"Generations after leaving earth, a starship draws near to the planet that may serve as a new home world for those on board. But the journey has brought unexpected changes and their best laid plans may not be enough to survive. "--
Al igual que en la trilogía marciana, sorprende la verosimilitud de las tramas. Especialmente cuando buena parte de las tesis de Marte rojo, azul y verde son contradichas en Aurora. El tema sigue siendo la expansión de la humanidad más allá del planeta. Pero el optimismo técnico y político presente en la epopeya sobre la terraformación marciana choca aquí con un pesimismo que apunta contra las ideas escapistas tan presentes en la CiFi hollywoodiense.
Interesante elección de narrador, por cierto.
En contra, el gusto de Robinson por las repeticiones y el abandono de una posible trama interesante a media novela.
A solid entry from Robinson, and a take on generation ships and interplanetary colonization I've not seen before. I think he left a lot of room for exploring other topics, including Iris and Earth development (or relative lack) over the centuries.
Interesting, but wordy. I skimmed large sections and feel I didn't miss much. Some interesting ideas buried in swathes of prose (though the prose was, at least, never boring).
The first half of the book was so engaging and full of interesting characters, it made the second half look so bad by comparison. I finished it out of hope that the book would turn around - but it never got me back, I should have just stopped reading it after the first half.
After reading Seveneves, this was a good contrast. Both spend a lot of time talking about orbital mechanics so that the reader understands the critical stakes for trying to keep people alive in a tin can in the vacuum.
The book is really surprising in a lot of ways - it takes turns away from the easy resolution of problems and some endings are really hard.
In the year 2545, a generation spaceship leaves Earth for a 170 years interstellar trip to set up a new colony in a distant exomoon at the Tau Ceti system, 12 light-years away from Earth. It is now 160 years into the trip and the spaceship is near its destination. It is at that point that “Aurora”, Kim Stanley Robinson’s new novel, begins its narrative.
aurora1Aurora is a captivating ‘hard’ science story, characterised by an emphasis on scientific accuracy and meticulous research. The mechanics, the design and the ecology of the ship are explained in great detail. The ship has the ability to accommodate multiple lifeforms, including 2,000 people in 24 different biomes (miniecosystems) from tundra to tropical, inside two massive wheels, the A ring and the B ring. Each biome has its own human population, 2,000 people in total.
The ship’s artificial intelligence, called mischievously, “The Ship”, acts as …
In the year 2545, a generation spaceship leaves Earth for a 170 years interstellar trip to set up a new colony in a distant exomoon at the Tau Ceti system, 12 light-years away from Earth. It is now 160 years into the trip and the spaceship is near its destination. It is at that point that “Aurora”, Kim Stanley Robinson’s new novel, begins its narrative.
aurora1Aurora is a captivating ‘hard’ science story, characterised by an emphasis on scientific accuracy and meticulous research. The mechanics, the design and the ecology of the ship are explained in great detail. The ship has the ability to accommodate multiple lifeforms, including 2,000 people in 24 different biomes (miniecosystems) from tundra to tropical, inside two massive wheels, the A ring and the B ring. Each biome has its own human population, 2,000 people in total.
The ship’s artificial intelligence, called mischievously, “The Ship”, acts as the primary narrator of the story. It is fun and fascinating to follow its effort to learn how to write a narrative of the history of the people in the spaceship under the instructions of the ship’s “chief engineer”. Looks like a simple story but this is deceptive; it is rather, a complex, fascinating and stimulating novel.
Once again Robinson stresses the importance of people living in ecological balance with nature, but rather than suggesting shaping an alien landscape until it resembles Earth, he explores the possibility of working on our own environment to redress the damage we’ve done to it. Aurora is also a story about love, persistence, human ingenuity, hope and ideas.
Human beings live in ideas. That they were condemning their descendants to death and extinction did not occur to them, or if it did they repressed the thought, ignored it, and forged on anyway. They did not care as much about their descendants as they did about their ideas, their enthusiasms.
Is this narcissism? Solipsism? Idiocy? Would Turing acknowledge it as a proof of human behaviour?
Well, perhaps. They drove Turing to suicide too.
Aurora is a brilliant book, perhaps Robinson’s best after the Mars trilogy.
Hard to review this novel and praise all that's great in it without spoiling it! There's at least 4-5 really clever bits I'd love to talk about that would spoil it, so I'll just be coy...
First off, it's a slow burn going in, but worth sticking with. I find Robinson consistently enjoyable as an author, even when I've felt a given novel is weak or underwhelming. But this one is neither. This is one of the most impressive "hard" sci-fi novels I've read in a long while, a highly inventive generational ship story with deep characters and a few surprising twists and reveals.
The emotional heart of this book dances around loss, acceptance, hope, love, discovery, aging and meaning, and "home" -- what it is, how one finds it or makes it. I wish I could say more, but I'd ruin it. Give this one a chance, and if …
Hard to review this novel and praise all that's great in it without spoiling it! There's at least 4-5 really clever bits I'd love to talk about that would spoil it, so I'll just be coy...
First off, it's a slow burn going in, but worth sticking with. I find Robinson consistently enjoyable as an author, even when I've felt a given novel is weak or underwhelming. But this one is neither. This is one of the most impressive "hard" sci-fi novels I've read in a long while, a highly inventive generational ship story with deep characters and a few surprising twists and reveals.
The emotional heart of this book dances around loss, acceptance, hope, love, discovery, aging and meaning, and "home" -- what it is, how one finds it or makes it. I wish I could say more, but I'd ruin it. Give this one a chance, and if you read it I'd love to talk with you about it...
To my friends who aren't that into sci-fi, I'd still recommend this one. Just be prepared for bouts of extended science exposition -- one of Robinson's strengths, put to skilled use here as it fleshes out several plot points and emotional themes to great effect.
