Tag: #scifi

Death’s Door — Alastair Reynolds

By 5t4n5

Death's Door -- Alastair ReynoldsAvailable in Belladonna Nights and Other Stories.

What happens when we finally become virtually immortal and we’ve done everything we wanted to do and we’ve gotten completely bored with life?   Play Russian roulette with portal doors, setting them for a 1 in 1000 random chance of them killing you when you use them.   And when you really get fed up you dial it up to a 1 in 10 chance of them killing you.

But maybe you have friends who don’t want you to die quite so soon, friends that want you to give life another chance.

Good story.

Next up from Alastair will be the Revenger Trilogy, beginning with Revenger.   But first i’m going to have to read a few other books from other writers.   Back with Alastair soon.

Bye for now.

Alastair’s Page

#scifi #alastairreynolds

Providence — Alastair Reynolds

By 5t4n5

Providence -- Alastair ReynoldsAvailable in Belladonna Nights and Other Stories.

A really good sleeper ship story.   The drive’s blown and there’s no way of slowing the ship down when it reaches its destination planet, they’re just going to sail right on past.

But then one of the crew has a great idea to find some purpose to the whole trip.   Except things just don’t turn out like they hoped they would have.

Next up from Alastair is Death’s Door.

Bye for now.

Alastair’s Page

#scifi #alastairreynolds

Different Seas — Alastair Reynolds

By 5t4n5

Different Seas -- Alastair ReynoldsAvailable in Belladonna Nights and Other Stories and The Best Science Fiction of the Year: Vol 4.

Another of Alastairs proxy body stories.   This time a caretaker is stranded on an automated sailing ship and needs help.   It comes in the form of a proxy robot, and the caretaker isn’t too taken with it’s driver’s attitude.

But, more is soon revealed as we go through the story and attitudes change.

A really good little story.   And maybe a good reminder to all of us not to judge people on their first impressions, sometimes you can be very wrong.

Next up from Alastair in Providence.

Bye for now.

Alastair’s Page

#scifi #alastairreynolds

Holdfast — Alastair Reynolds

By 5t4n5

Holdfast -- Alastair ReynoldsAvailable in Belladonna Nights and Other Stories and The Best Science Fiction of the Year: Vol 3.

Really good. If you enjoyed The Medusa Chronicles for it’s wonderful exploration of the Jovian atmosphere and it’s ecosystem, then you’ll really enjoy this as well.

It’s also got a nice hint of Enemy Mine sprinkled in with it.

Next up is Different Seas.

Bye for now.

Alastair’s Page

#scifi #alastairreynolds

Remainers — Alastair Reynolds

By 5t4n5

Remainers -- Alastair ReynoldsAvailable in Tales from the Edge: Escalation.

A little story that Alastair wrote for the Maelstom’s Edge Universe.

You don’t need to know anything about the Universe other than a maelstrom of energy is travelling up the spiral arm of the galaxy wiping out everything in its path.   Systems are being evacuated and there’s lots of different factions with different views as to how to deal with things.

This story covers a journey back to one of the evacuated planets.

Rather good.

Next up from Alastair is Visiting Hours.

Bye for now.

Alastair’s Page

#scifi #alastairreynolds

Sixteen Questions for Kamala Chatterjee — Alastair Reynolds

By 5t4n5

Sixteen Questions for Kamala Chatterjee -- Alastair ReynoldsAvailable in Belladonna Nights and Other Stories.

Kamala Chatterjee is defending her PHD paper in front of three judges, with sixteen questions to get through.

This really isn’t Alastair’s finest work.   I think it’s another one of those stories of his that just didn’t work out but he threw it into a collection to fill the pages with.

You mileage may vary though.

Rolling on through Alastair’s books, next up is Remainers.

Bye for now.

Alastair’s Page

#scifi #alastairreynolds

The Medusa Chronicles — Alastair Reynolds and Stephen Baxter

By 5t4n5

The Medusa Chronicles -- Alastair Reynolds and Stephen BaxterThis time Alastair teams up with Stephen Baxter to write this interesting yarn, taking us from an alternative history of the Apollo missions all the way into the deep heart of Jupiter, hundreds of years later.

As usual with anything Alastair Reynolds, it’s just great all round writing.   What i really liked about this one is the recreation of Jupiter with a whole eco system going on all the way down to the core of the planet.

Once again we’ve plenty of AI stuff going on, and going wrong on a cosmic scale (rapidly approaching an Earth near you, in case you’ve been sleeping under a rock and hadn’t noticed), and a solar-system wide war with a cyborg, running/wheeling/flying around, trying to make peace between everyone.

It’s a really good novel, and whether you believe me or not, i don’t care.   If you don’t want to read it, just because i think it’s really good, then that’s your loss, not mine.

Next up from Alastair is Sixteen Questions for Kamala Chatterjee, which i’m diving straight into in my quest to read everything by Alastair before the AI’s take over and destroy everything of value that ever existed and turn the Earth into a volcanic wasteland (which won’t be long, according to some people).

Bye for now.

Alastair’s Page

#scifi #alastairreynolds

A Murmuration — Alastair Reynolds

By 5t4n5

A Murmuration -- Alastair ReynoldsAvailable in Belladonna Nights and Other Stories.

Not one of Alastair’s best stories, i’m left at the end not really understanding what is happening in the outside world and therefore why any of this research is being done.   But if you enjoy a good murmuration of starlings then you might enjoy it just for the good descriptive writing of such things.

Let’s hope The Medusa Chronicles is better.

Bye for now.

Alastair’s Page

#scifi #alastairreynolds

Slow Bullets — Alastair Reynolds

By 5t4n5

Slow Bullets -- Alastair ReynoldsAt the end of a major war, the worse of the worse, from both sides (known as the Dregs by the crew), are put onto a sleeper ship and sent off to a far flung corner of the galaxy.

One by one the Dregs awaken: and find that something has gone horribly wrong with the ship.   With it’s systems failing, the ship has ended up where it should have been but a very long time in the future.

A really good story with the Dregs having to learn to put their differences aside and work together to survive, but some differences need settling first.

Next up in Alastair’s list is A Murmuration.

Bye for now.

Alastair’s Page

#scifi #alastairreynolds