Hyperion

by Dan Simmons

Paperback, 455 pages

Italian language

Published April 17, 2014 by Fanucci.

ISBN:: 978-88-347-2711-9

(15 reviews)

Nel 2700 gli esseri umani, grazie allo sviluppo della tecnologia dei teleporter, si spostano istantaneamente nella galassia, ma un terribile esperimento, il Grande Errore, ha causato la distruzione della Terra e la diaspora dell’uomo nello spazio, dando vita così a una nuova federazione che unisce tutti i mondi abitati: l’Egemonia dell’Uomo. Alla vigilia dell’Armageddon, sette pellegrini affrontano un ultimo viaggio verso Hyperion, in cerca delle risposte agli enigmi della loro vita. Ognuno di loro deve raccontare agli altri la propria storia, per farsi conoscere e dimostrare di non essere una spia. I racconti dei sette ruotano intorno ai mondi e alle difficoltà che circondano lo spazio: dalla minaccia degli Ouster, discendenti dei primi coloni che fanno a meno della tecnologia, al ruolo della Chiesa Shrike, temuta da tutti. E in questi racconti, di una bellezza sfolgorante, sta la chiave che permetterebbe loro di salvare l’umanità.

8 editions

Matt B Gets Lit reviewed Hyperion by Dan Simmons (Hyperion Cantos, #1)

Review of 'Hyperion' on 'Goodreads'

3 stars

I am so glad to finally be done with this book. It took me about a year and a half to complete it: I got frustrated about a third of the way in and had to put it down for a while. Then I would read sections of it in between other books I was reading.

The book was sold to me as "Canterbury Tales in Space," literally. It was a mystery book, wrapped in paper at a bookstore, and that phrase was written on the outside. Sci-fi isn't my usual genre, but I took a chance, thinking, "I like Canterbury Tales, and maybe this is a discounted price because the title is a secret." Spoiler alert: it was not a discounted price.

Yes, this is a book about a group of travelers, each telling their tale while on the pilgrimage. But that's where the comparison ends. The Canterbury Tales are told in multiple formats and voices: some prose, some poetry, some bawdy, some sacred. This author can't seem to get out of his own writing voice.

Don't get me wrong. It is a super talented writing style. The attention to detail is unsurpassed. In fact, that's where my frustration came into play. I felt there was often too much detail. There were described minutia that seemed only important to the specific paragraph they were enclosed in. Will I need to know 100 pages from now why a certain planet has specific life forms, or why a weapon I've never heard of works the way that it does?

And then the diaries within diaries! There may have been six or seven story tellers, but I read the lengthy, detailed background of at least ten or eleven people. With so much going on (and admittedly, possibly due to my jagged reading), I had forgotten some of the first characters' anecdotes by the time I got to the end.

I can understand why some people would appreciate that exhaustive focus, down to the nitty-gritty, but I found myself drowning in details. Getting through the book started to feel like trudging through literary molasses.

The character Martin Silenus said it best, "Am I the only one who can tell a straightforward story in this f**king herd?"

scmbradley reviewed Hyperion by Dan Simmons (Hyperion Cantos, #1)

An uneven mishmash

3 stars

Content warning Includes spoilers

I enjoyed most of Hyperion, it's a weird mishmash of different bits and pieces. I guess the intention is that the different stories are contributing to some sort of overarching narrative, but I didn't get much of a sense of that. But the individual stories are mostly interesting. There are two that I didn't particularly like though. The first was the benjamin button/fifty first dates story, which I guess is supposed to be sot of tragic, but just comes off as a bit goofy.

The other story I didn't like was the last one. Just everything about it is either creepy or stupid. So this late teen/early twenties guy meets a sixteen year old, they spend a few days or weeks together, and then the guy disappears for like ten years. Because of time dilation he come back still a young man to find that the girl, Siri, is now in her mid twenties. So ten years have passed, but Siri, who met this guy like a decade ago for a handful of days, is still in love with him? And then this pattern repeats throughout her life. This just struck me as so stupid, so implausible that it completely took me out of the story. It's also very much told from the perspective of the guy, and the reaction we're supposed to have is "oh weird, this woman is aging way faster than the character we're supposed to identify with". But I couldn't help thinking about things from Siri's perspective. She falls in love with this guy she meets for a couple weeks when she's sixteen, and then he fucks off for a decade and what? She just... Pines away for this dude? And is happy to let him back into her life when he shows up ten years later, over and over again? It just doesn't make sense.

So, Hyperion is an uneven book, with some high points and some low points. It feels more like a collection of short stories than a real novel, and the overarching narrative doesn't really resolve itself at all. I know there's a sequel, but come on, I just read 500 pages of this, I deserve some kind of closure. I don't really understand why this is seen as a classic.

cmonster reviewed Hyperion by Dan Simmons (Hyperion Cantos, #1)

Review of 'Hyperion' on 'Goodreads'

4 stars

I really enjoyed the structure of this book. 7 travelers on a package, ditched together by circumstance. Each tells their tale a la The Canterbury Tales. Each story is told differently and really well crafted. On to of yours, the world building is intriguing.