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Title: The Phoenix Exultant : The Golden Age, Volume 2 by John C. Wright ISBN: 0-7653-4354-1 Publisher: Tor Books Pub. Date: 19 October, 2003 Format: Mass Market Paperback Volumes: 1 List Price(USD): $6.99 |
Average Customer Rating: 4.5 (4 reviews)
Rating: 3
Summary: Imaginative but stiff
Comment: I did enjoy the wonderful flights of imagination in this and the previous book of the trilogy (I'll read the third when it comes out in paperback). It was pleasant to think about what life would be like in a future where every desire could be immediately satisfied, every thought brought to physical reality, and you are immortal. In the course of the story Wright does a fine job of making us aware of the kinds of problems such immense power would create, and the various constraints and adaptations the society employs (modes of consensual reality, "schools" of behavior) in order to keep things from becoming completely chaotic are entertaining.
I do have some criticisms. The story itself is pretty thin, certainly not worth three volumes. The entire narrative is a simple third-person description of what the protagonist says and does and thinks (well, there are some brief sequences about the father and the wife). A more skillful writer might have added dimensionality by weaving together various threads of the tale from multiple viewpoints and perspectives. The fact that literally anything can happen in a future where everybody is an immortal superman makes for some awfully convenient plot devices. The hero is stuck in a cliffhanger? No problem, his magic armor will save him at the last minute. Or the omniscient robot superintelligences will step in and fix things up. Or it was all a dream, etc. The relationships between the characters are wooden and superficial, the prose is packed with words having excessively many syllables, peoples names are a paragraph long.
But then many works of science fiction are like this. The authors are big on imagination and somewhat shorter on basic storytelling skills. I guess it sounds like I didn't like this book but not so. If you like hard science fiction then I recommend it.
Rating: 5
Summary: Excellent for a fast-acting sense-of-wonder recharge.
Comment: ____________________________________________
I loved it. PHOENIX continues on from the cliff-hanger that ends vol. 1. Phaethon has indeed been banished, ostracized, cast out of the Golden Oecumene, for rocking the boat...
I should stop here and reiterate that PHOENIX is emphatically NOT a stndalone. You will absolutely need to start with vol. 1 to make sense of this, and even then, it can be hard going. But worth the effort, and a lot of fun.
Anyway, PHOENIX opens with one of the neatest bits of recapitulation I've ever seen, and most welcome, too, as it's been 18 months or so since I read #1. The writing here is considerably smoother than in the first book, and the story is simpler and more linear --though I'm sorry to say the proofreading hasn't improved a bit (sigh). Cool covers, though.
OK, here's the reliable Paul Di Filippo, if you'd like a coherent, real review: [google at scifi.com]
"Wright dances brilliantly back and forth between... romance and talk of tightly woven superstrings and mesonic disrupters. Another thread is classic space opera: The whole contest between the Golden Oekumene and the Second Oekumene rings of nothing so much as the battle between Arisia and Boskone in Doc Smith's Lensmen series."
Sheer narrative pleasure, that's a good way to put it. The first half of #2 is a fairly routine (but fun!) "can't keep a good engineer down" romp --and I'm doing Wright a bit of a disservice, because there are still a dozen neat ideas per chapter --but PHOENIX really starts to rock when Daphne Tercius Semi-Rhadamanth makes her re-entrance, Daphne Tercius being the successor (sort of) to Daphne Prime, Mrs. Phaethon, who's hiding from him, and reality, inside an impregnable VR vault...
Anyway, Daphne3 is bright, sharp-witted, and determined, but Phaethon is so incredibly thick in dealing with her, you want to whack him upside the head. Gah! Their interactions are a delight, even if Phaethon isn't. Plus, we learn more about Atkins Vingt-et-un, the Last Soldier. And move in to Mercury, to fire up the Phoenix Exultant!
What can I say? Wright is very, very good for a fast-acting sense-of-wonder recharge, and PHOENIX is a welcome return to straightforward storytelling from the baroque splendors of GOLDEN-1. And I kept getting the frissons of delight, wonder and strangeness that are the reason I read SF. So, guys, it ain't perfect, but I predict Wright's GOLDEN AGE series will be delighting readers for a long time to come. And I'm more than ready for The Golden Transcendence, vol. 3, now available (and should be in my hands RSN).
Interview by Nick Gevers (highly recommended):
[Google at SF Site]
[on his influences]
"Jack Vance and Gene Wolfe are masters of style, and I filch from them without a twinge of remorse. The men are brilliant. They are the only authors I enjoyed as a child whom I can still enjoy as an adult.
Of the two of them, I have a mild preference for Jack Vance. Gene Wolfe, in fact, is too brilliant for me: I cannot figure out his puzzles. The mysteries in Jack Vance, in contrast, are honest and fair, and the clues are there..."
____________________
Note 1). Apparently, Wright had planned for a 2-volume issue, but vol. 2 ran long, and the publisher decided to split it. IB Golden Age was conceived as one long novel.
Rating: 5
Summary: Jack Vance meets Olaf Stapledon
Comment: Having read all three volumes in this trilogy now, I can say that this is truly a masterpiece. John C. Wright manages to update Jack Vance into the nanotech/deity-computer age. His future universe is remarkably well-imagined, an all the more difficult feat since it takes place thousands of years in the future. But rather than create a "Dying Earth" going-forward-means-backwards milieu, as did Jack Vance and Gene Wolfe, Wright aggressively imagines a high tech (and, unlike Gene Wolfe, explicit rather than implicit) future. Godlike AIs, mass-minds, augmented humans, and many other creations populate this remarkable universe.
In these volumes, Wright shows himself a master of dialogue (here is where he most often resembles Vance), although he is occasionally somewhat too twee (the conversations between Daphne and Phaethon). He shows himself a master of plot, with a number of unexpected plot twists. And, as alluded to above, he shows himself a master of invention.
Strangely, the three volumes resemble the three Matrix movies in their nature. The first volume, The Golden Age, is by far the best, for the simple reason that the reader is immersed for the first time in this wonderfully realized world (just as in the Matrix). The Matrix Reloaded did not have the newness of the first movie, but compensated for it by dangling mysteries in front of the viewer and by dazzling pyrotechnics and action. This is largely the case for the second volume of Wright's trilogy, The Phoenix Exultant. We are familiar with Phaethon's world, so it is comfortable rather than new and exciting, but the plot itself drives us along. The third volume, the recently released The Golden Transcendence, is the least satisfying of the three, just as the third Matrix movie is the least satisfying, as what mysteries are revealed are not quite as interesting as we might have hoped. But it nonetheless is still a winner by any standards. Together, they represent a remarkable achievement.
So, get this if you love good science fiction, but also especially if you like:
1) Jack Vance
2) Gene Wolfe
3) Iain M. Banks
4) Walter Jon Williams' Aristoi
5) literate high tech space opera
6) far far future romance
These are, truly, very good books (and deserved to have better proofreading by Tor).
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Title: The Golden Transcendence : Or, The Last of the Masquerade by John C. Wright ISBN: 0765307561 Publisher: Tor Books Pub. Date: 15 November, 2003 List Price(USD): $25.95 |
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Title: Altered Carbon by Richard Morgan ISBN: 0345457684 Publisher: Del Rey Pub. Date: 04 March, 2003 List Price(USD): $13.95 |
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Title: Broken Angels by Richard K. Morgan ISBN: 0345457714 Publisher: Del Rey Pub. Date: 02 March, 2004 List Price(USD): $14.95 |
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Title: Spin State by CHRIS MORIARTY ISBN: 0553382136 Publisher: Bantam Pub. Date: 30 September, 2003 List Price(USD): $11.95 |
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Title: Ilium by Dan Simmons ISBN: 0380978938 Publisher: Eos Pub. Date: 01 July, 2003 List Price(USD): $25.95 |
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