Member Review
Review by
Joseph K, Reviewer
Gregory Benford has been writing science fiction forever. Well, at least for a very long time, anyway. His wikipedia bibliography shows that his first novel was published in 1970, and his first short story was published in 1966. His breakout novel, TIMESCAPE, was published in 1980 and won the Nebula, British SF, and Campbell Awards. Aside from TIMESCAPE, he may best be known for his Galactic Center Saga - one of my favorite series of all time. I have a certain fondness for FOUNDATION'S FEAR, his contribution as one of the Killer B's (Brin, Benford, and Bear) in the Second Foundation series. While I've read a smattering of his novels, I don't believe I've read any of his short fiction, although sitting on my to be read stack is "The Best of Gregory Benford", so I suspect that at some point I'll get around to reading his short fiction as well.
His latest novel, SHADOWS OF ETERNITY, is touted as a "return to the sweeping galactic science fiction that readers have been waiting for". That is the tag line that caught my attention and drew my interest enough to want to read the novel. While I don't think that "sweeping galactic science fiction" is an accurate description, it does take the reader to places that are certainly not of this planet.
The good news is that SETI has born fruit. We have received messages from aliens far beyond our solar system. Two centuries from now, there is a SETI library on the moon, where Librarians attempt to disect and understand messages from those alien civilizations, but the most interesting ones are from alien artificial intelligences. Ruth, the protagonist that we follow throughout the book, is a Librarian in training, and she starts with the most difficult of projects, one which no experienced Librarian has been able to crack. She thinks highly of herself, and while those thoughts appear to be warranted, they end up being a bit unbelievable at times.
It's difficult to describe the plot of the novel, as there are many different stories going on. They do occur in a serial fashion, and in general one does not seem to have anything to do with the next except the final story is set up by one of Ruth's successes early in the novel. The early events are not interesting in and of themselves, other than to set up Ruth's notoriety which leads to the final story that makes up a majority of the novel. The Ythri (an idea that originally came from Poul Anderson who is credited in the Afterword) are coming to our Solar System to talk to Ruth. They feel she has the key to help them find what they are looking for. The Ythri are secretive, of course, and don't really want to divulge the secret of their quest, although we find out early on in this story that they came via a wormhole and need to find the wormhole to be able to go home. Humanity has never found a wormhole, although the existence of them has always been postulated.
In the course of the story, Fraq, the leader of the Ythri, takes Ruth on a series of challenges, including free fall from space to the surface of the Earth, to going deep under the surface of Mars, to wrangling a wormhole near the corona of the sun. But what is it all for?
And that indeed is the question the reader is left with when reaching the completion of the novel. Yes, the novel has a lot of interesting ideas that Benford explores in great detail; it *is* a hard science fiction novel, after all. And ideas always form the basis of traditional core sf, which this is. However, the novel is disjointed. As I previously stated, there are multiple stories here. Characters are introduced early on and then left behind, either never to be mentioned again or brought up in an offhand way. And while each of the stories within the novel are interesting in and of themselves, other than the common point of having the SETI library involved, they are not interconnected at all. Indeed, the final sections of the novel state that Ruth is no longer with the SETI library, without much explanation of why the separation happened. In the end, it's not really clear what
story Benford was trying to tell.
I would be remiss if I didn't bring up what I believe to be something totally irrelevant to whatever story Benford is trying to tell, that of how sex is treated in the book, and in particular Ruth's sexual escapades. They really don't add anything to the novel at all, and at times are down right...icky. While I'm not a prude by any stretch of the imagination, I still can't see the non-consensual sex with an AI episode as anything but off putting. It didn't add anything to the ongoing story, and it certainly didn't add anything to Ruth's character.
I really wanted to like this novel, and in fact there were portions that I found fascinating and interesting. But in the end, no number of interesting ideas - I really did like that sequence where the attempt was made to wrangle a wormhole excruciatingly close to the sun - were able to make this an inviting book. Benford is 80 now, and I hope that if he writes another novel that it will be better than this one. If he doesn't write another one, he's had a terrific career. Of that there is no doubt.
His latest novel, SHADOWS OF ETERNITY, is touted as a "return to the sweeping galactic science fiction that readers have been waiting for". That is the tag line that caught my attention and drew my interest enough to want to read the novel. While I don't think that "sweeping galactic science fiction" is an accurate description, it does take the reader to places that are certainly not of this planet.
The good news is that SETI has born fruit. We have received messages from aliens far beyond our solar system. Two centuries from now, there is a SETI library on the moon, where Librarians attempt to disect and understand messages from those alien civilizations, but the most interesting ones are from alien artificial intelligences. Ruth, the protagonist that we follow throughout the book, is a Librarian in training, and she starts with the most difficult of projects, one which no experienced Librarian has been able to crack. She thinks highly of herself, and while those thoughts appear to be warranted, they end up being a bit unbelievable at times.
It's difficult to describe the plot of the novel, as there are many different stories going on. They do occur in a serial fashion, and in general one does not seem to have anything to do with the next except the final story is set up by one of Ruth's successes early in the novel. The early events are not interesting in and of themselves, other than to set up Ruth's notoriety which leads to the final story that makes up a majority of the novel. The Ythri (an idea that originally came from Poul Anderson who is credited in the Afterword) are coming to our Solar System to talk to Ruth. They feel she has the key to help them find what they are looking for. The Ythri are secretive, of course, and don't really want to divulge the secret of their quest, although we find out early on in this story that they came via a wormhole and need to find the wormhole to be able to go home. Humanity has never found a wormhole, although the existence of them has always been postulated.
In the course of the story, Fraq, the leader of the Ythri, takes Ruth on a series of challenges, including free fall from space to the surface of the Earth, to going deep under the surface of Mars, to wrangling a wormhole near the corona of the sun. But what is it all for?
And that indeed is the question the reader is left with when reaching the completion of the novel. Yes, the novel has a lot of interesting ideas that Benford explores in great detail; it *is* a hard science fiction novel, after all. And ideas always form the basis of traditional core sf, which this is. However, the novel is disjointed. As I previously stated, there are multiple stories here. Characters are introduced early on and then left behind, either never to be mentioned again or brought up in an offhand way. And while each of the stories within the novel are interesting in and of themselves, other than the common point of having the SETI library involved, they are not interconnected at all. Indeed, the final sections of the novel state that Ruth is no longer with the SETI library, without much explanation of why the separation happened. In the end, it's not really clear what
story Benford was trying to tell.
I would be remiss if I didn't bring up what I believe to be something totally irrelevant to whatever story Benford is trying to tell, that of how sex is treated in the book, and in particular Ruth's sexual escapades. They really don't add anything to the novel at all, and at times are down right...icky. While I'm not a prude by any stretch of the imagination, I still can't see the non-consensual sex with an AI episode as anything but off putting. It didn't add anything to the ongoing story, and it certainly didn't add anything to Ruth's character.
I really wanted to like this novel, and in fact there were portions that I found fascinating and interesting. But in the end, no number of interesting ideas - I really did like that sequence where the attempt was made to wrangle a wormhole excruciatingly close to the sun - were able to make this an inviting book. Benford is 80 now, and I hope that if he writes another novel that it will be better than this one. If he doesn't write another one, he's had a terrific career. Of that there is no doubt.
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