[intensityxx]

Ficus:by the time they get that far there won't be any 'unevolved' except for small groups of religious nuts who refuse all technology.Archren: BTW, I totally agree with Ficus on the unbelievability of there still being completely "unevolved" humans in a future with such extensive forged humans.I'm driving along thinking about all this (gods, I'm a geek), when I remember that Unevolved do use MekTek improvements. In fact, I was surprised when an Unevolved character made use of one, or was described as having one. What I understood was that these were specific, task-appropriate improvements, as opposed to the Forged, who were completely specialized in function, and who were human/machine melds to a much different degree. I think this is a much more believable scenario than the more black-and-white one you're both describing.

[FicusFan]

I thought that use of Mek-Tek put you into the Forged group, albeit at a lower lever (you couldn't cruise to Mars). I thought the Strategois was Mek-Tek and I wouldn't consider him an unevolved human. He had copper lines embedded into his skin and some type of crest. Perhaps the Mek-Tek group was a waystation between the 2 groups. I thought the Abacand was what unevolved humans used to help them use technology without it changing them.

It also seems that Mek-Tek was something the human chose to do to him or herself. You are born a normal human and you decide to have some work done -- like plastic surgery now. The people who were Forged were probably designed and picked to be like that before birth and were sculpted, and grown into what they became -- all at the will of an outside agency or person. The unevolved human wasn't changed by an outside agency, and also chose not to change him or herself. They seemed to be in charge from what we saw, and both the Mek-Tek and the forged worked for them, thought they were more willing to accept the Mek-Tek socially.

You know the more I think about the consequences of the technology, the more I like it. Because it seems so true. You invent A to do Y and you have no idea the ripples and changes that it will create down the time line. How it will force other changes, or other decisions, or close off avenues -- all with no real intention, but as a side effect of change.

Did you think that not-ZDN was in another galaxy or just made up ? I couldn't figure out why it wasn't ZDN, and then when Trini realized that they (forged hive) had created the inside of the Moons to be what they wanted I thought maybe Isol had made up not-ZDN. Of course if that is so, why was there the left over stone civilization on it. I can understand it being totally bare, because the gaiforms needed to use their entire beings, but how come she 'made' the aliens ?

I think this book is really cool to talk about, I just wish the reading experience had been better and more enjoyable.

[Erfael]

Well, I've spent all month so far not commenting on this book, and now it's been probably five weeks since I finished it. So I'll do what I can. If I say something really dumb, I may have just forgotten something along the way.

I have to say this is one of the most enjoyable books I have read in which no part of the book was enjoyable. Taken individually, I don't think there were more than a very short handful of sections that I really enjoyed, but somehow, on the whole, I liked the book.

I guess my biggest gripe about it was that I sort of feel like I was led to believe that it was archaeological-SF, something I tend to like quite a lot when I run into it. In the end there seemed to be very little of that and much more of....other things.

I think she actually spent a little too much time trying to be literary rather than telling a good story in an enjoyable way. I'm all for meaning in my books, but not when I can't discern what that is and why the indivual parts to the book are so dull. I'm still not really sure why we had American Pie running through the beginning. Also not really sure why we had to end with the collie. In many ways it reminded me of Light, which is also by the same publisher. I wonder if I need to be wary of what I pick up by this house.

I felt there were a lot of ideas that she could have run with that she just stopped flat on. (Can't remember names....) When the roc fellow from the asteroid belt showed up, it seemed there was a really good opportunity to explore people's addictions to the internet and the problems it can cause, which she sort of just touched on and then moved on to other things.

It also didn't sit well with me that the Stuff would only take on people who wanted to be taken on, BUT once you say yes, there's no going back. It's sort of like they get to make the decision, but they're not really given the information to really decide well (reminds me of every fourth year in the US, actually). If it is really such a powerful and fair organism, one would think that it would give people the proper information before taking them in. It rather seemed like some sort of plague or something that tempted people into opening up to it and then sucking them in...except that by the end, it leaves Earth relatively alone. Confusing.

So I DID like it, but maybe for the same reasons Ficus did, novelty, not substance. Also, I really liked the color scheme on the cover. That stood out to me a great deal.

[FicusFan]

I actually liked how you didn't have all the info to make the decision to accept the stuff, and once you accept it there is no going back.

I think it mimics invention and technological change very well. Something is invented, and people only look at it one way, and don't see the associated changes until too late. Generally once something is out of the bag, you can't go back. Like un-inventing nuclear weapons.

I don't know if its the publisher you need to be aware of or just when they publish UK authors -- which both Harrison ( Light ) and Robson are. There often have a different take on what is meant by a good story. You probably want to avoid Steph Swainston too, she is the latest UK flavor of the month to be published here and her book also has ' clarity/lack of enjoyment' issues.

And I agree there should have been more archeaology, the whole world was wasted.

[odo]

I can see where it naturally leaves itself open to a sequel

The feeling I had all the time when reading the book is that JR was prepairing an scenary for something big, but that something was not going to happen in the book. I didn't know there was going to be a sequel, but somehow from the beggining I felt that the book was part of something bigger.

I didn't like the book much. It was too slow paced. But I did like the universe JR describes and the ending was open enough for that BIG thing to happen in the sequel. I may give it a try...