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"Ten years have passed on Tines World, where Ravna Bergnsdot and a number of human children ended up after a disaster that nearly obliterated humankind throughout the galaxy. Ravna and the pack animals for which the planet is named have survived a war, and Ravna has saved more than one hundred children who were in cold-sleep aboard the vessel that brought them. While there is peace among the Tines, there are those among them--and among the humans--who seek power...and no matter the cost, these malcontents are determined to overturn the fledgling civilization that has taken root since the humans landed. On a world of fascinating wonders and terrifying dangers, Vernor Vinge has created a powerful novel of adventure and discovery that will entrance the many readers of A Fire Upon the Deep. Filled with the inventiveness, excitement, and human drama that have become hallmarks of his work, this new novel is sure to become another great milestone in Vinge's already stellar career. "--… (more)
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Although this third book The Children of the Sky is nearly as long and complex as either of the others, it doesn't have their level of innovation in character or world vision, largely carrying forth some key cast and the setting of A Fire Upon the Deep. As a result, and especially in contrast to A Deepness in the Sky, it often feels like a mere epilogue to Fire. The ending of Children leaves many of its largest dilemmas and conflicts unresolved, and it pretty clearly implies that Vinge was hoping to eventually write at least one more book to further the story.
I had planned to defer reading Children of the Sky for a little longer after reading the second book, but I was prompted to pick it up sooner due to the recent death of the author. My memories of A Fire Upon the Deep were fuzzier than I would have liked, but Vinge was very artful with providing the right amount of indirect exposition so that I felt like I was on top of the story anyhow. I did enjoy the book, even though it was slighter than the other two: perhaps 50% of the readerly illumination for 70% of the reading effort, as compared to one of the others. Vinge did surprise me with a couple of major plot twists.
Most disappointingly, neither the race to civilization nor the political intrigue stories are resolved. The characters are moved around like pieces on a game board, and by the end of the book some of them have changed position and importance, and a few pieces have been eliminated, but nothing fundamental has changed; the book's ending is just the set up for another sequel.
A good book that was a few flaws short of being a very good book. The main plot of the book felt a bit overused: the righteous "good" people are cleverly made out to look like the "bad" people and spend most of the
This also happened quite a bit in A Fire Upon the Deep. However, the surviving bad guys were all remnant/reformed Tines that had the ability to drastically change due to their unique biology. It makes less sense with humans. In that, it's perhaps less realistic. I don't see the ringleader being allowed to get away with murder. Multiple murders, in fact.
Plus, the overall plot advanced very little since Fire. Where Fire ended with major unresolved plot lines, Children outdid it. We can only hope Vinge will manage to finish the tale one day while he still has the knack.
I give it 3.5 stars. It lost a half star due to the ending (and I even had my hopes down because I knew it had a bit of an unresolved ending before reading it) and because of the unsatisfying outcome of the main plot.
There are a lot of interesting elements to this story.
I'm not quite sure what I thought of the story, and that's probably because this was a middle episode in a much longer story. It was certainly intriguing and suspenseful, and I cared about the characters and what happened to them.
I listened to the audiobook, and Oliver Wyman is one of my favorite narrators. I probably wouldn't have enjoyed this in any other medium.
This was an engaging read, even though not much changes in the course of its 600+ pages: one enemy is dispatched, one enemy becomes an ally and another enemy becomes mostly irrelevant.
Disappointing,
The Children of the Sky is the third book in his ‘Zones of Thought Series.’ As I did not (yet)
What I liked most:
- This is a character driven story of political power and manipulation. The advanced tech from the wrecked human starship, much of which does not work, does not dominate the story and neither does the limited psychic ability of the native sentient species.
- The story has an overall positive mood, and you can see the beginnings of an industrial age if not a philosophical enlightenment emerging. These provide promise that the future will be a better one. The ending is a setup for a sequel, not quite a cliffhanger, but with enough unresolved issues to provide plenty of material for another story to explore how well this promise is achieved.
- The fictional world of the “Tines” is very imaginative. However...
What I liked least:
- Back to the Tines. I felt I was being asked to suspend too much disbelief to imagine that a species without hands (or the equivalent), and which has difficulty even approaching one another physically, could develop what amounts to an early industrial age technology.
- I like that this is a ‘character based’ story, but the characters did not evoke much empathy for me. We see some of their inner turmoil, especially with Ravana, but not enough to make me care much about what happens to her.
- The principle villain in this is simply evil. There is no explanation for why or what he is trying to achieve other than personal power. Still, there is enough here for the reader to loath him by the end of the book, but his ultimate and well-deserved demise happens almost between scenes.
- A good deal could have been left out, which may have improved the pace without sacrificing the plot. I suppose much of this can be attributed to editing. Authors sacrifice a lot when they choose to go through a traditional publisher and they should expect to receive value in return. In this case, a little rewriting, tightening the prose, and even catching a few grammar and punctuation errors would have done a lot to improve the book.
And really, the fleshing out of a civilization of Tines is fascinating. The creatures form packs of 4 to 8 canines, joined by telepathy into one coherent "person". But down in the tropical region they are more numerous and apparently uncivilized, clumped together in a "choir" that terrifies the pack northerners and that destroys anything that ventures into its midst. And there is the problem of what happens to single dogs or remnants of former packs who lose a member to death. It's all drawn up with fascinating imagination.
But the book takes a long time to develop- it doesn't move quickly until the last 200 pages, which are great. I'm not sure if this is the middle book of a trilogy or an end in itself- he published this one 19 years after Fire Upon the Deep. The ending begs for more, so I hope he's working on the next one.
With that always at the back my mind, the other
This story is all restricted to one planet so
The tines are the most realised aspect of the book - Woodcarver is, thankfully, largely absent from this book, as is (sadly) Pilgrim. The replacement cast, among them Amdi and others from the first book, is given great depth, and the reader can feel a real connection to these characters, this strength extends to some of the humans, but by no means all.
What isn't handled well is the passage of time - the novel takes huge leaps without real purpose, leading to some frankly bewildering passages. The division of the human society is also mystifying - no understandable motivation is given, other than some hand-waving around Ravna's influence in society.
All in all, a good book, but by no means a great one, and in that respect, I guess its a disappointment.