Status
Available
Call number
Series
Collection
Publication
Grand Central Pub (1996), 447 pages
Description
The third book in the author's Cat series follows the tough, half-human hero as he travels to Refuge, where strange life forms face an ecological disaster.
User reviews
LibraryThing member kraaivrouw
A good book with a bummer ending. Not surprising, I suppose, since the theme of this novel is the near impossibility of surviving as an outsider in a world governed by the corporate state.
Cat's a sweet character who somehow manages to be a bridge between peoples, but also manages to find himself
This is a book filled with longing - for community, for change, for love, for companionship, for a way to be whole. Vinge writes interesting characters & the plot here is nicely character driven, although she doesn't really do anything with the cloud whales and their dreamfall - odd to set up such a cool premise & then just sort of leave it there.
This is the third book of a trilogy and I think I like the second one, Catspaw, best. The characters, landscape, & ideas are more diverse - alien, but not alien all at once.
Cat's a sweet character who somehow manages to be a bridge between peoples, but also manages to find himself
Show More
alone & disregarded.This is a book filled with longing - for community, for change, for love, for companionship, for a way to be whole. Vinge writes interesting characters & the plot here is nicely character driven, although she doesn't really do anything with the cloud whales and their dreamfall - odd to set up such a cool premise & then just sort of leave it there.
This is the third book of a trilogy and I think I like the second one, Catspaw, best. The characters, landscape, & ideas are more diverse - alien, but not alien all at once.
Show Less
LibraryThing member allreb
I absolutely love this trilogy, but I'm frustrated by the very end of this book. Until about a chapter from the end, however, it's fantastic, though the weakest of the three by far.
LibraryThing member laranth
When the human expansion ran into an alien race based in the star system Beta Hydrae, they were overjoyed at finally confirming they were not alone in the universe. But the joy of meeting turned sour as the two races intermingled, for Humans and Hydrans were almost genetically identical, except for
Show More
the fact that Hydrans had psionic abilities. Now even the Hydran homeworld was not all their own, and human scientists studied their sacred places, looking for medical gold, while the controlling combine resented even this last Hydran haven. Cat joins a research team, looking for something of his past. Show Less
LibraryThing member zeborah
I am, apparently, hopeless at avoiding part threes in a series. Fortunately this stood well enough alone. As a story, it hangs together well, although the ending works better in a series than a stand-alone.
On the downside, I'm struggling to think of any way in which the book was not problematic.
Second, explicitly comparing the aliens' plight to that of Native Americans and then portraying the aliens as a peaceful, spiritual people with mystical powers makes my head hurt; even though it's not quite that simple, the only aliens we see are rebels or collaborators or druggies. And to top it all off, the author has wiped out all actual Native Americans in her world except for one guy with a medicine bag who knows hardly anything about his heritage and only exists to occasionally encourage the protagonist.
Then the only women in the story are: a love interest; a mother, who gets killed; a wise grandmother, ditto; another love interest, who has to reject her sister for the hero; and said sister, who is mad. Oh, there are a couple of other spear carriers, but I can't even remember who. There are certainly no positive inter-female relationships.
Having one of the major antagonists be an antagonist because she is mad also made me sigh.
And then there was simply the gigantic gaping plot hole: apparently the aliens are so peaceful because if they kill someone they die themselves. Thus they have been easily oppressed. And it has never occurred to a single one of them that they could minimise their losses if one of them used a bomb or something to take out a whole bunch of the enemy.
On the downside, I'm struggling to think of any way in which the book was not problematic.
Show More
First off, I should mention trigger warnings for sexual assault.Second, explicitly comparing the aliens' plight to that of Native Americans and then portraying the aliens as a peaceful, spiritual people with mystical powers makes my head hurt; even though it's not quite that simple, the only aliens we see are rebels or collaborators or druggies. And to top it all off, the author has wiped out all actual Native Americans in her world except for one guy with a medicine bag who knows hardly anything about his heritage and only exists to occasionally encourage the protagonist.
Then the only women in the story are: a love interest; a mother, who gets killed; a wise grandmother, ditto; another love interest, who has to reject her sister for the hero; and said sister, who is mad. Oh, there are a couple of other spear carriers, but I can't even remember who. There are certainly no positive inter-female relationships.
Having one of the major antagonists be an antagonist because she is mad also made me sigh.
And then there was simply the gigantic gaping plot hole: apparently the aliens are so peaceful because if they kill someone they die themselves. Thus they have been easily oppressed. And it has never occurred to a single one of them that they could minimise their losses if one of them used a bomb or something to take out a whole bunch of the enemy.
Show Less
LibraryThing member juniperSun
I'm sure I read at least Catspaw much earlier, but 20 years is a long time to remember a series. Not that you needed the previous books to enjoy this, but there were a number of references to his history.
At one point I would have indiscriminately sucked up anything that mentioned psychic powers,
Not a book that bears too much close examination about the reality of how people interact, how many chances a person gets in life.
At one point I would have indiscriminately sucked up anything that mentioned psychic powers,
Show More
but I'm older & tireder now. Cat's bitterness is honest, Miya's idealism is sweet. Big business has octopus tentacles over all our lives (yes, I mean real world). No fairy tale endings.Not a book that bears too much close examination about the reality of how people interact, how many chances a person gets in life.
Show Less
LibraryThing member ChrisRiesbeck
A big disappointment. I enjoyed Psion and Catspaw, but the word that kept coming to mind for all 440+ pages of Dreamfall was "overwrought". The sales pitch for fans of the character Cat are (1) he goes to a planet where Hydrans still have a community (2) he meets the love of his life. But the
Not recommended, especially for fans of the first two books.
Show More
Hydran / humanity set up is just a retread of the Native American story (or Avatar if you wish) and the love story amps up the cliche "one person in the universe" to ridiculous extremes. Cat spends the entire book bitterly complaining. As in Catspaw, he is caught between rival groups. Ironically, in Catspaw, he was actually an agent of change, intelligently crafting a way out of an impossible situation. In Dreamfall, he's just a pawn with a few handy genetic traits. Where Catspaw had a rich noir backdrop of combines in conflict on Earth, with a variety of interesting characters, Dreamfall has an misty-eyed alien planet where semi-sentient clouds shed solidified thoughts that are then mined, like bat guano, by the nasty humans.Not recommended, especially for fans of the first two books.
Show Less
Language
Original language
English
Original publication date
1996
Physical description
447 p.; 6.25 inches
ISBN
0446516279 / 9780446516273