Manifold: Time

David Deutsch of Oxford University has said of the Universe's complexity, "If we nudge one of these constants just a few percent in one direction, stars burn out within a million years of their formation, and there is no time for evolution. If we nudge it a few percent in the other direction, then no elements heavier than helium form. No carbon, no life. Not even any chemistry. No complexity at all."
Baxter plays out this scenario to its logical conclusion, the end of our Universe and far beyond. How would you like to save the world? Would it be enough? How about saving the Universe? The author's tightly-plotted tale has a core of realistically-depicted, three-dimensional characters (and two strong female characters just for good measure), and it's well worth a read.

Stephen Baxter's intriguing book provides a new view to predicting Earth's end. His style of writing, although a bit slow at times, allows the characters to develop to bring the story to its irreversible end, and what an ending it is.
I am impressed by Baxter's creativity. For an author with such an extensive technical background he goes beyond that call to incorporate simplicity to the scientific material and to explore the depth and interaction of his characters leading to earth's outcome without being humdrum!
A most enjoyable book, well written and would recommend it to all sci-fi buffs who really want food for thought.
Ceridwen "C.J." Johnson Toronto, Canada

or at least pilot an interplanetary ship and begin a mining project on an asteroid. What should seem like a silly mess becomes an intriguing science fiction adventure with a sense of wonder that is like that first viewing of 2001 or Star Wars. I look forward to the remainder of the triology and to other works by Baxter.

Baxter's narrative, especially the squid-pilots, is fairly compelling as noted by other reviewers. But Time is too reminiscent of others' stories and images, especially Clarke's (surprised Time won the Clarke award? it's a look-alike contest!) and Blish's, to seem particularly innovative.

This is a very deceptive book. It starts with no fanfare: I was immediately sucked into what appeared to be a great setup for a plot. However, I soon realized that the plot does not so much develop as advance jerkily and unpredictably. The reader is dropped into implausible situations that exist only to give his "scientific evangelist" characters a framework from which to lecture, Ayn Rand style, on some aspect of physics. In fact, the constant introduction of new physics seems to substitute for actual plot.
As soon as Baxter kills off the physicist responsible for most of the lecturing, the book degrades rapidly. Without physics to substitute for plot, the book drags on for a few hundred pages until it ends abruptly.
The idea of this book has merit. I was initially excited to see where Baxter would go with the ideas he proposes in the first chapter. But on many occasions, just when I thought the next physics lecture would tie everything together, he threw in something completely out of the blue.
The plot (what there is of it) does not resolve at the end. We are left with an great explosion, and a physics lecture to justify killing off every major character in the book.
Don't waste your time on this book.

Caution, Spoilers Ahead

This is a really awful book--one of the few truly laughable works of recent so-called "hard"science fiction. While there are a lot of unrelated sub plots (with some admittedly interesting scientific "what if's,") the real plot line is simplistic, preposterous, muddle-headed and just downright offensive. In Baxter's hypothetical near future, people of the future somehow reach back in time to create a bunch of super intelligent children whose mission (we find in the end, after countless red herrings) is...wait for it...to destroy the universe! But, these kids are not the bad guys, because (in Baxter's view) the "heat death" of the universe is somehow intolerable to the human spirit. Thus, by destroying the universe ("It's the wrong universe!" exclaims one of the children) a new one with different physical laws will be created in its place; and even though everybody in the old universe dies a terrible death, it's ok because the new universe will somehow recreate the human mind and we will all live happily ever after in a universe that is eternal, set free of the horrible laws of thermodynamics.

This is about the loopiest idea for a science fiction story I've ever heard. It also puts Baxter squarely in the camp of the "we-are-the-only-intelligent-life-in-the-universe" crowd. As you may know, there are two lines of thought on extraterrestrial intelligence: "we are alone" is one; and "we are not alone" is the other. The math and statistics of each is camp points, not to a right or wrong analysis of the data, but rather insufficient data. It's an argument tantamount to the existence of God, with both sides stridently arguing their obvious correctness.

In any case, this novel is pure drivel, with an idiotic premise, and an idiotic conclusion.

When I first picked up Manifold: Time I was unimpressed and put it down after 15 pages. Weeks later when I started reading it again out of boredom, I couldn't put it down. This book has some of the first new ideas I've come across in a while. Baxter isn't the GREATEST writer of all time, but he is the perfect man for this story. In a way, I see Manifold Time as scientific theology. It gives all life purpose, no matter how insignificant it may seem.
That all said, this book probably isn't for you if you hate science and want more of a space opera.

Interesting story, plenty of science nuggets, the timespan sequence that shows the end of the universe through Heat Death was certainly fascinating but it needs more character depth to make it a higher scoring book. The Blue Children reminded me of Nancy Kress's Beggars in Spain, but they were just sort of thrown away at the end. Well, come to think of it, so was the universe. :) I also didn't like Cornelius much.

While the main character, Reid Malenfant, seems at time to be nothing more than a foil for other characters, the plot and ideas more than make up for this slight detraction. A facinating look that combines various ideas from as far back as twenty years ago. Very reminisicent of "2001" in its sense of wonder. But since it is a substantially larger book, the ideas are bigger and more numerous. Baxter's predictions of the future are disquieting because of how logical he has extrapolated his ideas. A near flawless science fiction novel.

This is an amazingly depressing novel which denies the existence of God and finds Christians to blame for virtually every bad thing that happens.
There is a disturbing assumption through out this novel that we know exactly how everything works in the physical universe and that man is the most important thing to come along in this happenstance we call life.

Great concept, rotten characters I could care less about. A mind is aterrible thing to waste when you don't have characters, or for that matter writing talent, to pull it off. TIME SHIPS was a much better story.

The book is an extraordinary work of Sci Fi which is based on ideas and fact that have already been proven and written about in various scientific journals. The book comprises such a wide band of theories: front time travel to genetically enhanced squid to alternative universes. Further, there is human drama which seems even more exilerating considering the events taking place in the backgroud. All this, and much more, combined in one work of art.
I highly recommend the book.

You've got to admire Stephen Baxter for undertaking such a difficult project: an adventure across the slopes of time, evolution and the universe to find humanity's place. I think he pulls it off. Some of the concepts were difficult, but the characters are there searching for understanding as well. It's a fun and wondrous read. This book stands with 2001, Fantastic Voyage and even Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy.

You've got to admire Stephen Baxter for undertaking such a difficult project: an adventure across the slopes of time, evolution and the universe to find humanity's place. I think he pulls it off. Some of the concepts were difficult, but the characters are there searching for understanding as well. It's a fun and wondrous read. This book stands with 2001, Fantastic Voyage and even Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy.

This book was terrible. The characters were lousy and I didn't care about any of them. The story was slow and boring. And the science was just too much. I know, it's supposed to be "hard" science fiction, but if you like it that hard, I'm sure that there are some science textbooks out there that would have a better story and much better science.

The scope of this novel is immense. From the savannas of Africa to the beginnings of the universe, Manifold:Time is an adventure of such gargantuan proportions its amazing that it fit into one book. This is Sci-Fi at its best.

The accounts of rocket and space craft development are pretty ridiculous, but the 'deep time' sections are spectacular. Manifold Space is probably the strongest book of the trilogy, and Time is good but has a weak ending.

Reid Malenfant is awesome! It was great fun watching him tour the cosmos. My one gripe is the squids. Squids, really? It just seemed too far fetched, but hey, "suspension of disbelief," right? In any case, I loved this book.

Perhaps the worst written science fiction novel I have ever read. The characters were lifeless and not at all engaging. You simply didn't care what they were going to do next. The plot was a paper thin, meandering mess. Despite the fact that I really enjoy novels about twisting time, I just can't find a redeeming feature in this novel. This was the first book I read by Baxter. It will certainly be my last. Don't waste your valuable time on this dreck!