Any other Alastair Reynolds fans here?

[iansales]

I have it down as March next year.

 

[Jojo999]

Just finished "House Of Suns".

I enjoyed HS and would recommend it as an easy to read story.

The book flowed well and Reynolds character and plot development is improving. However, there were a number of questions that remained unanswered for me at the books end.

And as I am finding too often with Reynolds books, the ending was again unsatisfying and too enigmatic for my tastes. I'm getting so I don't look forward to the endings of his stories because I know I am not going to be satisfied.

I'm now into the early part of "The Prefect".

 

[Another Will]

Hooray, other AR fans!

I bought Revelation Space when it came out in paperback, and was hooked from the start. It was agonising waiting for each book to come, but the wait has always been worth, as Alastair is a superb writer.

I recently finished The Prefect and House of Suns.

The Prefect was his most immediately accessible book since Chasm City, I felt. Good storyline, with the main character reminding me of Sam Vimes (from Terry Pratchett's Discworld) but in a serious, dedicated to the job way.

House of Suns was very different to normal AR, I felt, a bit Iain M. Banks-ish. It's not RS space , but very different. I did like it though, as the characters grew. I've seen some fairly negative responses to HoS, but I'd like to see more set in this universe. Good Stuff.

Looking forward to Terminal World, as I do enjoy a bit of Steampunk/New Weird feel.

 

[Fried Egg]

I'm just coming near the end of Revelation Space, the first of his novels I have read, and my feelings are fairly mixed towards it.

I see why people struggle with the beginning; it's not that it's particularly slow, it's that he disrupts the pace of the story by switching between narative strands too frequently. I've no problem with multiple perspective narratives but when the author switches between them every page or two, it's really quite jarring.

Eventually though the narrative strands do come together but the tension doesn't really intensify towards the climax (it hasn't yet anyway) and just plods along at the same pace. Mind you, I am really enjoying his impressive envisioning of future technology which really shows that he knows what he's talking about. Interesting technological concepts are explored but I'm finding the characters a bit annoying, unengaging and unconvincing.

Reading this story puts me somewhat in mind of Stephen Donaldson's "Gap" series although whether that's because I just don't read that much space opera or it really is similar, I'm not sure. Altough to be honest I found the "Gap" series far more successfully maintained the narrative tension altough Donaldson's understanding of technical matters was obviously not as sound as Reynold's.

Still, I reserve full judgement until I finish the book. Altough I do get the feeling that I would much more prefer to read short stories by this author which are more about the concepts and less about the characters.

 

[Stephen Palmer]

If you can, read all three in the series, then sit back and take a deep breath!

 

[Connavar]

Still, I reserve full judgement until I finish the book. Altough I do get the feeling that I would much more prefer to read short stories by this author which are more about the concepts and less about the characters.

Thats why i went from enjoying the early parts of the book to not enjoying the story after more than half of the book.

Concepts,worlds wise it was good, i enjoyed Hard SF elements but the character was so weak that they ruined the book for me. Didnt finish it even if i could have forced myself.

 

[clovis-man]

Finally got around to reading House of Suns. Once I got about half way through, I almost couldn't put it down. Fascinating tale with some ingenious sub-plots. The prologues at the beginning of each book section were great. Minor quibbles: a couple of gaps in the story fabric and some of the shatterling characters were a little too cobbled together. But, overall, it held together quite well and has me wanting more.

 

[gully_foyle]

Just reading House of Suns and about a third of my way through. Love it. I'm thinking of taking back all the bad things I said about Reynolds, well most of them anyway.

 

[Rodders]

That's good to hear. I have read that his next books will be a "future history" trilogy about mankinds first 11, 000 years in space. Could be interesting. After that, he's returning to the Revelation Space universe. Yay!!! (Well, possibly returning anyway.)

 

[Vertigo]

I too love AlastairReynolds, though I did initally find his Revelation Space books a little tough going until I got to grips with the RS universe. I started with Revelation Space but now believe this to have been mistake. I later got hold of a recommended reading list for the series that is more or less chronological, though not necessarily in the order published. In particular Chasm City precedes Revelation Space chronologically and also introduces the universe much better, however it too is chronologically preceded by many short stories and novellas. I did feel like I was swimming out of my depth for the first half of RS. I have put the list below - it includes the short stories novellas as well as the full books (most of the short stories are from the Glactic North collection). I'm sure others may disagree with some aspects of the list but I think it provides a reasonable guide. I also cannot say definitively since I haven't read them all myself yet!

Great Wall of Mars
Glacial
A Spy in Europa
Weather
Dilation Sleep
Diamond Dogs
Turquoise Days
Grafenwalder's Bestiarty
Nightingale
Chasm City
Revelation Space
Redemption Ark
Absolution Gap
Galactic North
The Prefect

As I say I haven't read them all yet so if anyone who has would care to correct it I would certainly appreciate it!

Incidentally if anyone is just getting into the RS series I can strongly recommend a visit to Wikipedia where there are a number of pages giving summaries of different factions (Ultras, Conjoiners etc), characters, alien races and technology.

I have found this quite useful as particular characters appear in different books often quite far apart (or example Nevil Clavain - first introduced in the Great Wall Of Mars).

Hope that helps some of you.

 

[bluespider100]

Well, the only title I've read under AR is House of Suns which has a capturing plot accompanied by a flowing characters. as a few comments before me mentioned, the ending was a bit weak, I really hope that the Revelation Space series won't be like that.

 

[TheEndIsNigh]

Apologies to any and all regular contributors to this thread.

I'm conducting an experiment for Jojo regarding notifications and lack thereof.

I'll PM you Jojo to advise you of this post.

So as not to completely hijack the thread I have never read any AR books though now I've gleaned some impressions from here I may well look out for him when next I'm scratching my head in Smiths for something to read.

And there's another dollop of potential reading to get through in the short time we all have left.

 

[Rodders]

Notifications?

As for AR, start with Galactic North. It's a series of very good short stories set in his "Revelation Space" universe. You should get a good feel for his writing from there.

 

[bluespider100]

Notifications?

As for AR, start with Galactic North. It's a series of very good short stories set in his "Revelation Space" universe. You should get a good feel for his writing from there.

I think I'll do just that, I had a hard time picking things up reading the Revelation Space.

 

[Vertigo]

I have found these pages very helpful, though you have to watch out for Spoilers especially in the characters page. However I actually copied these pages to my local drive and referred to them quite a lot when I was getting started. Whilst you might feel this shouldn't be necessary there have been a few series where I could have done with something similiar. Some series even publish a separate guide book! Do be aware that the Galactic North stories span the whole series occuring both before and after the main books. On the other hand The Great Wall of Mars which is the first story in GN does introduce you to the start of everything which does give a much better foundation. However IIRC you won't find out much about the Ultras in those stories.

Factions in Revelation Space - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Races in Revelation Space - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Technology in Revelation Space - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
List of Revelation Space locations - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
List of Revelation Space characters - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

 

[Zappster]

Werthead has a seemingly good blog post that covers in what order it may be best to read some of the short stories in the Galactic North collection. I say seemingly because I haven't started reading the Revelation Space series yet. Still going through some of Reynolds' standalones. But he does touch upon which stories might spoil mysteries in the main books.

I can't link to it (guess it's protection against Spam?) but if you google "revelation space wertzone" it should lead you to the blog post in question.

 

[Vertigo]

That is the same chronological order as the one I put in a few posts back in this thread. The only exception is The Prefect, and since I've not read that one yet myself I can't comment on it . I have read as far as Redemption Ark so far and it certainly works for me. I suspect I will leave The Prefect to the end which Werthead also seems to suggest might be best.

 

[bluespider100]

I have found these pages very helpful, though you have to watch out for Spoilers especially in the characters page. However I actually copied these pages to my local drive and referred to them quite a lot when I was getting started. Whilst you might feel this shouldn't be necessary there have been a few series where I could have done with something similiar. Some series even publish a separate guide book! Do be aware that the Galactic North stories span the whole series occuring both before and after the main books. On the other hand The Great Wall of Mars which is the first story in GN does introduce you to the start of everything which does give a much better foundation. However IIRC you won't find out much about the Ultras in those stories.

Factions in Revelation Space - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Races in Revelation Space - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Technology in Revelation Space - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
List of Revelation Space locations - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
List of Revelation Space characters - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

You're a lot of help in the forum , no really, thanks a lot! I just bought Galactic North a while ago, but I will finish up with Use of Weapons first before heading into the universe made by AR.

 

[Vertigo]

Ah the great Mr Banks - you seem to be ticking off all my favourite contemporary SF authors Spider, if you like them you should also check out Neal Asher; another slightly complex timeline there but Mr Asher himself gives some guidlines here: http://www.sffchronicles.co.uk/forum/525773-wheres-the-best-place-to-start.html

 

[manephelien]

Count me in as an AR fan. I've only read half of his Zima Blue collection and already I want more.