Chasm City - Spoilers!

[Lady of Winterfell]

I just finished this book a couple days ago and really liked it. I am going to indulge in some spoiler information, so if the thread title didn't warn you away, go away now. I was slightly disappointed with the way the "real" Tanner was killed. I know that Cahuella was obsessed with the hamadryad, and it makes sense he would have the venom installed along with the changes to his eyes, but it kind of came out of nowhere for me. Other than that, I really loved this book. I loved the Sky Haussman storyline and the flashbacks to Tanner and Cahuella.

Anyway, I did have two questions. Maybe I just missed these as I was reading rather quickly trying to finish this book.

1. If Cahuella had the venom fangs put in his mouth by the Ultras, wouldn't this have shown up on the Mixmaster scan? And so wouldn't he have known at that point he had them?

2. What was the package that Constanza sent down to the surface?

 

[Lady of Winterfell]

*cough* Anybody?

 

[RichF]

I also really enjoyed this one. The history of Chasm City and the Haussman flashbacks were very intriguing. Although I did find it a tad long and I was not always convinced by some of the characters motivations. Also I agree with you Tanner's death did seem pretty whimsical.

Unfortunately, my memory is awful so I cannot answer either of your questions as it's been a year and a half. Although I have just finished Revelation Space. I'd definitely recommend House of Suns if you haven't read it already, its easily the best Reynolds book I've read so far.

 

[Lady of Winterfell]

Thanks for the reply Rich! I appreciate it, even if you don't have the answers. (does it make me a bad person to say it makes me happy to hear that I'm not the only person who forgets what they read?) I have not read House of Suns yet, but I will definitely look into it. I finished Galactic North just a short while ago, and have read the Revelation Space trilogy and Pushing Ice of his works so far.

 

[Vertigo]

'fraid I fall into the same pot as Rich F; been a few years since I read it. I did love it but can't remember that level of detail now without going back to it again. But, as I recall, it was simply the collection of evidence Constanza had amassed on Sky before he imprisoned her. As far as the fangs go I really can't remember that detail.

 

[clovis-man]

Chasm City was the first Reynolds novel I read. I have now read everything of his except for Blue Remembered Earth. I'm not one for minutiae or intricate detail, so I'll be of no help to your inquiry. But I would suggest just not to worry about it and go with the larger view of the story.

 

[Lady of Winterfell]

Thanks to you both Vertigo and clovis-man. I appreciate your responses. It appears that I will just have to let it go. I'm sure in a month or so I will have forgotten about it.

 

[RichF]

I think I'm going to have to start a book diary to record what I thought about a book when I've just finished it. Otherwise by the time I bump into someone who's actually read the same book I've forgotten it!

You could always ask the author himself: https://twitter.com/AquilaRift. I asked him whether a sequel to Pushing Ice was still on the cards and got a quick response (yes hopefully in the not too distant future I think was the gist of it).

 

[Lady of Winterfell]

I actually just started a book journal when I was reading Chasm City for that exact reason! It's incredibly annoying to me that I can't remember what I've read, and even more so because my Dad and brother can remember everything they read. I don't know why my Dad didn't share those genes with me too! I feel like lots of times I can't contribute to conversations because I just don't remember enough about a book.

And thanks for link. I have resisted the urge to join twitter, mostly because I have nothing to say. But I am seeing it would be worth joining just to follow those people who do have something to say that I'm interested in.

 

[Vertigo]

Like you I have simply forgotten most of the books I've read over the years and started getting annoyed with myself when I bought a book and only realised I had already read it once I started reading it (again!).

I now use Calibre (free book database software) for keeping a record of everything I've read (and want to read). Although it is really designed for use with ebooks, you don't have to actually have the book to include it's details in the database and you can just as easily add printed books to the database as well as the ebooks. I have recently started to write little 'reviews' of each book I read (really just a few of my thoughts on the book). I store these in this database as well as posting them on GR and my blog here (it's all I use the blog for).

 

[Lady of Winterfell]

I have never heard of Calibre, but just checked out the website. It looks quite helpful! You said you put your reviews there. Where do you put these exactly? In the tutorial I didn't see anything about adding your own reviews.

I also try to write reviews in the hopes that it will help me better remember what I read. I thought I could also benefit from a book journal, so I started one in Word and I just have the title of the book and bullet points for anything that happened in the story that I thought was interesting or important. I'm hoping this will help in the future if I see someone talking about a book, I can go back and read my notes about it and hopefully it will give me the info I need.

 

[Velocius quam lucem]

I just finished Chasm City, and I can't say it was my favorite, but what I like about Alastair is his glints of future science, and there was plenty of that. As for your two questions:

1. If Cahuella had the venom fangs put in his mouth by the Ultras, wouldn't this have shown up on the Mixmaster scan? And so wouldn't he have known at that point he had them?

Very good observation. I agree 100%. In a book that long I suppose there will be a few of those. Another thing that I wondered is what led to Ferris digging Gideon out from the rubble he had toppled upon himself whilst hiding from "the machines" (and when and how was he uncovered?).

2. What was the package that Constanza sent down to the surface?

I believe it was a post-mortem video that exposed Sky Haussman for all the evil things that he had done in deception and licentiousness.

 

[Vertigo]

I have never heard of Calibre, but just checked out the website. It looks quite helpful! You said you put your reviews there. Where do you put these exactly? In the tutorial I didn't see anything about adding your own reviews.

I also try to write reviews in the hopes that it will help me better remember what I read. I thought I could also benefit from a book journal, so I started one in Word and I just have the title of the book and bullet points for anything that happened in the story that I thought was interesting or important. I'm hoping this will help in the future if I see someone talking about a book, I can go back and read my notes about it and hopefully it will give me the info I need.

I'm terribly sorry LoW I completely missed your question!

Calibre is an excellent free program and seems to be the default program used by all ebook users, at least those that keep their books on their computer rather than just on their readers. (it makes uploading books from your computer to the reader trivial as well).

First of all I add some custom columns (very easy to do) and here I have a drop down list of topics (similar to their current tags column which is really just genre) in this column I put a list of significant topics covered in the book like AI, Cyborg, Dystopian, Social, Longevity, Romance, Religion, etc. I find this quite handy for questions like "Anyone know any good SF looking at AIs?"

The reviews I put with the blurb. When you edit the properties for a book there is one section of text that generally gets filled with the back cover blurb for that book (either direct from the ebook or fetched from online databases like isbndb.com) Although this blurb is usually filled in automatically you can edit it. So I just add my reviews above the blurb.

 

[Lady of Winterfell]

Velocious quam lucem - Thanks! I appreciate your response. I already can't remember the scene you are asking about, so can't help there.

Vertigo - No worries! Thanks for answering it now.

 

[Grunkins]

Regarding the venom fang bit, I think Al just really wanted a big dumb deus ex machina to cheapen the ending of his story. There's no reason he couldn't have planted plenty of groundwork for the fangs earlier. He just wanted it be a big surprise. I think it's just a decision made by a, then, immature writer.

 

[AndrewT]

Regarding the venom fang bit, I think Al just really wanted a big dumb deus ex machina to cheapen the ending of his story. There's no reason he couldn't have planted plenty of groundwork for the fangs earlier. He just wanted it be a big surprise. I think it's just a decision made by a, then, immature writer.

I have to disagree Grunk - I thought that was a jawdropping ending. The whole thing. The only thing I did not like about this book was the machines that eat intelligent maggots that try to hide digression that seemed to contribute very little to the overall plot. I was about to toss the book at that point but very glad I didn't. The climax was superb and the identity theft was a super clever plot device.

 

[AndrewT]

I've read that Reynolds has a very deep knowledge of physics so his writing tends to be more accurate than some authors. But one thing I wondered about while reading this was if it is possible to leave a large ship in a flotilla using a smaller transport when the flotilla is travelling at 8% of the speed of light in order to travel to one of the other ships in the flotilla. I guess if you are leaving the large ship that is at that speed then your initial speed would be equal but you would be left behind quickly unless your small transport has powerful thrust. I was a little skeptical on that one but overall still impressed with his accuracy.

 

[AndrewT]

I guess it would be since if you left at that speed there would be no resistance in space.