Children of Time

by Adrian Tchaikovsky

paperback, 608 pages

Published June 4, 2015 by Tor.

ISBN:: 978-1-4472-7329-5
OCLC Number:: 911035831

(215 reviews)

Children of Time is the epic story of humanity's battle for survival on a terraformed planet.

Who will inherit this new Earth?

The last remnants of the human race left a dying Earth, desperate to find a new home among the stars. Following in the footsteps of their ancestors, they discover the greatest treasure of the past age - a world terraformed and prepared for human life.

But all is not right in this new Eden. In the long years since the planet was abandoned, the work of its architects has borne disastrous fruit. The planet is not waiting for them pristine and unoccupied. New masters have turned it from a refuge into mankind's worst nightmare.

4 editions

matt.shook.rocks reviewed Children of Time by Adrian Tchaikovsky (Children of Time, #1)

Pulled me in and never let go

5 stars

It's been way too long since I have had a novel grab me from the very first chapter. The plot spins out from a premise that never seems completely outlandish, where humans in suspension pods try to reestablish on a distant terraformed earth. The plot is somewhat like Battlestar Galactica, except there's only one Cylon and Earth is full of deadly arthropods.

The book is brilliantly structured, alternating between a human and a non-human protagonist. Spoiler: man was the true monster all along.

Wild Woila reviewed Children of Time by Adrian Tchaikovsky (Children of Time, #1)

Impressive & audacious vision

5 stars

Spiders undergo enhanced evolution, building an extraordinary new civilisation. Meanwhile the last of humanity searches for a new home, bringing its destructive tendencies with it. Impressive & audacious vision, but lacks engaging characters.

Reading time 6 days, 100 pages/day

theDuesentrieb@buecher.pnpde.social reviewed Children of Time by Adrian Tchaikovsky (Children of Time, #1)

Amazing, depressing and uplifting at the same time

5 stars

Great book, a take on a thought experiment for intelligent life that doesn't take anthropological shortcuts and a humanity that isn't able to learn from mistakes

theDuesentrieb@buecher.pnpde.social reviewed Children of Time by Adrian Tchaikovsky (Children of Time, #1)

Amazing, depressing and uplifting at the same time

5 stars

Great book, a take on a thought experiment for intelligent life that doesn't take anthropological shortcuts and a humanity that isn't able to learn from mistakes

ch1n3du reviewed Children of Time by Adrian Tchaikovsky (Children of Time, #1)

Review of 'Children of Time' on 'Goodreads'

5 stars

TThis book is good for so many reasons, it manages to deliver very interesting ideas but always feels grounded in the characters. It has the most interesting imagining of non-human intelligence I've seen.

Marsha Woerner reviewed Children of Time by Adrian Tchaikovsky (Children of Time, #1)

Review of 'Children of Time' on 'Goodreads'

4 stars

What a wild ride! People… Spiders… Ants… Beetles… Crazy computers…
All combined to make a wild story. Various philosophies on humanity are pointed out subtly, and really, spiders win in that sense…

Woile reviewed Children of Time by Adrian Tchaikovsky (Children of Time, #1)

Review of 'Children of Time' on 'Goodreads'

5 stars

Excellent evolutionary tale

Sam reviewed Children of Time by Adrian Tchaikovsky (Children of Time, #1)

Good ending, didn't care for the human portions

3 stars

Content warning Discussion of the ending

For most of this book I didn't expect to continue with the rest of the series. I very much enjoyed the spider scenes and seeing their culture, values, and technology evolve over time, but I didn't much care for any of the human scenes until right at the end.

One aspect that I particularly liked is that, ironically, the spiders are effectively Humanist at the end while the humans take on the place of the un-evolved animals who think of the spiders in a predator/prey relationship. The spiders then turn the tables and uplift the humans in the same way (and using the same mechanism) that the humans originally uplifted their civilization (except by bootstrapping empathy instead of sentience). It brought the whole thing to a nice conclusion in a circular way and made me decide to try the second book as well.

Michael Haider reviewed Children of Time by Adrian Tchaikovsky (Children of Time, #1)

A Pleasant Surprise

5 stars

What a great book. I'm so happy I went back to it, and I'm looking forward to starting the second book in the trilogy, probably in the new year.

I would highly recommend this to any and all sci fi fans.

iamd3vil reviewed Children of Time by Adrian Tchaikovsky (Children of Time, #1)

Review of 'Children of Time' on 'Goodreads'

5 stars

One of the best scifi and books I have ever read. Can't wait to read the next one.

marksutherland reviewed Children of Time by Adrian Tchaikovsky (Children of Time, #1)

Review of 'Children of Time' on 'Goodreads'

3 stars

Frustratingly well executed but somewhat irritating. Tchaikovsky weaves two tales together, one about a post-apocalyptic ark ship that outlives its expected lifetime and another about a civilization of spiders infected with a magic virus that makes them evolve quickly and be more empathetic. All of this is interesting, well structured, makes good use of contrast and variation on themes, is everything you could expect of modern sci-fi.
My complaints are a bunch of annoyances that take the shine off the whole thing. Chief among them is the main human PoV character who is a humanities professor surrounded by STEM and executive types who blunders his way from one catastrophe to another apparently knowing better than the rest of the cast but doing precious little with his wisdom over the course of Portal millennia. The human cast are a bunch of bad stereotypes and you could have cut half that half of the book and had something far less frustrating.
The spider's history is far more compelling but beyond a few analogies for (mostly Western European) history I didn't really feel like the cultural or political implications of the society he outlines were explored at any depth. I don't mind the conclusion but there is no real questioning of whether the use of the nanovirus could be immoral or misused. Reducing your crisis between two civilisations to a straw man philosophical model between two parties then resolving it with a macguffin seems like it cheapens your narrative and the philosophy you were shoe horning in there.
I can see why this is well regarded, there is a lot that's good in here, and if you like a more classical style of science fiction this may tickle your fancy, but I don't feel it's quite as clever as it wants to seem. It's also hard to avoid the takeaway being that maybe eugenics would be good.

WagesOf reviewed Children of Time by Adrian Tchaikovsky (Children of Time, #1)

Fresh

4 stars

Content warning too many legs

What a cool ride. I did not expect to have the giant spiders to end up as the bosses at the end!

Sam reviewed Children of Time by Adrian Tchaikovsky (Children of Time, #1)

Review of 'Children of Time' on 'Goodreads'

2 stars

I tried, I really did. It had some interesting concepts but I felt it's pacing was all wrong from the kind of story it was trying to tell and as such became a chore to read.

Kenobit reviewed Children of Time by Adrian Tchaikovsky (Children of Time, #1)

Fantascienza e... ragni

5 stars

Una storia di scienza e tecnologia da una prospettiva completamente inaspettata. Un ragionamento molto interessante sul linguaggio e sulla terraformazione.

nightgolfer reviewed Children of Time by Adrian Tchaikovsky (Children of Time, #1)

Review of 'Children of Time' on 'Goodreads'

4 stars

I'd have given this book the fifth star if I'd actually cared about a single one of the humans in it, even the tiniest bit. I was rooting for the other team (no spoilers) the whole way through. Pretty impressed that the author made me care so much about the other team, though!