The Uplift Saga by David Brin - SF series discussion

[finvarre]

This saga consists of 6 books:
Sundiver
Startide Rising
The Uplift War
and the trilogy:
Brightness Reef
Infinity's Shore
Heaven's Reach.
Who's read any of these books and what did you think about them?Why do you like/dislike this series?

 

[Winters_Sorrow]

Personally I love this series and have read them all - however, I only two of the books (something I shall have to rectify at some point).

The best thing I liked about this series is, of course, the main premise. That all species have attained Sapience (sp?) with the help of a patron species and are obliged & bound into servitude as clients until they 'earn' the right to become parton's themselves.

Into this universe come the Human race, 'wolflings' as they are Sapients without a Patron (at least no-one's admitting it, or can prove it anyway).
The stories are well told (although personally I found some of the other species somewhat neglected in terms of storytelling).

I enjoyed the second series too, the idea of 'endangered' sapients forming a lost colony to survive with each other's help

 

[lazygun]

Only read two or three of the series and what was most memorable was the positive interactions of different aliens as individuals rather than races.
Downside would be I do not have the whole series.

 

[profeaston]

I've reviewed them all (in Analog) over the years, loved them, and found it interesting to reflect on their kinship to my own "Organic Future" series (Sparrowhawk, Greenhouse, Woodsman, Tower of the Gods, Seeds of Destiny), which for a decade provided a nice flow of movie option money, though they never made the movie.

 

[Stalker]

Yes, the whole Brin's series is interesting, and I look forward to see the end of Earth blocade and what solution will be taken on the Fleet of Progenitors found by Streaker.
Despite some difficulties I encounetered with putting all things to the places they belong in an extremely tight narration full with neologisms and sometimes overloaded with terminology, I, nonetheless, think that Brin delivered a brilliant piece of "xenological" SF, clever and vivid; he undertook a unique travel into studyings of possibility of co-exictance of various intelligent races (as on Jijo), and I find his approach more or less justified because there is no other way of dealing with such diversity of life in his Universe.

 

[Taltos]

Personally I liked the first trilogy better than the second. The story was more compact, also the second series suffered from too many view points. Brin should have restricted himself to, lets say, 10 POV-s Anyways both series are good reads and I'd suggest them to any SF lover.

 

[Jayaprakash Satyamurthy]

I think Brin writes some of the best aliens in SF! However, I've only discovered this series, and have only read two books so far - Sundiver and Startide Rising. The development in Brin's skill as a writer from the first book to the second is amazing - Sundiver was pretty good, but I found the characterisation and pacing in Startide absolutely irresistable!

I really like Brin's descriptions of the mission to the sun in Sundiver - they are so vivid that I feel like I've been there myself, and ought to sometime soon, even if I haven't. This really is what the hoary old 'sense of wonder' is all about.

The more layered narrative in Startide is nevertheless more satisfying. Tye characters - human, dolphin and simian - are all well-realised and believable. The passages that tell about the progress of the space battle from the PoV of one or another of various alienraces are a stunning excusrion into a variety of alien psyches and cultures. There's just a touch of humour (the young woman who has to deal with the advances of an 'amorous porpoise') and poetry, in the form of the haikus the delphines communicate in. It's one of the most exciting SF novels I've read, and I look forward to picking up The Uplift War and carrying on with the story.

Are there likely to be more Uplift books beyond the 6 already written?

 

[Winters_Sorrow]

Not sure about new Uplift books, but I notice he's writing a new series called "The Kil'n"

The first book's called Kil'n People and looks quite good - synopsis below

Al Morris is a private investigator. Actually, he's lots of private investigators. For he lives in a world in which every person, every day, can be in any number of places at the same time. It's the world of dittos. It is our world. Welcome to the future. In a business where information is the currency, Al's dittos are loaded. And with a number of cases on the go at once, it is crucial that Al keeps track of what's going on. What he doesn't know is that he is about to be drawn into a plot that could throw this delicately balanced world into chaos. It seems that the technology has been developed for dittos to replicate themselves. It seems that real people may no longer be necessary. And, suddenly, it seems that mankind's dream of immortality could turn into a nightmare

 

[Taltos]

Are there likely to be more Uplift books beyond the 6 already written?

A little spoiler (if any) but at he end of the (currently) last book, I had the feeling onf incompleteness, i.e. a lot of endings were left open, so Brin can write continuations in one or more books. Whether he is planning to continue this series I don't know. Unfortunatley his official home page is also currently not accessible.

 

[Jayaprakash Satyamurthy]

Oh, I seem to be able to visit the site from here...so here's the word from Brin:

[font=Verdana,Geneva,Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif][size=-1]"Temptation," which first appeared in Robert Silverberg's anthology Far Horizons, features the adventures of a female dolphin on the faraway world, Jijo, who must escape from two of her own kind and then penetrate a deeply dangerous ancient secret. This novella will be a core element of the next Uplift novel... and answers several unresolved riddles left over from Heaven's Reach.[/size][/font]

Link

So I guess it's something we have to hope he'll get around to - but there is a chance of it.

 

[finvarre]

I also felt that Sundiver was by far the weakest of these 6 books. I read it after Startide Rising and The Uplift War, and was disappointed (OK, I liked it, but..). Yet he's won the Hugo award with this one, am I correct?

I haven't read the last installment in this series, The Heaven's Reach, and am still waiting for the translation probably due next year. The good news is, on the author's official webpage http://www.davidbrin.com/ David Brin states that he's going to write yet another, new Uplift novel. Here's the quote:

I've also posted two short stories based in the Uplift universe. "Aficionado," which first appeared in Popular Science, details the very beginnings of Earth's Uplift Project. "Temptation," which first appeared in Robert Silverberg's anthology Far Horizons, features the adventures of a female dolphin on the faraway world, Jijo, who must escape from two of her own kind and then penetrate a deeply dangerous ancient secret. This novella will be a core element of the next Uplift novel... and answers several unresolved riddles left over from Heaven's Reach.

I've read the Kil'n people and don't believe this is a beginning of a series of any kind. Actually, it reminded me of The Altered Carbon by Richard Morgan, and I've mentioned this in last month's Book Club discussion about that book. It's 'just' a SF crime story, still very interesting, but no new species there. What I liked best was the concept of cloning oneself everyday several times. The clones lived only 24 hours and could survive only if uploaded into the main persona's brain. All in all, an entertaining read. Apart from this book, recently he's also written one of the novels in the 'Second Foundation trilogy', about Hari Seldon. (I don't know what's left to be said about Seldon as Asimov himself wrote 2 prequels to Foundation about Hari Seldon's life )

I believe what I liked best about the Uplift series was indeed the 'uplifting' concept as well as a very clever and interesting description of alien races. I loved the concept of these 10 or so galactic languages, and the characterisation of every race was unique. I wish there was a sequel to what happened on Garth, in The Uplift War, I enjoyed the Gubru, the Tymbrimi and Thennanian very much and there was much about the other species uplifted by 'us' , the chimps.

However, what I considered a flaw was that I felt this vision of our future was way too optimistic. 'Uplifting' dolphins and chimpanzees in 200 years' time? Boy, by that time these species will be only a memory! But it was very nice to read about humans being one of the 'best' and most self-conscious species in the universe . This is not a picture we get with other SF writers, like CJ Cherryh for example .

 

[finvarre]

Sorry, knivesout - seems I've repeated your link.
As for the Uplift universe, I found this page of help too (lists all the species, languages and names mentioned in the book):
http://www.gayspermbank.com/brin/index.htm

 

[Jayaprakash Satyamurthy]

Yes, Brin certainly has a largely positive, progressive view of humanity - one that used to define SF, and is still not out of place amidst the various contending dystopias and near-dystopias on offer.

 

[Winters_Sorrow]

I've read the Kil'n people and don't believe this is a beginning of a series of any kind. Actually, it reminded me of The Altered Carbon by Richard Morgan, and I've mentioned this in last month's Book Club discussion about that book. It's 'just' a SF crime story, still very interesting, but no new species there. What I liked best was the concept of cloning oneself everyday several times. The clones lived only 24 hours and could survive only if uploaded into the main persona's brain. All in all, an entertaining read.

Well he's supposedly writing another one for publication next year called "Kil'n Time" as the second book of the series, so...

p.s. think he won the Hugo with "The Uplift War" too

 

[finvarre]

Well he's supposedly writing another one for publication next year called "Kil'n Time" as the second book of the series, so...

p.s. think he won the Hugo with "The Uplift War" too

Yes, he has won the Hugo twice . Thanks for the info on The Kil'n Time, most helpful! I'll have to investigate what it is about.

 

[BAYLOR]

Ive read the first Three. In terms of concept, it Great stuff, The who uplifting of species .

 

[RX-79G]

I read Startide and thought the human characters lacked depth and the uplift thing felt unmotivated. Didn't read any other Brin since.