed this book - one of the best I've read this year. I finished some time ago, but it took me some time to collect my thoughts. Here are some questions I had. I remember almost none of the first book in the series. As a result, the prologue, with "the Man" i.e. Ducanh i.e. Pham Nuwen doesn't make sense to me. How did he end up there, what was he doing there? Did Sammy's visit suddenly rekindle his ambition? Can anyone provide the context from the first book necessary to appreciate this?
The first few mentions of Brisgo Gap don't seem to make sense. They reference "ejets": why?
In Chapter 42, Pham thinks to himself about Ezr: "You're part of the reason I have to kill Anne Reynolt, you little jerk." Why?
In Chapter 43, why did Pham blow the localizers when he and Ezr were talking about Focus? I realize he was angry and emotional, but this act seemed impetuous and pointless, which is not in character.
In Chapter 55, why did Victory and co. show up to the command center and take control? Was it just to ensure they stayed online so Trixia and co. could control it? If so, what were Trixia and co. hoping to do with that command center?
Chapter 66 (the last one): When Trixia and Victory were talking, Victory said: "But it got harder and harder to disguise the counterlurk. Videomancy was a great cover, it let us have independent hardware and a covert data stream right under the humans' snouts." What was the purpose of this counterlurk, and was Trixia involved with it?
Epilogue: Pham plans to go to the galactic core, seemingly on the off-chance that he may find a "supercivilization". Does this strike anyone else as implausible, too much of a shot in the dark?
The characters speculate that Sherkaner went underground or something, "he intends to outlast all the mysteries"..."beginning on the greatest Lurk of all." What's all this about?
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The problem is the the first book, i.e. A Fire Upon the Deep takes place centuries after this one. There is a great review by Jo Walton here on why this is a tragedy: https://www.tor.com/2008/07/19/deepne...
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Too bad nobody told us that first! Hey! I never finished A Fire Upon the Deep! So you are saying I should read this one and then A Fire Upon the Deep?
I guess I have to read this one a second time when I'm more in the mood for it (and once my TBR pile isn't sky high). At the first read it left me rather unconvinced and a started skipping passages.
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They are different stories set in different zones of the same universe. I think reading them as they were published is correct. However, first two volumes can be read as standalones, only the third starts shortly after first (I just started, so not sure about the same/different characters)
@Ryan, I'll try to answer your questions later today if time permits
Would still appreciate any engagement with my questions!
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ok, let's see
Ryan wrote: "How did he end up there, what was he doing there? Did Sammy's visit suddenly rekindle his ambition? Can anyone provide the context from the first book necessary to appreciate this?"
It is described later in this book, that his love betrayed him and his idea of uniting humanity, so he became a hermit to die and I think that either the ambition was rekindled or he just wanted to live.
Ryan wrote: "The first few mentions of Brisgo Gap don't seem to make sense. They reference "ejets": why?"
Firstly, there is Brisgo Gap - a place where the Traders had saved a high civilization and billions of lives. And there is the Brisgo Gap, the ship named after that success. Ejet is a short for electric jet, used by ships and later the giant diamond to maneuver.
Ryan wrote: "In Chapter 42, Pham thinks to himself about Ezr: "You're part of the reason I have to kill Anne Reynolt, you little jerk." Why?"
IIRC because Ezr is a bad conspirator and Anne leads Focused, who can uncover Ezr, so kill her to protect him and the conspiracy
Thanks! I hadn't realized that Pham's timeline between getting betrayed and getting picked up happened without any significant intervening events. I guess Pham maneuvered his ship from the fleet Sura had provided him with to Triland, for some reason. I don't believe this reason was ever stated.Nor had I picked up on the Brisgo Gap being the name of a spaceship as well as a place where the betrayal occurred.
Your explanation about Ezr also makes sense.
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Sorry, forget with other matters. Next time do not hesitate to remind in a day or two.
So, what do we have?
In Chapter 43, why did Pham blow the localizers when he and Ezr were talking about Focus? I realize he was angry and emotional, but this act seemed impetuous and pointless, which is not in character.
In the chapter Erz criticizes Pham for wanting to use Focused as the backbone of his planned empire and says they aren't slaves. Pham is angry with Erz, who dares to disagree with him and shows that he is the boss by destroying localizers and noting "Without the localizers, we die! Die, little Vinh. I no longer care." - which can be translated "only my plan is right and only I can save us" So, it is part emotions (stakes are high, even Pham is human and under stress) and part dominance game.
In Chapter 55, why did Victory and co. show up to the command center and take control? Was it just to ensure they stayed online so Trixia and co. could control it? If so, what were Trixia and co. hoping to do with that command center?
I guess yes, Trixia and co. could control it, to prevent mutual annihilation by nuclear strikes and maybe keep communication with the orbit.
Chapter 66 (the last one): When Trixia and Victory were talking, Victory said: "But it got harder and harder to disguise the counterlurk. Videomancy was a great cover, it let us have independent hardware and a covert data stream right under the humans' snouts." What was the purpose of this counterlurk, and was Trixia involved with it?
the purpose to supply spiders with data about humans in such a way that humans in charge of annexing the planet were unaware of such talks. I think (cannot recall for sure) that Trixia knew the true reason behind videomancy (think of it like Einstein suddenly dropped his studies for astrology, but this is because aliens use tech to make starlight in specific regions Morse blink)
Epilogue: Pham plans to go to the galactic core, seemingly on the off-chance that he may find a "supercivilization". Does this strike anyone else as implausible, too much of a shot in the dark?
The idea is sound - the core has older stars, so life should have started there earlier. Also the distance between stars there is smaller, so easier to setup a multi-star empire
Hugo & Nebula Awards: Best Novels
Books mentioned in this topic
A Fire Upon the Deep (other topics)Foundation (other topics)
The Moon Is a Harsh Mistress (other topics)
A Deepness in the Sky (other topics)
A Fire Upon the Deep (other topics)
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Authors mentioned in this topic
Jo Walton (other topics)Jo Walton (other topics)
Jo Walton (other topics)
I plan to read this book in May, following onto our November group read of A Fire Upon the Deep. It will not likely be a group read for awhile, as we have been heavy on winners and don't want to run out of them! However, it's part of my personal quest to finish out all the Hugo/Nebula winners this year. Anyone who wants to join in is welcome, just let me know your timing, and contribute to discussion here!