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[Obadiah]

I picked this up because the cover was pretty and found a favorable review of it on Slate. Really, I was just browsing and hoping for something to blow my mind with ideas.

And blown away I was!

I haven't read a lot of contemporary Science Fiction lately, so I don't have much of a frame of reference when comparing this book to others.

The novel is essentially a story of diplomacy that takes place within an intricately depicted 24th century where humans are not quite human, and have created small city states by colonizing Mars, Venus, and various moons of Saturn and Jupiter. As they have adapted to space, humans have begun modifying themselves in various interesting and bizarre ways unconstrained by the societal structures on Earth. Those living off-world have almost become a different species, looking back at their original ruined home, Earth, with a sense of annoyance and frustration at the influence it still exerts on them.

The characters are interesting but one dimensional. I found it difficult believing that the main character, Swan, could plausibly be any kind of serious representative for anything, let alone her home planet of Mercury, which she sort of turns in to. Swan is a heavily modified self-absorbed designer/artist/engineer(?) prone to wild mood swings and impulsive behavior (she once ingested a live colony of alien bacteria that still live in her gut, just for the hallucinogenic experience). She gets pulled into the aforementioned interplanetary intrigue when her grandmother, Alex, an influential diplomat dies, but leaves a mysterious plan in motion that everyone seems to think involves Swan.

This is not an action or thriller type of story, but the various plot developments and twists were enough to keep me interested.

The real draw was the setting. The novel is a slow drip of revelation after revelation of the 24th century. First we're introduced to the characters, then their various shapes and sizes, then their lifestyles come into play, and along with that all of their trans-human modifications upon modifications. I won't give away too much, but here are a few examples of the setting:
* Swan's home - Terminator, a city on rails constantly running ahead of the sunrise on Mercury.
* Gender - purely a form of personal identification that an individual can switch over the course of their multi-century lifespan.
* Interplanetary travel - done with asteroids cylindrically hollowed into habitats that orbit the sun.
* Economic system - a sort of tiered fractured social sharing with leaders vying for power and influence, and capitalism pushed to the fringes.

In addition, the novel is filled with thought-provoking random fictional unsourced excerpts and lists that provide a background zeitgeist describing perspectives on the setting's detailed history, advances in science, and new problems encountered.

It is truly an amazing world that the the author has managed to build.

[OdanUrr]

I will give it a try. Thanks!

[Naughty Bear]

Sounds awesome!

[Obadiah]

Anyone read any of his other stuff? I was going to check out Red Mars, but its from 1993 and I'm wondering how dated it is.

[Eurypterid]

The Mars series is excellent and although I've not read them since they were released, from what I recall I think they'd still be quite relevant today and not that outdated.

[Nerevar-as]

I read Red Mars this year. Aside from the dates being way too soon, didn´t notice anything outdated.