Hyperion is a 1989 science fiction novel by American author Dan Simmons. The first book of his Hyperion Cantos, it won the Hugo Award for best novel.The plot of the novel features multiple time-lines and characters. It follows a similar structure to The Canterbury Tales by Geoffrey Chaucer. The next book in the series was The Fall of Hyperion, published in 1990.
Hyperion is difficult to classify - essentially a Sci-Fi version of the Canterbury Tales, it weaves together some rather disparate narratives into a whole that promises more than the sum of its parts.
At the beginning, I was worried. Shortly after that, I fell in love. This is a phenomenal read. Beautifully spun tales that keep one fully engaged and unable to put it down. Reading older sci-fi and seeing how on point it can be is always a treat. This is no exception. So glad I finally picked this up. Started a filler book, but immediately reading the rest of this series after that.
Loved this story, it's universe, and the multi-narrator format. Very disappointing ending. I might decide it worthwhile to read the next one. This felt more like a bundle of X (don't want to spoil anything) disparate novellas. All really good on their own.
I just read Dune for the first time, a couple weeks before this. Strangely, even though it's twice the length (and I enjoyed both books), Dune took me like a third the time to read.
Poetic sci-fi, rich characters, and not too intense in its sci-fi-ness. Touches a lot on aging. Really enjoyed the form: multiple short stories that are tied together.
Finally got around to reading this story of seven pilgrims travelling to see a strange being on a distant world, and it's quite something. For all that this didn't look like an especially long book, it felt like a very, very long read. There were times I struggled to pick it up at all to continue, mostly because I felt I needed to complete an individual pilgrim's story in a single sitting (the book is divided into six of these stories).
The world in which Hyperion takes place is fascinating and sometimes strange; the worldbuilding is excellent and enticing, definitely the main strength in my eyes and the thing that kept me going. There's an independent but parallel AI civilization called the TechnoCore, a strange mythic reaper called the Shrike, semi-alien Ousters who live in migrant fleets and terrorize colony worlds, and more, and they all interact in increasingly interesting …
Finally got around to reading this story of seven pilgrims travelling to see a strange being on a distant world, and it's quite something. For all that this didn't look like an especially long book, it felt like a very, very long read. There were times I struggled to pick it up at all to continue, mostly because I felt I needed to complete an individual pilgrim's story in a single sitting (the book is divided into six of these stories).
The world in which Hyperion takes place is fascinating and sometimes strange; the worldbuilding is excellent and enticing, definitely the main strength in my eyes and the thing that kept me going. There's an independent but parallel AI civilization called the TechnoCore, a strange mythic reaper called the Shrike, semi-alien Ousters who live in migrant fleets and terrorize colony worlds, and more, and they all interact in increasingly interesting ways as the story is revealed.
The individual tales, though, are somewhat uneven. Two of them I really liked overall; one was well-done but depressing; one was mostly interesting but a little too reliant on old-fashioned tropes for my taste; and two more mostly left me cold. The writing is quite skillful, though there are brief occasions where something too melodramatic or too convenient happens that made me laugh when I perhaps wasn't meant to, and a few narrative choices occasionally feel quite dated.
I'm interested enough in the world these stories are built into, and some of the characters, that I plan to read Fall of Hyperion. The mythic edge to the story, the vivid descriptions, and the strange far-future politics and high stakes really get to me. I think I could have dealt better with the occasionally less-compelling personal stories if I had allowed myself to take breaks within a chapter rather than forcing myself to read each one in a sitting, so that's on me. Definitely a solid book.
Great shape and pace uncovering what our characters live for and are willing to die for as they tell their stories on a pilgrimage beyond their control. Somewhat marred by adolescent martial and marital themes, though not entirely out of place. Structure allows a lot of varied exploration of this humanity-descended space civilization's internal conflicts and contradictions.
Loved the story, hated the endless descriptions. At least 1/3 of the book was wasted on describing every person or setting mentioned even briefly.
Re-read finished: 24-2-2023
Rating remains 5 stars out of 5
Still love this book. It gets better with time (haha) and re-reads.
This is a five star book that ends about twenty pages too early. The story is driven forward by these fascinating mysteries, and right on the verge of answering them the book ends. Are they answered in the sequel? I don't know. But I shouldn't have to read the sequel to find out the answers to the main driving questions of this book.
It feels like Dan Simmons didn't know the answers to those questions, so ended things early.
This type of science fiction is no longer my bag. The childish sex scenes and the dialog of the "poet" killed it for me after about 30% of the way through. Did not finish.
Simmons builds an extremely interesting world, it's just too bad he has no interest in exploring it. Instead he seems to see it as a challenge to fill his book with mediocre science fiction tropes -- it's all there: poetry excerpts, laughably bad sex scenes, an awkward focus on references, metaphors and similes to "XYZ thing from the 20th century", and a painfully bad ending that Simmons clearly thought would be "epic"
It's a shame that the characters, story, and writing of this book is so terrible, because the periphery is fantastic. Every time Simmons takes a minute from navel-gazing about 19th century poets, he shows a gem of a universe he's created. A gem that he's resolute about not exploring or expanding upon.
Perhaps the best science fiction book I read in the recent years, justifies its reputation. Plenty of characters, well constructed, developing through parallel stories that converge on a single point in time and space. What happens though is the subject of the next book, which I'm about to begin.
It's pretty rare that I give a book a full five stars, especially with my skepticism of "great" genre reading, but Hyperion is a gem. The Canterbury Tales structure is brilliantly executed and thoughtfully woven together. The pervasive literary allusion is delicious. Simmons takes a love of scifi and a love of literature and writes this beautiful mixture of the two. The book is wrenching, it's funny, it's compelling, elegantly styled and written, dipping into different genres and voices. Hyperion is fantastic.
My only gripe was the cliff hanger ending. Now I need the next book!
For years people have been telling me “Oh, you love Space Opera, you’ll love Hyperion”. I finally read it.
The story is pretty okay, a little unexciting, but generally sort okay. I have 3 main problems, which stopped it being really edifying for me.
Firstly, it’s essentially a bunch of people sitting round telling stories. Like seriously, couldn’t you think of a better bridge between story arcs.
I also don’t feel the universe was described match the social effects of technology with the technology in it. For example there are fully sentient AIs, but however it’s never explored as to what it’s like to be a sentient AI or the differences in experience for them of us. There’s instantaneous travel, which apparently is expensive, but is also ubiquitous (not sure that makes sense). It all feels a little untidy.
Finally this story could practically be set now, with on major …
For years people have been telling me “Oh, you love Space Opera, you’ll love Hyperion”. I finally read it.
The story is pretty okay, a little unexciting, but generally sort okay. I have 3 main problems, which stopped it being really edifying for me.
Firstly, it’s essentially a bunch of people sitting round telling stories. Like seriously, couldn’t you think of a better bridge between story arcs.
I also don’t feel the universe was described match the social effects of technology with the technology in it. For example there are fully sentient AIs, but however it’s never explored as to what it’s like to be a sentient AI or the differences in experience for them of us. There’s instantaneous travel, which apparently is expensive, but is also ubiquitous (not sure that makes sense). It all feels a little untidy.
Finally this story could practically be set now, with on major changes in the plot. I feel that Space Opera should express some change in society over time, be it regressive or progressive. This is staunchly set in 1990, just 1990 with a roughly painted background of the future.
3/5.
This book turned out to be different than how it started and what i'd assumed it would be like. It's about 6 people stories and how they're linked to the world of Hyperion. There's some interesting sci-fi tidbits in there, for eg. i loved the idea of Tachyon trees. Overall a fun read, and i did get hooked to it up until the last story. The ending even though hard to anticipate, was a little weak and abrupt(but i don't like such endings, not to give anything away). I didn't research the book that much, except the fact that it's on a lot of must-read sci-fi lists. So i didn't realize till the end that, there were many other books in the series. I'd still give it 5 stars, since it was definitely a good book and was a pleasant surprise.
