ospalh reviewed Humans by Robert J. Sawyer (Neanderthal Parallax, #2)
Book two of a trilogy
2 stars
So, which parts of the story are in part 2. Let me think. No, that was part one, that was part three. Not all that much happening. Well, not that much apart from all the discussions of god – believing in one is good, because otherwise people wouldn’t we OK with politicians sending people to war¹ – and eugenics – great, all you need is a society without classes or poverty, and without different races to start with.
Yeah, no. I used to like it, but my thought was »Well, obviously eugenics won’t work, because we have racism and poverty« but if that is the point you want to make, you have to hammer it home mercilessly. That wasn’t done here. And a few sentences on a web page along the lines of »I don’t believe in what I write in my novels« doesn’t cut it for me.
Oh, and …
So, which parts of the story are in part 2. Let me think. No, that was part one, that was part three. Not all that much happening. Well, not that much apart from all the discussions of god – believing in one is good, because otherwise people wouldn’t we OK with politicians sending people to war¹ – and eugenics – great, all you need is a society without classes or poverty, and without different races to start with.
Yeah, no. I used to like it, but my thought was »Well, obviously eugenics won’t work, because we have racism and poverty« but if that is the point you want to make, you have to hammer it home mercilessly. That wasn’t done here. And a few sentences on a web page along the lines of »I don’t believe in what I write in my novels« doesn’t cut it for me.
Oh, and here we are getting more and more bits, where the science here became outdated. The paleontology i mean, the parallel universes is the fiction bit in science fiction. Mainly the Neanderthal genome project, the gene flow between Homo species &c. Stuff like the Denisovans: he, let’s sequence the genome from this Neanderthal bone next. ... Hmm. You know, that isn’t a Neanderthal, but another species of human.
1 I think that was the point of the Vietnam war memorial scene? That believe in god makes what should be unbearable – people dying in a pointless war – bearable.
