Redemption Ark (Revelation Space)

I marvel at the mind of Alatair Reynolds, and wonder how he was able to create this universe of complex characters and plots that swept me away. For the last 2 days I put my life on hold and devoted every available minute to reading Redemption Ark.

There is a savage enemy that is determined to eradicate humanity, and a host of fascinating characters who, each in his/her own way, works to defeat it.

Clavain's story becomes the thread that pulls this novel into a cohesive whole. He has lived for centuries, mostly as a solder, often having to make difficult moral decisions. Now he and those around him are literally in the fight for their lives. A part of their arsenal includes recently discovered alien technology which can literally manipulate the quantum fabric of space, but used incorrectly the consequences are horrifying.

I have also read Revelation Space and Chasm City. Although not strictly necessary it is probably best to read the books in sequence. All three are equally absorbing. Now I just have to find the time to read the next book in the series - Absolution Gap

Okay, I've slogged through Revelation Space, Chasm City, and now Redemption Ark. I should've given up after Chasm City, which took forever to go precisely nowhere, but no, I stuck it out with this one. What a mistake. The characters of Revelation Space mutate herein into almost unrecognizable caricatures of their former selves; in particular Ana Khouri becomes a lovelorn weakling; and further, though one keeps waiting for him to reappear, Dan Sylveste never does. But the "insult to injury" moment comes late in the book when, after we've finally gotten into some relevant and fairly entertaining space-based action, a new chapter begins jarringly with a major character waking up from a lengthy, induced sleep-trance. The other characters then fill him in, oh-so-briefly, on the various crucial events that transpired while he decided to take a nap. I felt so cheated, I could've thrown the book through a window! Having scanned ahead to some of the scathing reviews of Reynold's third book in the trilogy (Chasm City is a stand-alone detour), I have decided that life is too short, and good books too many, to bother with Reynolds again. His overall inability to construct and maintain a sensible, coherent plot makes for some mighty frustrating reading. But then again, his space-operatic premises are often intriguing, and his characters are sometimes compelling...and such great cover designs too....oh well, maybe I'll stick it out for the last one....

Alastair Reynolds has it, and he is running with it. Somehow out of a genre that hasn't had much interesting things happen to it in recent history (I think) Alastair has created a unique and highly colorful landscape of technology, characters, motivations, and catastrophes that is simply incredible. I usually read fantasy, but I picked up Revelation Space and couldn't just stop with that one and continued on with Chasm city and now, Redemption Ark the newest book in his science fiction futuristic series.
The complexity of this book alone should win awards within literary circles, the sheer number of plots, subplots and threads of storyline is staggering, but somehow, surprisingly, Reynolds weaves it all together and the reader is completely in the story for the entire length of the book. I think that this is probably one of the best books out today for science fiction or for fantasy, and I highly recommend reading this book to whoever has a rainy Sunday to read good literature (good luck putting it down once you start.). I highly anticipate the new book in the series and hope it is as good as the last 2. Thank you Alastair for bringing some excellent literature to this genre of writing.

Plot Summary: As in Revelation Space, there are 3 major plotlines that converge as the book goes on. First there are the conjoiners Skade, Clavain, Galiana, and Felka and the various intricasies of their enhanced mind society. They are at war with the Demarchists who play a minor role in this book. We are introduced to Antoinette Bax, her friends, and her ship as her path intersects Clavain's in the war zone, a place where she whould not be. For some reason the conjoiners see fit to let Bax live but this is not the last time their fates will bring them together. Meanwhile near Resurgam, Khouri and Volyova have both survived the events of Revelation Space and are witnessing the Inhibitors as they build a sun and planet destroying weapon of unknown capabilities. Far from helpless, they devise a plan to evacuate the colonists and, if needed, use the cache of weapons aboard their lighthugger. Skade has designs on getting those weapons for the good of the conjoiners but Clavain does not like Skade's reasoning so he also is racing to get to those weapons. It turns out this is not the conjoiners first or last brush with the Inhibitors, who they call the "wolves".

Opinion: Other than some minor things, I thought this book was a much better read than Revelation Space. The plot elements stayed seperate up until the climactic ending, as opposed to their convergence before the halfway point in Revelation. There was much more technical discussion and hard sci-fi elements to this book. While I love the extra desciptive elements, it tends, rarely, to drag the dialog down at times. Not often, but a couple times, I thought to myself "get on with it". I did not read Chasm City but I sense some things in Ark would make a little more sense, or at least have been more fleshed out in my mind, had I read it. I cared more for the characters of this book. I felt like I could actually relate to the motives of the characters and could "root" for a few of them to succeed. They do still have their flaws which just adds to their realism. The galaxy is getting more dangerous as the Inhibitors are making very noticable moves against the human race forcing characters to make difficult decisions, for better and worse. I was satisfied with the conclusion despite not much being resolved. In fact, the seperate plots merge together very well near the last few chapters. A big finish is being set up here and it shows.

Recommendation: It is a great continuation of the Revelation Space story, so if you liked the first, you should love the second. Maybe Chasm City would be a better second book in this series. This is a much more technically descriptive novel than Revelation Space so if too many long winded explanations detract from your enjoyment, you might not like this one as well as previous books. I thought everything was great except the concept of hyperpigs was just a little much for me. I rate this 4.5 out of 5 stars, I can't wait to read the conclusion of the series.

Plenty of people have written to summarize the plot, so instead I'm just going to focus on describing the experience of reading this book.

I spent the entirety of this book waiting for a climax that never came. Actually, it came, but while we were sleeping (!!really). It's like the author had a deadline, and when that deadline came he just had to stop writing, no matter how pissed off he leaves the reader (OMG it's WORSE in Absolution Gap). I could rant several pages about leaving the reader hanging like that. Ok, so it's a device to get us to read the next book - wait a second, nope, nevermind, he just skips over it. And what?? Is the little girl supposed to bring some sort of humanity into the story - contrast Clavain? Instead she just annoys me because he didn't develop her character enough to make me care.

In summary, he skips over the parts you want to read, goes into depth about a lot of things you won't care about, and generally speaking not much actually happens in this book - just a lot of explaining. The book's not entirely hopeless as it fills in many details about the RS universe, but I kept on waiting and waiting for things to pick up like they did in RS and it just never happened, leaving me very disappointed and hoping that "maybe the next one will be better" (hahaha - nope)

Alastair Reynold's strength comes from the fact that he has crafted a truly remarkable world, with extraordinarily imaginative beings. His greatest triumph, however, is that he has brought back what the sci-fi genre truly needs: REAL SCIENCE. This novel is for those of us who love Robert Heinlen, Poul Anderson, Larry Niven, Isaac Asimov, and Arthur C. Clarke.
Too many people were brought up with Star Wars and Star Trek which are 95% fantasy and 5% melodrama. As good as they may be, they have NOTHING to do with science fiction. Reynolds uses both fantasy elements and science elements to create a strange and horrific, yet alluring vision of the future. A place where humans have reshaped themselves into things almost unrecognizable, where you can travel to other worlds only if you're willing to forever leave behind your family and friends.
Redemption Ark is not as good as Revelation Space. Part of the attraction I found to Revelation Space was the feeling of a vast history that is merely referred to by the characters but never shown the reader. I found the mystery of this undiscovered knowledge to be attractive. Redemption Ark reveals the answers to many questions, and though it brings up many questions of its own, it takes away from that alluring mystery.
Again, the book contains multiple plot lines just like Chasm City and Revelation Space. The style is relatively the same, lacking in characterization but very strong in style, science, and intelligence. I highly recommend this novel to anyone who enjoys REAL science fiction, not dumbed down nonsense that condenses easily into a 1 hour tv program (hint hint: star trek).

Redemption Ark is the third novel in the Revelation Space series, following Revelation Space. In the previous volume, the Nostalgia for Infinity has retrieved forty hell-class weapons from a hidden cache and carried them away. The Captain and crew know very little about the weapons, but Ila Volyova is the closest to a resident expert. While an Ultra herself, Volyova doesn't carry any implants at all, so she has acquired, modified and trained Boris Nagorny to be the Gunnery Officer. Unfortunately, Nagorny had a psychotic episode, tried to kill her, and ended up dead himself.

The ship's Captain, John Armstrong Brannigan, has been mostly consumed by the nanoplague, which has also spread to the ship systems themselves. Volyova has reduced the Captain's temperature to cryogenic levels and tried various anti-nanite measures with no success. So the lighthugger has came to Yellowstone in the Epsilon Eridani system to procure the services of Dan Sylveste to treat the Captain's condition. However, Sylveste was no longer there, having gone to Resurgam in the Delta Pavonis system.

Ana Khouri was an ex-soldier and assassin impressed into the service of the Mademoiselle, who had Khouri's husband in a reefer. The Mademoiselle had plans for Dan Sylveste and Khouri was her chosen agent to execute these plans. Nonetheless, a copy of the Mademoiselle would be riding an implant within Khouri's brain during the mission.

Ila Volyova needed a gunner to replace Nagorny. When Khouri applied for a ride to Delta Pavonis, Volyova covertly tested her aptitudes and implants and then snapped her up as a crewmember. But Volyova also deeply conditioned Khouri for loyalty before allowing her to join the crew.

In this novel, the Nostalgia for Infinity has survived its excursion against the deadly machines on, in and near Cerberus and Khouri has returned from the dead. Volyova has allowed the Captain to warm up and he has effectively become the ship itself. The rest of the crew were killed in the mutiny.

Khouri has briefed Volyova on the knowledge obtained within Hades, the neutron star that is also a gigantic computing machine. Now they are aware that the Inhibitors will probably be returning to destroy human life on Resurgam just as they had previously destroyed the Amarantin and so many other intelligent species throughout the galaxy. Khouri and Volyova have devised a scheme to evacuate Resurgam, but they don't know how much time they have. Fortunately they have already laid the groundwork when the machines appear and start disassembling three rocky moons within the system.

Volyova has been trying to get the Captain to approve the use of the hell-class weapons against the Inhibitors. However, the Captain is none too sane; he is feeling deep guilt for his treatment of Sakaji and goes catatonic whenever she brings up the subject of using the weapons. She has discovered, quite by accident, that all the weapons have an autonomic subpersona with a modicum of free will, but the Captain still has overriding priority.

The Conjoiners have decided that they want their weapons back. They decide to press Clavain to join the Closed Council so that he can lead the effort to retrieve the weapons. When he agrees, he is informed of the presence of the wolves, a machine intelligence that has possessed his beloved Galiana and killed all her crew. When he inspects the ships that will be made available to him, he decides that the Conjoiners are planning to abandon the rest of humanity to the wolves. He immediately takes action to defect from the Conjoiners.

Clavain has major obstacles in his mission to protect the rest of human from the dangerous wolves. He had defected to the Conjoiners 400 years ago from their enemies when he was convinced that his side was wrong. Now he is doing it again and may be making some headway, but he is stolen from the Demarchists and Ferrisville Convention forces by a mysterious Mr. H, who has very extensive connections.

While parts of this novel follow directly from Revelation Space, other portions refer back to Chasm City and still another backstory concerning the Conjoiners is introduced as well. This series seems to be written as a tapestry of plotlines that show up as minor details in one story and become a major thread in another. Moreover, the stories themselves have the same feel of plot elements woven in one scene that recur in later events. In fact, some components, such as the Mademoiselle, become even deeper mysteries in subsequent volumes. Somehow I don't think that the next volume, Absolution Gap, is going to resolve everything.

Remember everything. Trust nothing. Take notes. It will all be important later.

Highly recommended for Reynolds fans and for anyone else who enjoys suffering withdrawal pains between installments and truly contorted plot twists when the next volume arrives.

-Arthur W. Jordin

This takes place in the same universe as Revelation Space, and it turns out to be related. Two political factions, the Demarchists, and the Conjoiners have been fighting a war, and the mind-sharing Conjoiners are winning. Then something scares them, badly.

The action here is wide-scale again, after the one man story of Chasm City.

Clavain, the reluctant Conjoiner, and Skade, one of the new breed, must try and find some amazing super weapons to give them a chane against the entities know as the Wolves that they have discovered.

The Wolves have a job, to exterminate sentient species, and they are very good at it.

This is where some information from Dan Sylveste and his new form, and the ties to Revelation Space come in.

The Ultras from Nostalgia From Infinity also have interests in these weapons.

All characters involved have to decide what to do about the planet Resurgam, which will be the first to face the destructive power of the Wolves.

A story that is not finished until the next book.

A few years ago, I read "Revelation Space", a fine novel, rather interesting, except for the fact that it was wholly forgetable and I wholly forgot it as soon as I finished it. Then, I pick up "Redemption Ark", which is the "sequel" to "Revelation Space" and I had to force myself to remember its predecessor. I guess I should pay better attention when I read Sci-Fi novels as you'll never know when you have to rmemeber the intricate details of an author's universe.

Like "Revelation Space", "Redemption Ark" is set in a confusing, seemingly underpopulated human area of space where people live with no visible means of support, food or manufacturing. All those minor details aside, however, the book is an exercise in theoretical physics and the author strictly adheres to the relativistic qualities of space travel. Almost to the detriment of the novel itself. The book really does remind the reader of Arthur C. Clarke, and I imagine that Clarke was a huge influence in Reynold's life. Not a bad role model. Like Clarke, Reynolds takes into account all aspects of space travel, from gravity, inertia, energy consumption, things like that. Also like Clarke, his characters are a bit flat, not very interesting and the dialogue can get a bit unbelievable.

This book definitely had some good points and bad points. The best part of this novel as a space battle/chase scene held at relativistic speeds which was one of the most original space battles I've ever read. The bad points, however, outnumber the good ones. My biggest complaint about this book is that it didn't really get interesting until page 200 or so and it's WAY TOO LONG as it is. You can tell where the book was edited as key parts of it seem to have chopped out and you're left with a short explanation as to what happened. The next book in this series, "Absolution Gap" is also very long, weighing in at over 700 pages, so I expect the same there. I'll read "Absolution Gap", if for no other reason then I would like to see if the series gets better, but I promise you I won't finish it if it takes more then 200 pages to get going. Especially since this book sort of ends in the middle.

Light years ago, the Inhibitors feared intelligent species and built machines to stop any from developing. These killing machines traveled the universe to destroy intelligent life. Eons later, the machines must have failed as intelligent species have arisen including humans advancing throughout the cosmos.
Late in the twentieth-sixth century, the human crew of the Infinity learns why a sentient race suddenly vanished, but the crew also innocently rouse the Inhibitors. The death killing machines turn towards mankind for total annihilation. Planets are eradicated to tap into the raw material to build a doomsday destruction device never seen before by humanity. As humans compete and even kill one another to escape the coming genocide, only war criminal Clavain seems remotely capable of stopping what looks like human extinction.
Though there is a bit of the middle novel syndrome to REDEMPTION ARK, fans of hard core futuristic outer space action thrillers based on scientific theory will relish this Reynolds universe tale. The exciting story line picks up about fifty years after the events of REVELATION SPACE, but for the most part can stand on its own though reading the debut novel first is recommended. The key human characters are fully developed and make the audience believe that they the readers too are part of a doomed future because the Inhibitors seem so authentic. Those fans who want premium outer space adventure will peruse Alastair Reynolds's powerful two novels and its companion but independent tale, CHASM CITY, as well as some related short stories. This will have to satiate the audience until book three is released next year.
Harriet Klausner

Chasm City, and the Revelation Space books, bring to life a universe, that is as rich, dark, and weird as the early Greg Bear novels. If you like your science fiction hard and fast, with rich characters, these books are for you. Reynolds somehow brings the tremendously long distances and time spans between stars up to the speed of heat in his "lighthuggers" (relativistic starships) in Revelation Space, and describes a culture that had great wealth in technology, and lost it in Chasm City. So, go find yourself an intelligent weapon of planetary destruction in your lighthugger weapons bay, get your mods implants, and get ready for some kick-ass gunnery training. Sci-Fi doesn't get much better than this.

It was about what I expected. The ending perhaps felt a bit rushed and I was disappointed by a lack of detail around some things which happened which had been setup through the whole book. I very much hope this storyline continues with the next book.

Lacking the initiative to go back and review Reynolds' other books (for the moment,) I'm going to weigh in on his most recent. True fans of well-written hard SF should be aware of the strength of UK writers by now -- Alastair Reynolds needs to be held in the same esteem as Ken Macleod, Peter Hamilton and Richard K. Morgan. The works in his Inhibitors series (Revelation Space, Chasm City, and too many short stories and novellas to mention) are among the finest hard SF ever written. Redemption Ark shares their fine writing, storytelling and concepts, but as an obvious transition chapter in the overall story, it fails to excell as an actual novel.
Not to say it's not good and a fun read; on the contrary, it kept me glued to the page from start to finish. Its problem is its transitory nature -- it neither completes the saga of the Inhibitors and the human diaspora nor supplies a self-contained chapter of the overall story. The next (final?) book in the series, Absolution Gap, should rightfully complete the story begun in this book. A part two, if you will.
Ignore Reynolds at your own peril -- he's a force to be reckoned with in SF. Do not, however, begin your exposure to him with this book. Start with Relevation Space and follow from there. The rewards will be evident.

This book is really interesting. I finished it in a week, which is pretty fast for me. So it's a real page turner. This is a really good book, I liked the plot. The over all idea is good.
The only problem I have is that it's VERY obvious that he was in a hurry to finish the book. There are points where the characters start narating themselves. They say things to other characters that aren't natural. Like when they are explaining a conversation and then they describe what the person they were talking to was 'thinking'...
Then, at the end of the book, the story reaches it's climax.. you turn the page, and everyones waking up in cryogenic sleep pods. Then, as the people wake up the author just narates all the stuff he left out. I mean, it's blazing obvious that the author wasn't done with the book, his publisher called and said "We need the book done right away!" so the author thought "What gimmic can I use to fit the rest of the book into 5 pages? I know! They all wake up and then I gave just give a brief overview!" It's really too bad, this book should have been 2x as long.
Also, previously his books were semi-atonomis. You didn't need to have read 1 to understand the other. But with this one I think it's rather important to have read both the previous ones or there will be some rather large holes in your understanding.
I still thought it was a pretty good book though.

The novels of Reynolds have acquired a following. But as is the fate with may of these interminable-seeming series, it is beginning to flag and decompose under its own weight. This novel will have little overall effect on the genre and in fact has little to no effect even on its own universe. It almost acts as a bridge novel between Revelation Space and whatever it is that's coming next (rendering Chasm City all but forgotten). Few people, certainly, will read this book more than once.

WHY YOU SHOULD READ THIS:

Is there anything good about this book? Sort of. If you're desperately interested in the universe that Reynolds has created, then you will find some sections of this book interesting. But even Reynolds fanatics will have little use for the entire book. There really is no other reason to buy Redemption Ark in anything other than mass-market paperback.

WHY YOU SHOULD PASS:

Anyone who isn't a huge fan for some reason or another should pass. In fact, if you're a big fan, you may want to not read this book since it mildly harms its predecessors. There are plenty of reviewers out there who disagree with us, but if you're here and reading this review then you should trust us. There are far, far better books out there for you to read.

READ THE ENTIRE REVIEW AT INCHOATUS.COM

One of the best things about Alastair Reynolds is that he is a practicing astronomer who really knows what he is talking about when it comes to space and planetary motion. If Reynolds makes up something that is not realistic by today's standards he is at least basing it on the current theories of space and time. This is why a science major like myself would appreciate reading his fiction more than most of the pop that found in the sci-fi section of today's book store.
However, there are many problems with Redemption Ark. It was far less enjoyable to read then either Chasm city or Revelation Space. The strength of Reynolds writing comes largely from his was imagination that is not too far detached from realistic outlook on scientific principles of today (such as our inability to achieve the speed of light). He presents us a whole new and exciting world of the future, the world that is based on the assumption of human race having the intelligence to propagate its survival by colonizing space. The setting Reynolds presented was so convincing and intriguing that it made Revelation Space almost like an ethnographic account of new cultures as well as a novel at the same time. Chasm city had some of the same element but Redemption Ark had almost nothing new. Once again we find ourselves in the same world but we are no longer impressed by it, but find ourselves in a familiar territory.
Writer's style also started wearing off in its ingenuity. Reading Redemption Ark felt like being supplied with tiny spoons of interesting plot points drifting amid empty conversational and narration filler. It is if we are feed the relevant information at more or less constant rate as we progressed towards the end. At times there were many lines like: It was time to do what had to be done or Now she knew what to do or Now he understood the significance. Some chapters ended as over dramatized, unfinished soap opera episodes.
Yet although the aforementioned flaws are more or less forgivable the biggest downfall of Redemption Ark is failure to introduce and develop likable characters. There are too many characters that are poorly developed that get too much attention and plot time. One of such characters was Felka, a semi-crazy side kick of Clavain who we really do not know much about except her affection for Clavain. There is Galiana, mentioned way too much and too often but without enough of concrete information for us to draw up her personality. But the old characters are back but they are no longer as intriguing as before. Volyova is back but is more irritating this time.
The hardest thing about reading Redemption Ark was the first two hundred pages. The prolonged introduction to new characters and setting up of a plot was just too long and mind-numbing. Too bad I couldn't amplify my conciseness like a true Conjoner and read those pages fifteen times faster.
Overall, I think that this is a worthy read for any Alaistair Reynolds fan. It is somewhat less satisfying then his previous works but nonetheless Redemption Ark is still entertaining. I'm looking forward to reading more from Reynolds although I truly hope that whatever else he will write will have nothing to do with Revelation Space universe. It is time he applied his creativity onto a new project, Revelation Space saga had all the development it needed. Go Reynolds!

I have to agree with the earlier suggestion that Redemption Ark is a slow read, particularly during its first third - roughly 230 pages. I appreciate the hard science, the frequent flashes of imagination, and the detailed descriptions, but the characterization isn't all that strong. And we have one sappy character, Thorn, who gets way too much attention from Reynolds and, for that matter, deference from the other characters.

When the novel reached 670 pages, the author seems to have thrown in the towel and decided to end it as soon as possible. The remaining 20+ pages read like an epilogue (even before the formal "epilogue"), as outcomes are quickly explained to us that would have been better dramatized in full, since they represent the culmination of the novel. At least one or two important points are not explained at all. This is really a failure in planning the novel - or maybe a failure by Reynolds' editor. Some readers are bound to feel disappointed, if not cheated.

So, Alastair hits again. This (and its prequels) have some absolutely billiant bits. However...

You can almost predict when the editor is going to hit. There are some real potboilers lurking in this series - they miss the novel and may hit the novellas.

Forgetting the gaps this is the latest in a series of fascinating stories that answer ther Fermi Paradox (IE, if there is intelligent life in the universe why aren't the working at McDonald's?).

Somewhat fascinating.

Deeply imaginative work! Great series of expansive galactic history, action, adventure and conceptual monumental events. All interspersed with a variety of colorful characters and environments. Awesome!

I love Alastair Reynolds writing. While perhaps not as "action-packed" as some others, its still a great read and I'm glad there are still other RS books ahead of me.
I'm pretty new to the concept of space opera, but I am well and truly smitten with the grand and epic scale of these stories. Ill confess that Redemption Ark feels kind of like a middle of the series story, it picks up where others left off in places and leaves me hanging in still others, but I guess it is a middle installment so to speak, looking forward to more!

First, I'd give Revelation Space and Chasm City 5 stars. Both are masterpieces. This book retains some of the same brilliant energy and gnarly braininess, but just feels padded out toward the end. The ideas are there, the plot is good, but it could have had about 200 pages hacked out and been a far better book. Still a good read, but I think I'll lay off the Reynolds for awhile...I feel a little betrayed.

It's a year since I finished Revelation Space but, finishing Redemption Ark yesterday, I had the distinct impression that was a much better written book.

Reynold's strength is clearly his ability to come up with those hard scientific ideas that are a foundation of SF, but perhaps he doesn't know that - no matter what the genre - characters are at the foundation of any good story. In this area I believe Reynolds' has failed to develop plausible, complex and interesting characters. Perhaps total failure is too strong a word, but certainly next to the strength of his SF ideas the characterisation is very weak.

Perhaps the biggest glaring problem I had is this: This is an optimistic view of the technology and spread of humanity seven hundred years into the future, but also a attempt at realism - so why has their actually humanity barely developed in this period? Why has society and culture hardly evolved?

Reynolds makes half-hearted attempts to invent new social organisations. The Conjoiners are his prime example and tantalising reference to them is made in the first book. Here, we finally get some details only to learn that beneath the surface they resemble every other human group in the book - being populated by self-serving squabbling humans who nonetheless all exhibit remarkable ability to do high-level physics on the fly but are unable to progress beyond the petty competitiveness and oneupmanship that dominated their collective pasts.

We get told of bigger, broader motives - Clavain's desire to save humanity - but we never really FEEL them. Reynold's DESCRIBES a lot of internal conflict - the decision to blow up Nightshade - but rarely SHOWS us.

In short, I found all the characters to end up being pale imitations of each other and was lead to wonder whether we shouldn't let the Inhibitors destroy this fascinatingly technological yet spritually barren interpretation of humanity's future after all.

There was plenty more to indicate to me Reynolds is already falling away into a being a churner of mass-produced triviality, something rife in the fantasy genre but so far less prevalent in SF.

The whole episode of the capture of Zodiacal Light is a glaring omission and could have made one of the best chapters in the book. I was reminded of the contrast between this and Neil Stephenson's Confusion where an entire book is devoted to a swashbuckling boat-capture adventure! Reynolds skims over this with a bare minimum of attention, missing a great opportunity no seasoned storyteller would pass up and also an obvious opportunity to develop Scorpio's and the other pigs' characters (think about how weak Scorpio's evil intent towards humans seems especially after he just changes his mind later on after some cathartic experience we weren't even present for).

Perhaps Reynold's ideas for this book exceeded his ablities on this occasion. If I could offer some advice I would say go back to basics. If he could combine his talent for hard-SF concepts with strong story-telling basics we would have a winner.

I just read Revelation Space(re-read), Chasm City, and now this book, all in the last 3 weeks. What an trip! I usually prefer fantasy-especially Gene Wolfe-but I have to say, this book was delightfuly and surprisingly "human" for a "hard sci fi" novel. Dont get me wrong. It has intricacies of plot and characterization and oogles and shmoogles of "hard-science" (you might actually learn something! wow!). But it is a work that I found very edifying to the soul on a spiritual level. This is a great series and I cannot wait to read Absolution Gap. I actually loved the ending. I recommend you read them in this order 1.Revelation Space 2.Chasm City 3.Redemption Ark 4.Absolution Gap.(Chasm City is a prelude and not part of the trilogy but this is the order that they were written in, and the order that you will find them most enjoyable.)

Redemption Ark is the Sequel to Alastair Reynold's Revelation Space. It has alot of good hard science but this time around the sequel reads like a soap opera with obvious portaganists and antagonists and cookie cut outs called characters. In Revelation Space everyone was both villain and hero. Prime examples are Khouri and Volyova. The former an assassin for hire who later re-directs her focus to saving Resurgam and the latter a lighthugger crew member with a penchant for killing unsuitable gunnery officers who by the end of the book still looks out for her own best interests first. These two are re-introduced to us in Redemption Ark. And to me are the highlights of the book.

Clavain is too obviously the 'hero' where Sylveste was never any such thing. In fact, I cannot remember one heroic thing Sylveste did in Revelation Space.

However, my main problem with the sequel is the issue of the Conjoiners, who make up many of the main characters. The Conjoiners are a genetically and technologically enhanced offshoot of humanity. The have a hive or group mind mentality. They literally share a single huge conciousness. They are also winning a decades long battle against the Demarchist. Who fear being conscripted into the hive.

So my problem? Although, one is supposed to sympathize with the Conjoiners. I find myself sympathizing greatly with the Demarchists. Even if being conscripted was not so ghastly horrifying as the propaganda machinces want the rest of humanity to believe, still...no

History proves that technology spreads like wildfire among people with little or no resistance against the change. Examples, fire, the wheel, farming, the combustabile engine, the radio, the phone, the computer...

However, history also proves that ideas move at a lot slower pace. The more different they are to the norm the longer it takes for it to catch on. For example, the idea of the natural rights of man, the equality of women, democracy...

So its a little hard to swallow that by the 26th century the winners are going to be the Conjoiners. Who are basically modern communists.