From rec.arts.sf.reviews Fri Jan 30 16:25:59 1998 Path: news.ifm.liu.se!news.lth.se!feed1.news.luth.se!luth.se!sunqbc.risq.qc.ca!newsswitch.lcs.mit.edu!news.media.mit.edu!not-for-mail From: rrhorton@concentric.net (Rich Horton) Newsgroups: rec.arts.sf.reviews Subject: Review: The Stone Canal, by Ken MacLeod (1996) Followup-To: rec.arts.sf.written Date: 09 Jan 1998 12:02:05 -0500 Organization: Concentric Internet Services Lines: 87 Approved: wex@media.mit.edu Message-ID: NNTP-Posting-Host: tinbergen.media.mit.edu X-Newsreader: Gnus v5.3/Emacs 19.34 Xref: news.ifm.liu.se rec.arts.sf.reviews:1725 The Stone Canal, by Ken MacLeod Legend, UK, 1996 Trade Paperback edition: Legend, 1997, =A35.99, ISBN: 0099559013 Review copyright 1998 by Rich Horton It's long been true that a lot of the best SF comes from British or UK-based writers. Nowadays, frustratingly for those of us in the US, a lot of very fine SF is being published first in the UK and not until much later in the US. Iain M. Banks, Greg Egan, and Terry Pratchett are examples of this. Worse, some fine stuff doesn't seem to get published here at all! Many of Iain Banks' supposedly non-SF novels and Tom Holt's later comic fantasies, for instance. Now here comes another new British writer, and a very impressive one on the evidence of this novel, who isn't so far getting published in the US. _The Stone Canal_ is MacLeod's second novel. It is apparently related to his first novel (_The Star Fraction_) and his third novel (_The Cassini Division_, forthcoming in 1998), but I am told it can be read without difficulty on its own, and I found it to stand alone just fine. At a first brush, MacLeod reads like Iain Banks meets Bruce Sterling. The novel's opening, with a somewhat smart-alecky "human-equivalent" robot briefing a confused newly-awakened man, and its structure, alternating chapters on different timelines, definitely echo some of Banks's work. Note that Banks acknowledges MacLeod's help with _Use of Weapons_, in terms which suggest to me that he may have helped with that book's unusual structure. The deeply political concerns, and central character's habit of talking at length about politics, as well as some of the technology and the attitude towards technology, reminded me of Sterling and also, in a different way, Kim Stanley Robinson. Which is to say, at times this book is a bit talky. But in the final analysis, _The Stone Canal_ is a very original, very impressive novel. It's true SF, chock full of sense of wonder concepts, interested in new technology, in future politics, and in how technology affects politics and human life in general. The novel opens with a man awakening in the desert of a Mars-like planet, accompanied by a "human-equivalent" robot. Soon we meet another robot, Dee Model, this one a "gynoid" (female android), who has escaped her owner for whom she was a sex toy, and is proclaiming her autonomy. The man is soon revealed to be Jonathan Wilde, a legendary figure of political resistance among the inhabitants of New Mars, and the gynoid is based on a clone of Wilde's long-dead wife. The two encounter each other, and both end up in the hands of the "abolitionist" movement, which favors freeing intelligent robots from human slavery. Soon they are jointly involved in lawsuits brought by Dee Model's owner, who is Wilde's friend, long time rival, and apparent murderer, Dave Reid. This seems like plenty of background for a novel in itself, especially given the interesting environment of New Mars, with its single City, 5/6ths of which is given over to "wild machines," and with the pervasive semi-VR technology, the grounds for speculation about the nature of human vs. machine intelligence, and the semi-anarchist political structure of the colony. But in parallel tracks we follow the early life, on roughly present-day Earth, of Jonathan Wilde, Dave Reid, and the two important women in their lives: Myra and Annette. Reid is a diehard Trotskyite socialist, and Wilde an anarchist and "space nut;" and the tension between their political views, as well as the tension resulting from their relationships with the two women, is followed over the decades. Both men become very powerful in the decaying near-future environment; as both in their ways push to open up space travel for people in general. The two timelines inevitably converge, and the real concern of the novel comes clear: understanding of the nature of the "fast folk" -- originally human simulations run on very fast computer hardware -- and understanding the link between New Mars and Earth. MacLeod speculates fascinatingly on nanotechnology, virtual reality, and astrophysics. Everything is well-tied together in the end, although in a slightly disappointing manner. This is one way in which I rather suspect reading _The Star Fraction_ might improve this novel, as I gather it may show some more the nature of MacLeod's future. The first and last lines of _The Stone Canal_, by the way, are both stunners, if a bit contrived, as overtly "stunning" lines often are. The characters of Wilde and Reid are very well presented, though the female characters are a bit sketchier. The novel's weaknesses are an occasional tendency to talkiness, the rather familiar setup of the relationship of the main characters, along with their realization of enormous political power, and the slight flatness of the ending. But all in all this is an excellent pure SF novel, and one which bodes well for a career to watch. If only a US publisher would pick up MacLeod! %A Ken MacLeod %T The Stone Canal %I Legend (Random House UK) %C London %D 1996 %G ISBN: 0099559013 %P 322 pp. %O This edition, Trade Paper, 1997, UK=A35.99 From rec.arts.sf.reviews Thu Oct 15 15:12:02 1998 Path: news.ifm.liu.se!news.lth.se!feed1.news.luth.se!luth.se!cyclone.news.idirect.com!island.idirect.com!ai-lab!news.media.mit.edu!not-for-mail From: rrhorton@concentric.net (Rich Horton) Newsgroups: rec.arts.sf.reviews Subject: Review: The Star Fraction, Ken MacLeod (1995) Followup-To: rec.arts.sf.written Date: 09 Oct 1998 11:32:33 -0400 Organization: Concentric Internet Services Lines: 93 Approved: wex@media.mit.edu Message-ID: NNTP-Posting-Host: tinbergen.media.mit.edu X-Newsreader: Gnus v5.3/Emacs 19.34 Xref: news.ifm.liu.se rec.arts.sf.reviews:2124 The Star Fraction, Ken MacLeod Review Copyright 1998 Rich Horton _The Star Fraction_ is Ken MacLeod's first novel. He has since published two more; both set in the same "future history" as _The Star Fraction_. These are The Stone Canal_ (1996) and _The Cassini Division_. So far none of these books have been published in the US, but happily I can say that Tor has just announced plans to publish at least the latter two in the near future. I liked _The Stone Canal_ a great deal, and _The Star Fraction_ no less. I have yet to read _The Cassini Division_. MacLeod is a very politically savvy writer, and his books are full of politics, but the politics is almost always expressed through action, or it is an integral part of the setting. In other words, the books aren't lectures: they are, rather, about politics in interesting ways, ways that are integral to their themes. I should add that besides being about politics, the books concern interesting future technology, especially computer technology and Artificial Intelligence, and they are centered on believable and likable characters. They have rollicking plots, as well. _The Star Fraction_ follows several characters through a revolution of sorts in 21st century Great Britain. As the novel opens, the UK of our time has undergone several political upheavals, and is now "balkanized" into quite a few different, nominally independent political divisions. These include the "Hanoverians," apparently the closest thing to a controlling force on the island; the "Army of the New Republic," the remnants of a liberal/socialist republic which apparently succeeded the Kingdom of our present time; a number of basically independent "mini-states," some occupying only a few blocks of territory, with wildly different political organizations: these include the religious "states," radical Greens, homosexual enclaves, and finally an anarchic area of London called Norlonto (North London Town). Furthermore, the whole world seems to be under the loose control of some combination of the US and UN, and such organizations as Stasis, which proscribes certain technology, and Space Defense, which controls the orbital anti-nuclear lasers. This society is fascinating, and the details are well portrayed, with off the cuff hints, and only the occasional well-done infodump. The main characters are Moh Kohn, a basically Trotskyite mercenary; Janis Taine, a scientist studying memory enhancement; and Jordan Brown, a young atheist computer expert, fleeing from his upbringing in the Fundamentalist Christian enclave Beulah City. Their paths intersect when one of Moh's jobs involves defending Janis' lab: Stasis seems to have decided that Janis' research is dangerous, and Moh takes her to Norlonto, in the process becoming infected her new memory drug. At the same time Jordan encounters the mysterious "Black Planner," an entity of the net, who some think may be the long-feared "Watchmaker:" an AI coalesced from the combined networked computing power of the world. Jordan also flees to Norlonto, and hooks up with Janis and Moh. Moh soon begins to remember details about his late father's work, which involved a freeware program called (cleverly) Dissembler, which has become omnipresent on the world's computers. People are beginning to ask Moh what he knows about a mysterious organization called The Star Fraction. The novel is fast moving and clever throughout. The action is resolved intelligently: none of the characters really know what they're doing, or necessarily why. This results in some wonderful irony, and in a believable and honest plot. The villains have believable, even defensible, motives; and the heroes, while they are virtuous, may not be right. Or, better, what is "right" is ambiguous. A further delight of the book is MacLeod's writing. He is a clear and elegant writer, with a great ear for clever brand names and other phrases, which subtly illuminate the nature of this future world. In this he is like Greg Egan and perhaps most of all Bruce Sterling. As with those two writers, MacLeod' near futures seem fully furnished, real. He also loves puns (i.e. "the house ... had the look of a castle in which there had been many wild knights"). Usually these are fun, and work to further enhance our feeling for his setting; but sometimes this facet of MacLeod's writing may be a bit overdone, or self-indulgent. At times MacLeod is capable of exhilarating flights of metaphor, such as his description of Moh's first experience of what we might tiredly call "cyberspace:" several pages of kinesthetic description ("She wiped the sarcasm from her lips and shook in small drops, like sneers, from her fingers") which was both fun to read and a reasonable representation of what Moh might have felt. This is an excellent book, and all the more remarkable for being a first novel. Iain Banks' jacket quote says "this man's going to be a major writer:" for my money, he already is. %A Ken MacLeod %T The Star Fraction %I Legend %C London %D 1996 (HC 1995) %P 341 pp %G 0-09-955881-5 %O PB, UK 5.99 pounds Rich Horton | rrhorton@concentric.net "I am an excellent cook, and anyway when I am fifty I will probably prefer the breakfast to the girl anyway." - W. M. Spackman From rec.arts.sf.reviews Tue Aug 24 16:10:11 1999 Path: news.ifm.liu.se!news.lth.se!feed2.news.luth.se!luth.se!newsfeed.sunet.se!news01.sunet.se!news99.sunet.se!uninett.no!howland.erols.net!portc02.blue.aol.com!pitt.edu!gatech!sipb-server-1.mit.edu!senator-bedfellow.mit.edu!usenet From: "Aaron M. Renn" Newsgroups: rec.arts.sf.reviews Subject: Review: The Cassini Division by Ken MacLeod Followup-To: rec.arts.sf.written Date: 22 Aug 1999 19:23:11 -0400 Organization: GNU's Not Unix! Lines: 56 Sender: wex@tinbergen.media.mit.edu Approved: wex@media.mit.edu Message-ID: NNTP-Posting-Host: tinbergen.media.mit.edu X-Newsreader: Gnus v5.3/Emacs 19.34 Xref: news.ifm.liu.se rec.arts.sf.reviews:2438 The Cassini Division by Ken MacLeod Review Copyright (c) 1999 Aaron M. Renn Conclusion: Believe the Hype - Highly Recommended When this book came in the mail, I was pretty upset. I couldn't believe I just paid $23 for a book that was only 240 pages long. After reading it though, I realized just how fully I'd been sucked in to the modern SF's notion that only 500+ page epics can qualify as great novels. In the old days, lots of great books were under 300 pages. MacLeod proves that even today you don't have to write long to write well. I for one think a heckuva lot of current SF authors could learn something from him on this front. A few hundred years in the future, Earth is an anarchist paradise. The radical anarcho-capitalist elements are trapped on the far side of a wormhole. A couple of post-humans called the "fast folk" who had transcended after uploading their brains into computer hardware live meaningless lives trapped inside their own virtual reality simulations on Jupiter. Nevertheless, they still manage to bombard human space with viruses that render all electronic equipment too dangerous to use. Read the book to find out what was used instead. The Cassini Division stands guard around Jupiter waiting for any sign of a fast folk breakout. All of that is set up in two previous novels that are not published in the US, but MacLeod backfills the story well. In this installment, the fast folk are indeed showing signs of life on Jupiter, and the Cassini Division has very little time to decide on a course of action. MacLeod is apparently a political philosophy buff and it shows in this book. Since I am as well, that aspect really appealed to me. It's great to see speculations about what the world might be like if the followers of any of various fringe political movements ever got in charge. MacLeod is apparently an old communist, and his leftist sympathies show, but not enough to offend this liberal. I greatly enjoyed his world. There are a lot great ideas and themes in here that I really don't have time to go into. With only 240 pages to work with, MacLeod didn't have much either. That's probably a good thing as the novel's length kept him from letting the story get bogged down in philosophical ramblings. In short, just buy it. This is one of the rare books that's actually worth picking up in hardcover. I might even be paying a visit to amazon.co.uk to snag his other three books in the near future. %A MacLeod, Ken %T The Cassini Division %I Tor %D 1999-07 %G ISBN 0-312-87044-2 %P 240 pp. %0 hardcover, US$22.95 Reviewed on 1999-08-17 Aaron M. Renn (arenn@urbanophile.com) http://www.urbanophile.com/arenn/ From rec.arts.sf.reviews Thu Sep 9 16:09:16 1999 Path: news.ifm.liu.se!news.lth.se!newnews.hk-r.se!newsfeed1.swip.net!swipnet!hermes.visi.com!news-out.visi.com!cam-news-hub1.bbnplanet.com!news.gtei.net!bloom-beacon.mit.edu!senator-bedfellow.mit.edu!usenet From: "Aaron M. Renn" Newsgroups: rec.arts.sf.reviews Subject: Review: The Star Fraction by Ken MacLeod Followup-To: rec.arts.sf.written Date: 08 Sep 1999 22:21:30 -0400 Organization: GNU's Not Unix! Lines: 63 Sender: wex@tinbergen.media.mit.edu Approved: wex@media.mit.edu Message-ID: NNTP-Posting-Host: tinbergen.media.mit.edu X-Newsreader: Gnus v5.3/Emacs 19.34 Xref: news.ifm.liu.se rec.arts.sf.reviews:2449 The Star Fraction by Ken MacLeod Review Copyright (c) 1999 Aaron M. Renn Conclusion: Highly Recommended In my review of The Cassini Division, I said I was planning to order the rest of MacLeod's books from Amazon.co.uk. Well, I followed through and I'm happy to say this one was worth every penny I spent in shipping, even if my order did arrive slightly damaged. The Star Fraction is MacLeod's first book. It takes place in the same universe as The Cassini Division, but so much earlier in time - the mid-21st century - that the feel of it is totally different. Only the collection of oddball political movements seems to be carried through between the books. While I thought The Cassini Division was a strong novel, I liked this one even more. I'd classify The Star Fraction as intelligent cyperpunk with a sense of humor. In fact, I found myself laughing about every other page. This is a ten times more funny book than the gawdawful Connie Willis novel that won the Hugo this year. But it manages to also be a great serious novel at the same time, and it is literally exploding with great portrayals of various political movements. MacLeod does a wonderful job here of not playing favorites. There are sympathetic characters and working experiments at all positions on the dial. Political philosophy junkies will love this one. It made me want to go back and read up on my Trotsky and I'm not even a communist. It's impossible to do the plot of this book justice here, but briefly, Moh Kohn is a security mercenary hired to protect a university researcher whose work is being suppressed by the evil forces of Stasis - a security arm of the US/UN. He plans to take her to Norlonto, an autonomous anarcho-capitalist enclave where Stasis has no authority. But before he can do that, he is exposed to the memory enhancing chemical she was working on that, along with some dope he was smoking, triggers memories that activate a long buried program when he jacks into the net. A program that appears to be the first true AI - something the US/UN has vowed never to allow exist. This book has a great plot, great characters, and a great world. It's funny, it's got action, it's got romance, it's got international finance. It doesn't fall into formulamatic cyberpunk. It does provide an extremely entertaining read. The book can be a bit hard to follow at times as it jumps into flashbacks and such. But I'm sure it will be a lot easier the second time around. This one's good enough that I'm sure there will be a few re-reads. Note that this books is available in the US through Laissez-Faire Books at http://laissezfaire.org/ or via amazon.co.uk. The book has a Canadian price of C$8.99 printed on the back, so it may be available in bookstores there. How'd those Cans get so lucky? %A MacLeod, Ken %T The Star Fraction %I Orbit %D 1998 (original publication 1995) %G ISBN 1-85723-833-8 %P 341 pp. %0 trade paperback, £6.99 Reviewed on 1999-09-06 Aaron M. Renn (arenn@urbanophile.com) http://www.urbanophile.com/arenn/ From rec.arts.sf.reviews Sat Sep 11 17:39:09 1999 Path: news.ifm.liu.se!news.lth.se!feed2.news.luth.se!luth.se!newsfeed.online.be!news.algonet.se!algonet!howland.erols.net!bloom-beacon.mit.edu!senator-bedfellow.mit.edu!usenet From: pm@postviews.freeuk.com (pm agapow) Newsgroups: rec.arts.sf.reviews Subject: Review: "The Cassini Division" by Ken MacLeod Followup-To: rec.arts.sf.written Date: 08 Sep 1999 21:59:14 -0400 Organization: Infocalypse Lines: 80 Sender: wex@tinbergen.media.mit.edu Approved: wex@media.mit.edu Message-ID: NNTP-Posting-Host: tinbergen.media.mit.edu X-Newsreader: Gnus v5.3/Emacs 19.34 Xref: news.ifm.liu.se rec.arts.sf.reviews:2452 "The Cassini Division" by Ken MacLeod A Postview, copyright p-m agapow 1999 It is 300 years in the future and much has changed. Earth is an idyllic paradise, peaceful under a ruthlessly pragmatic socialist ideology. Government is nearly non-existent, laws few, and the land returning to wilderness. Space is a different proposition. Centuries ago, post-humans retreated into Jupiter, living at vastly accelerated speeds within simulated environments. The lethal computer viruses they spew into space have already once brought Earth to the point of destruction. Now the Cassini Division monitor Jupiter, their ships circling the planet, packed with nano-mechanical computers and the most lethal weaponry available. In a society with hierarchy, the buck stops with the Cassini Division. In a society without secrets, the Cassini Division have hatched a plot to end the Jovian problem once and for all. For some time, I nursed the suspicion that Ken Macleod was actually Iain M Banks under a different name. Although that hypothesis is certainly false - I've seen them in the same room - it is a fair description of MacLeod's work, his worlds being a less advanced version of Banks' Culture. They are different from a lot of SF worlds in that they are utopian, although not flawless. These utopias just don't work like our world. Many SF futures are distressingly similar to the present day, despite intervening centuries. People go to work, get paid, read their mail. To unfairly pick only one example, see Jerry Pournelle's work. But "The Cassini Division", illustrates a wide and probably realistic gap, like when the protagonist catches a flight and falls into a conversation with a fellow passenger: "Did you know," she said as we poured coffee mugs and tea into cups, that in the old system, there were people who did this as a fulltime occupation?" "Did what?" "Serve refreshments on aircraft." [...] "Really?" I said. "Why? Did they enjoy it or something?" "No," she said earnestly, "they did it because it was a way of getting what they needed to live on." The past is so dead that people have forgotten there was ever anything else. To continue the comparison to Banks, the Cassini Division themselves are much like the Special Circumstances, the freewheeling, dirty tricks agency of Banks' Culture. They are driven yet joyful, hedonistic and like their job. The Cassini Division do vicious, dangerous work, are ruthless and amoral but you want to meet these people. Hell, you want to be them. It's an achievement to make such potentially horrible people so likable. Technology freaks will find a lot to like with space-time wormholes, downloaded minds, fusion jets, nano-factories and morphing smart matter, mixed with philosophy and a good ear for a mean phrase. ("If it isn't running programs and it isn't fusing atoms, it's just bending space.") On the downside, "The Cassini Division" is a sequel, of sorts. You certainly don't need to have read MacLeods preceding novels ("The Star Fraction", "The Stone Canal") to understand and enjoy "The Cassini Division". However, certain characters and events loom large in the story that are only important in the context of the earlier work. For a new reader I suspect they would seem strangely over-emphasized and out of place. At the same time, the climax feels slightly incomplete, as if this was just the setup for a larger story. As a final quibble, the view of scientific progress is a touch simplistic. To understand a wormhole constructed by the post-humans, the Division recruits a physics genius, albeit one who hasn't practiced his trade in decades. Convenient for the plot but barely realistic. In balance, "The Cassini Division" is a good book, not only worthy but also an enjoyable read. But darn it all, MacLeod's already gone and written another one ("The Sky Road"). [***/recommended] and Prague on the Sid & Nancy scale. %A Ken MacLeod %T The Cassini Division %I Orbit %C London %D 1998 %P 240pp %G ISBN 1-85723-603-3 %O hardback, UKP15.95 Paul-Michael Agapow (pm@postviews.freeuk.com) "We were too young, we lived too fast and had too much technology ..." From rec.arts.sf.reviews Mon Sep 20 11:42:05 1999 Path: news.ifm.liu.se!news.lth.se!feed2.news.luth.se!luth.se!sunqbc.risq.qc.ca!gatech!sipb-server-1.mit.edu!senator-bedfellow.mit.edu!usenet From: rrhorton@prodigy.net (Richard Horton) Newsgroups: rec.arts.sf.reviews Subject: Review: The Sky Road, by Ken MacLeod (1999) Followup-To: rec.arts.sf.written Date: 15 Sep 1999 14:02:24 -0400 Organization: Prodigy Internet http://www.prodigy.com Lines: 140 Sender: wex@tinbergen.media.mit.edu Approved: wex@media.mit.edu Message-ID: NNTP-Posting-Host: tinbergen.media.mit.edu X-Trace: newssvr04-int.news.prodigy.com 937079222 3735118 209.156.166.230 (11 Sep 1999 19:47:02 GMT) X-Complaints-To: abuse@prodigy.net X-Newsreader: Gnus v5.3/Emacs 19.34 Xref: news.ifm.liu.se rec.arts.sf.reviews:2459 _The Sky Road_, by Ken MacLeod Review Copyright 1999 Richard Horton This is another excellent, engaging, novel from a fairly new Scottish writer, just now making his mark in the United States. His third novel, _The Cassini Division_ (1998), was published here by Tor just this year (1999). _The Sky Road_ is his fourth novel, not yet available in the US. But I am sufficiently a MacLeod addict that I get my fix from Amazon.co.uk as soon as I can. This one probably does not quite jar my favorite of his novels, _The Stone Canal_ (1996), from its position at the top of my personal MacLeod heap, but it's very fine, with yet another differently organized somewhat anarchic semi-utopia on display, as well as yet another look at the turbulent 21st century, and the menace of Artificial Intelligence. Ken MacLeod's new book is an intriguing offshoot from his previous three novels. I'll give a brief summary of "the story so far", if you will bear with me. _The Star Fraction_, _The Stone Canal_, and _The Cassini Division_ all come from the same future history. In this future, the world has fractured into numerous smaller states by the early 21st Century, essentially by a continuation of the process begun in the ex-commmunist states in the 1980s. _The Star Fraction_ treats of a small slice of time in the 2040s, dealing mostly just with the UK, and portraying an interesting fractured society, with dozens of "micro-states" built around various political ideologies, from the Greens to gays to fundamentalist Christians to various flavours of Socialists to anarchists, as well as loyalists of the Republic which succeeded the monarchy of our time, and loyalists (Hanoverians) to a version of that monarchy. All the political viewpoints were a key factor in the interest of _The Star Fraction_, but the main plot surrounded an artificial intelligence called the Black Planner; and the fear that AI's would take over the world. This turns out to be probably the central theme in all MacLeod's work, along with possible somewhat anarchist utopias. _The Stone Canal_ is set on two timelines. One begins in our '70s, following Jon Wilde and Dave Reid, two friends/enemies who begin as Socialist-leaning students in Glasgow, and end up with great power, much of which in different ways ends up promoting space exploration. The other timeline is far in the future, on the distant world of New Mars, as downloaded and revived version of both Wilde and Reid struggle again, this time over the rights of AI's, and the dangers in particular of the "fast folk" -- AI's who run so fast that human timescales are enormously long to them. _The Cassini Division_ is set shortly after _The Stone Canal_, and again concerns the dangers of the "fast folk," many of whom have colonized Jupiter. _The Cassini Division_ also features a trip to New Mars. These three books, in addition to the persistent worry about AI's, portray a variety of political organizations, and forms of organization, most notably perhaps the anarcho-socialist society of the Solar System and the anarcho-capitalist society of New Mars, in the time of _The Cassini Division_. _The Sky Road_ is kind of an "alternate history" of MacLeod's future. I can't think of anyone else who has done this sort of thing, except perhaps within a single book. The earlier parts, chronologically, of _The Stone Canal_, and all of _The Star Fraction_, are set in a common past to both _The Sky Road_ and to _The Cassini Division_, but one of the events in _The Stone Canal_ goes a different way in _The Sky Road_. Like _The Stone Canal_ and, to a lesser extent, _The Cassini Division_, this book is told in two threads, one in the past, in 2059, and the other some centuries in the future. The pastward thread follows Myra Godwin-Davidova, American-born lover of both Jon Wilde and Dave Reid, and a minor character in _The Stone Canal_. Myra, 105 years old, is the head of the government of a mini-state near Kazakhstan, called the International Scientific and Technical Worker's Republic. At the opening of the action, the Sino-Soviet Alliance, or the Sheenisov, is advancing on Kazakhstan. Both the reformed UN and Dave Reid's Mutual Protection Society are trying to take control of the world, partly from space, and to stop the Sheenisov. Myra goes on a whirlwind tour of Kazakhstan, Turkey, the US and the UK, looking for military assistance. What she has to offer are the world's remaining supply of nuclear weapons. But her problem is, it's not at all clear who the real enemy is, or for that matter how many enemies there are. She also deals with her personal problems: her age, her guilt over such betrayals of her past ideals as the use of slave labour, and the selling of nuclear protection, and her loss of yet another loved one in suspicious circumstances. The other thread features Clovis colha Gree, a young student in an odd, somewhat Utopian, Scotland. He is working on a project building a spaceship: the first spaceship to be built since the mysterious "Deliverance." It seems that since this "Deliverance" the world has reorganized itself on a rather pastoral model. Clovis' field of study is history, particulary the life of the "Deliverer." The reader figures out right quick that the "Deliverer" is Myra Godwin-Davidova. Clovis meets a beautiful woman called Merrial, and they fall tumultuously in love. But Merrial is a tinker, and the tinkers are regarded with suspicion by the rest of society, as they are the only people who deal with the somewhat restricted computer technology available in this future. Clovis is drawn by his love for Merrial and his thirst for knowledge about the Deliverer to a questionable search for secret files of the Deliverer's: ostensibly to help protect the spaceship project. But this search leads them not only to some anti-hagiographic knowledge about the Deliverer such as her use of nuclear weapons, but also to some potential use of the "black logic," the "path of power." The two threads converge to reveal to the reader some, at least, of what's going on: what the Deliverance really was, and what "black logic" might be, and part of the nature of this future society. It's intriguing, and clever, and by the end quite moving. The reader of the other books is also treated to a few cameos by major characters from them: Dave Reid, of course, and also Jordan Brown and Cat Duvalier from _The Star Fraction_, and, a bit too cutesily, I thought, a version of Ellen May from _The Cassini Division_. The only weakness is that I found Merrial and Clovis' affair just a bit convenient: not all that easy to believe. One of the main reasons I had trouble with it is a bit of a spoiler, however. I also found the political machinations of Myra's time hard to follow, but that weakness is in me, partly, and partly, I think, it's a feature: MacLeod 21st century really is a chaotic time. I also was impressed again by MacLeod's clever way with a phrase. His prose is sound, but only some of the time does it sing. The first chapter is quite impressive in this way, but he doesn't really maintain that peak level. However, throughout there are dry asides, and clever plays on words, and mordant observations that hit home. Ken MacLeod continues to be one of the most exciting new SF writers. His books are politically intriguing, and honest, also full of nice SFnal speculation about future technology, nicely written, and fast moving. The characters are well-drawn, and almost always ambiguous. Which is to say, real people. Each of his books is worth reading, and _The Sky Road_ is one of his best. %A Ken MacLeod %T The Sky Road %I Orbit %C London %D 1999 %P 291 pp %G 1-85723-755-2 %O Hardcover, £16.99 Rich Horton | Stable Email: mailto://richard.horton@sff.net Home Page: http://www.sff.net/people/richard.horton Also visit SF Site (http://www.sfsite.com) and Tangent Online (http://www.sfsite.com/tangent) From rec.arts.sf.reviews Wed Oct 20 12:33:25 1999 Path: news.ifm.liu.se!news.lth.se!feed2.news.luth.se!luth.se!newsfeed.berkeley.edu!newsfeed.stanford.edu!bloom-beacon.mit.edu!senator-bedfellow.mit.edu!usenet From: tillman@aztec.asu.edu (P.D. TILLMAN) Newsgroups: rec.arts.sf.reviews Subject: Review: MacLeod's "Cassini Division" Followup-To: rec.arts.sf.written Date: 18 Oct 1999 18:02:47 -0400 Organization: Software Agents Group Lines: 116 Sender: wex@deepspace.media.mit.edu Approved: wex@media.mit.edu Message-ID: NNTP-Posting-Host: deepspace.media.mit.edu X-Newsreader: Gnus v5.5/Emacs 20.3 Xref: news.ifm.liu.se rec.arts.sf.reviews:2481 Cassini Division, Ken MacLeod review copyright 1999 Peter D. Tillman Rating: "A" -- a fresh look at future politics, married to solid hard-sf extrapolation. Short & sweet, fast & funny, but with a rather appalling protagonist and ideology, and a weak, pat ending. Even so, highly recommended. %A Ken MacLeod %T The Cassini Division %D 7/99 US %I Tor %O $23 %P 240 pp %G ISBN 0312870442 *SPOILER ALERT* You really shouldn't read past here if you haven't read the book. Much of what follows won't make sense if you do. So there, Mr. College Professor (Pfhuut), Mr. Non-Cooperator (PFHHHOONT!), Mr. *Banker* (!!PFFHHOUNGT!!) S P O I L E R S * * * "A brilliant novel of ideas" -- front-cover blurb by Vernor Vinge. The central anarcho-socialist idea -- the "True Knowledge" -- is, well.... "Might Makes Right". Ugh. I've always thought the best way to judge a person's character is to watch how they treat someone who has no power over them -- think back to good & bad bosses you've had. Fortunately, the "comrades" don't seem to apply this principle in their everyday lives. But the protagonist, Ellen May Ngewthu, is an appalling individual, a close analog to Gen. Curtis "Bomb 'em back to the Stone Age" LeMay. Unlike LeMay, she has the freedom to act, and completely destroys the "post-human" Jovian civilization for the offense of hijacking a third-party spaceship. Even the crudest SF carnography trots out a stronger casus belli to trigger mass genocide (at least for human aggressors). Ellen has a remarkable ability to dehumanize her opponents -- bluntly, she's a violently paranoid racist. Even after personal contact with legally-human "robots" on New Mars has, kind of sort of, made her accept them as "part of *us*, whereas the Jovians -- 'You mean you would contemplate a union -- with *them*?'...." ".... Time for Plan B," Ellen decides, disregarding a direct order from the Solar Council delegate -- Plan B being genocide by comet bombardment. Worked, too. And the Jovies *were* baddies, through & through, in the pat, weak & rather disappointing ending. Feh. Post-socialism (or anarcho-socialism) in MacLeod's Solar Union adopts the form, but little content, from present-day socialism and communism -- irony? (At least, I hope the character who says that Lenin was "just misunderstood" is intended as irony.) The Union economy isn't described in enough detail to judge whether it might actually work (though with enough to succeed as a fictional device). Perhaps there's more detail elsewhere -- this is the first MacLeod book I've read (but it won't be the last). MacLeod has clearly read his Vinge -- though, curiously, the Union's policy is to avoid a Vingean singularity at almost any cost, and to destroy any culture that reaches it. For a more convincing (IMO) snapshot of a successful democratic anarchy, read Vinge's "The Ungoverned." Another sfnal predecessor that likely influenced MacLeod is Ursula K. LeGuin's wonderful "The Dispossessed" and related works. And read Hans Moravec's recent "Robots" for another view of the coming post-human era. Humans as aliens: the MacLeod future history has encountered no aliens, so they've made their own -- the "fast folk" or post-humans are the most dramatic example, but all three societies here -- the post-socialists, the anarcho-capitalists and the fast folk -- are quite different from today's cultures, and quite strange to each other, a welcome relief from the more usual "futures" that are today with tailfins stuck on. And it's a pleasure to read a lean, non-bloated novel. Not that there aren't some future-anachronisms here: helicopters, elevator attendants(!), brass-&-steel(!) mechanical computers.... Memo to MacLeod: brush up on your Drexlerian molecular rod-logic nanocomputers. Or if those won't work -- DNA-based biocomputation. Or if you *have* to go macro-mechanical, you'd use lightweight composites & light metals -- inertia in the gear trains, y'know? And anyway -- how likely is it that non-networked electronic computers would be crippled -- or taken over -- by "radio viruses" from Jupiter? Tin Ear Dept: ".... I weren't that worried. Had you lot figured.... Just gosh-darn lucky...." (p. 168, US hc ed). Umm. Mebbe this rancher emigrated to Texas from the lil ol' UK? Enough of this grumbling & nit-picking -- I had a great time reading "Cassini Division", which you might not have guessed, I just realized, from reading this far. I found myself deliberately slowing down to savor the book, something I last did for Phyllis Gotlieb's lapidary "Flesh & Gold". And it makes you think. A definite keeper, highly recommended despite the appalling genocidal "heroine." [note 1] PS: How do you pronounce "MacLeod"? I presume it doesn't rhyme with Cleo? PPS/Memo to PNH/SFBC: when do we get the rest of MacLeod's books here in the USofA? Note 1) Hey, it could be worse. Consider, for example, Barnes' "Kaleidoscope Century", or Barton's "When Heaven Fell." At least Ellen has self-doubts... Read more of my reviews: (including Moravec's "Robots" & Gotlieb's "Flesh & Gold") http://www.silcom.com/~manatee/reviewer.html#tillman From rec.arts.sf.reviews Wed Oct 20 12:43:57 1999 Path: news.ifm.liu.se!news.lth.se!feed2.news.luth.se!luth.se!news-peer-europe.sprintlink.net!news.sprintlink.net!howland.erols.net!bloom-beacon.mit.edu!senator-bedfellow.mit.edu!usenet From: "Aaron M. Renn" Newsgroups: rec.arts.sf.reviews Subject: Review: The Sky Road by Ken MacLeod Followup-To: rec.arts.sf.written Date: 19 Oct 1999 11:02:21 -0400 Organization: GNU's Not Unix! Lines: 61 Sender: wex@deepspace.media.mit.edu Approved: wex@media.mit.edu Message-ID: NNTP-Posting-Host: deepspace.media.mit.edu X-Newsreader: Gnus v5.5/Emacs 20.3 Xref: news.ifm.liu.se rec.arts.sf.reviews:2484 The Sky Road by Ken MacLeod Review Copyright (c) 1999 Aaron M. Renn Conclusion: Highly Recommended What can I say, Ken MacLeod does it again. This is another great effort from him. Fans will not be disappointed. However, unlike with his other books, this one is much better if you know what has happened before. It sure helps if you've already read The Stone Canal. Don't buy this as your first MacLeod novel. MacLeod's books all are vaguely similiar. They inhabit the same future history. They have the various political fringe groups and in jokes. The implications of artificial intelligence are explored. But yet the books are all very different in tone and scope. The structure of this novel harkens back to The Stone Canal. There are two parallel time streams going, with chapters alternating in between. In this one though, both of them take place in "real time" as opposed to TSC, where one stream told the main story and the other did simultaneous backfill over a long period of time. This one also is more slow moving, but makes up for it with what is probably the best ending of any of his books yet. It also takes his fondness for pubs to a whole new level. Every chapter the characters were stopping by the local watering hole for a drink. Made me damn thirsty. Also, this novel is a slightly different variant on the MacLeod future history. Some of the events in TSC and The Cassini Division obviously never happened or turned out differently. At some time in the undisclosed future, humans are once again preparing to reach for the stars. At some time past, most modern computer technology had been swept away by someone called the Deliverer. Many technologies and philosophies are viewed with the same level of acceptance as, say, Satan worship. Meanwhile in our other thread, we get to follow the adventures of Myra Davidov after the death of a certain someone at the Khazakstan border in TSC. The only real complaint I have about this book is how the same people always seem be the key players and keep running into each other. I groaned when we found out C3P0 and R2D2 were in with Anakin and Obi-Wan from the beginning. Similarly, I cringed when I saw some of the folks Myra ran into. This is clearly a nitpick, which should show the depths to which I have to sink in order to find something negative to say about this otherwise excellent and well-written book. I'm always bothered when writers create something popular, then milk it with endless sequels. That's why I'm happy to report that I've heard that MacLeod is now working on Something Completely Different. I definitely think it's time to give this universe a rest while we still love it and want more, rather than when we've had enough. %A MacLeod, Ken %T The Sky Road %I Orbit %D 1999 %G ISBN 1-85723-755-2 %P 291 pp. %O hardcover, £16.99 Reviewed on 1999-10-05 Aaron M. Renn (arenn@urbanophile.com) http://www.urbanophile.com/arenn/ From rec.arts.sf.reviews Wed Oct 20 12:44:17 1999 Path: news.ifm.liu.se!news.lth.se!feed2.news.luth.se!luth.se!sunqbc.risq.qc.ca!newsfeed.cwix.com!bloom-beacon.mit.edu!senator-bedfellow.mit.edu!usenet From: "Aaron M. Renn" Newsgroups: rec.arts.sf.reviews Subject: Review: The Stone Canal by Ken MacLeod Followup-To: rec.arts.sf.written Date: 11 Oct 1999 22:38:07 -0400 Organization: GNU's Not Unix! Lines: 42 Sender: wex@deepspace.media.mit.edu Approved: wex@media.mit.edu Message-ID: NNTP-Posting-Host: deepspace.media.mit.edu X-Newsreader: Gnus v5.5/Emacs 20.3 Xref: news.ifm.liu.se rec.arts.sf.reviews:2471 The Stone Canal by Ken MacLeod Review Copyright (c) 1999 Aaron M. Renn Conclusion: Highly Recommended Another stellar job from MacLeod here. I've read three of his books so far, all of which have similar themes, but are different enough to keep things from getting old. In this one we have the various political movements of course, and the obligatory bits about AI and what it means to be human. But there's a lot more in there too. The Stone Canal operates in two different time streams. One is Jonathan Wilde telling us his history from about 1975 to the 25th century. This is nice because it puts a little more structure around the events in The Star Fraction, as well as providing a nice backfill to The Cassini Division, which US readers will doubtlessly appreciate. The other is a series of events that happen over a couple of days on New Mars involving a vat grown clone of Wilde and a gynoid (a vat grown human body with an imprinted robot brain) who's trying to achieve autonomy. I personally found this book a lot easier to follow than The Star Fraction, which seemed to jump around randomly at times. Though I must say I probably enjoyed this one just ever so slightly less as well. I really don't have much else to say about this book except that I loved it. To repeat my previous reviews, this MacLeod guy is great. It remains to be seen if he can keep coming up with great new stuff over the long term, but his first few books are absolutely first rate. This one is 100% worth special ordering from the UK or Canada. However, for those who are on a budget - or don't want to take my word for it - I hear that The Stone Canal will be out in the US sometime in the next year. %A MacLeod, Ken %T The Stone Canal %I Legend %D 1997 (original publication 1996) %G ISBN 0-09-955901-3 %P 322 pp. %O trade paperback, £5.99 Reviewed on 1999-09-19 Aaron M. Renn (arenn@urbanophile.com) http://www.urbanophile.com/arenn/ From rec.arts.sf.reviews Wed Mar 8 12:10:13 2000 Path: news.ifm.liu.se!news.lth.se!feed2.news.luth.se!luth.se!logbridge.uoregon.edu!newsswitch.lcs.mit.edu!bloom-beacon.mit.edu!senator-bedfellow.mit.edu!dreaderd!not-for-mail Sender: wex@deepspace.media.mit.edu From: pj@willowsoft.cix.co.uk (Paul S. Jenkins) Newsgroups: rec.arts.sf.reviews Subject: Review: Ken MacLeod's _The Star Fraction_ Organization: CIX - Compulink Information eXchange Reply-To: pj@willowsoft.cix.co.uk Followup-To: rec.arts.sf.written Approved: wex@media.mit.edu Date: 06 Mar 2000 11:59:16 -0500 Message-ID: X-Newsreader: Gnus v5.5/Emacs 20.3 Lines: 37 NNTP-Posting-Host: deepspace.media.mit.edu X-Trace: dreaderd 952361959 2944 18.85.23.65 Xref: news.ifm.liu.se rec.arts.sf.reviews:2630 _The Star Fraction_ by Ken MacLeod Review Copyright (c) 2000 Paul S. Jenkins Moh Kohn is a mercenary with an intelligent gun. Janis Taine is a biologist researching memory drugs. When Kohn goes to Taine's laboratory after a raid, the drugs have a strange effect on him, triggering deep memories and setting off a chain of events that takes the pair of them on a wild adventure through the political landscape of a future Britain. MacLeod's vision of future politics is drawn in considerable detail, and populated with a number of engaging characters in addition to Kohn and Taine. Young Jordan Brown, for instance, fresh out of his computer- operator job, with a stash of dubious money, meets up with the mercenaries for an adventure of his own. Or there's Catherin Duvalier, a mercenary with whom Kohn has worked before, only now she appears to have been paid by the other side. MacLeod's debut novel is a confident work. The characters are highly believable, the setting fully realized. The plot is intricate and detailed, and probably needs a degree in political science to understand it fully. I got a bit lost toward the end of the book, possibly because my reading of it was broken up, so I'd recommend reading it at a stretch. At the close, MacLeod seems to take an age to tie up the loose ends of his complicated tale, which is probably unnecessary, as he has written two sequels. One to re-read, I think. %A MacLeod, Ken %T The Star Fraction %I Orbit (Little, Brown) %C London %D 1998 (copyright 1995) %G ISBN 1 85723 833 8 %P 341 pp. %O paperback GBP 6.99 Paul S. Jenkins | More reviews at: Portsmouth UK | http://www.cix.co.uk/~willowsoft/revup/ From rec.arts.sf.reviews Tue Aug 1 13:35:18 2000 Path: news.ifm.liu.se!news.lth.se!feed2.news.luth.se!luth.se!newspump.monmouth.com!newspeer.monmouth.com!howland.erols.net!bloom-beacon.mit.edu!senator-bedfellow.mit.edu!dreaderd!not-for-mail Sender: wex@poison-ivy.media.mit.edu From: webmaster@sflare.com Subject: Book Review: The Stone Canal by Ken MacLeod Newsgroups: rec.arts.sf.reviews Organization: mail2news@nym.alias.net Followup-To: rec.arts.sf.written Approved: wex@media.mit.edu Date: 31 Jul 2000 11:37:36 -0400 Message-ID: X-Newsreader: Gnus v5.5/Emacs 20.3 Lines: 65 NNTP-Posting-Host: poison-ivy.media.mit.edu X-Trace: dreaderd 965057858 9443 18.85.23.103 Xref: news.ifm.liu.se rec.arts.sf.reviews:2770 The Stone Canal by Ken MacLeod Review Copyright 2000 Eoghann Irving This is the second Ken MacLeod book I've read. It's part of a sequence of books, all of which share the same universe and explore certain political ideas. "The Stone Canal" also has particularly close links with the follow up book "The Cassini Division," which I read first just to be difficult, in that the events in this book are referred to in "The Cassini Division." The central characters in this book are Jon Wilde -- yes, the plural was deliberate. The story jumps back and forward from the 20th century where he was a political agitator and "anarchist with nuclear capability" to the far future where he is brought back to life. His return to the living is the responsibiliity of the construction robot Jay-Dub who wants him to take Dave Reid (an old associate of Wilde's and now the most important man in Ship City) to court. Add to this the fact that Dave Reid's robot concubine Dee Model is attempting to assert her own freedom and she just happens to have the body of Wilde's now deceased wife. As you can no doubt tell there is a lot going on in this book. Its packed with interesting ideas. MacLeod does a stunning job of world building throughout this book, taking it from 1975 through into the 21st century via wars and revolutions and then on to the far future in New Mars. Be warned that political ideas are central to this book. In particular there is a sort of battle between libertarian ideals and socialist ideals. The two might seem light years apart but MacLeod makes a strong case for them actually being intertwined. On several occasions I found myself exclaiming "but thats just not RIGHT" as I read what a character had to say about something. I see this as a tribute to the realism of MacLeod's characters that I actually wanted to argue politics with them. The book is imaginative and well written. MacLeod plays with the narrative form a little but not in such a way as to distract you from the story itself. His main characters have real personality to them. They aren't simply mouthpieces for their politics. I do wonder how easy it would be for people outside of the UK to read this book though. There are several references which would probably slip past them. Certain dates or unusual ways of referring to things. Since I live in Scotland it was rather an unusual feeling for me to read descriptions of places that I regularly pass. I only really have one small problem, which is that I gave "The Cassini Division" a 10 and this book is actually a little better. Score 10/10 %A Ken MacLeod %T The Stone Canal %I Legend (Random House UK) %C London %D 1996 %G ISBN: 0099559013 %P 322 pp. Read this and other book reviews at http://sflare.com/books/reviews.html Submit your own reviews at http://sflare.com/books/submit.html