Nicholas (nwhyte) wrote,
Nicholas
nwhyte

August Books 10) A Fire Upon The Deep, by Vernor Vinge

When I first read this I didn't know Vinge's work all that well, and now I've read a few more of his books I can spot some of the standard elements - viewpoint characters who are young or even children, dark ill-explained conspiracies in the background, slightly deus ex machina ending. But what makes this book special is the alien Tines, a lovely concept of packs of four to eight dog-like aliens with mini-hive minds, and the political economy of what happens to their pre-industrial culture when two different factions rescue children off a crashed earth ship and start developing human technology to try and defeat each other with. (This is in the context of a bigger galactic power game, whose details I really failed to grasp, affecting the rescue ship.) It goes on a bit for what is in it, but generally a good read; I much preferred it to the prequel, A Deepness in the Sky, which also won the Hugo several years later.

A Fire Upon The Deep shared the Hugo with Connie Willis' Doomsday Book (which I personally preferred) and beat KSR's Red Mars, which is on my current reading list, Maureen McHugh's China Mountain Zhang, which is somewhere on the to-read shelves, and Steel Beach by John Varley, which I haven't otherwise heard of. More remarkable perhaps is the absence of Neal Stephenson's Snow Crash, surely at least as important a book as any of the above, from any of the short lists.
Tags: bookblog 2010, rereads, sf: hugos, writer: vernor vinge
Subscribe

  • Whoniversaries 16 April

    i) births and deaths 16 April 1936: birth of Derrick Sherwin. On paper, he was producer of Doctor Who for only two stories and 14 episodes, the…

  • Whoniversaries 15 April

    i) births and deaths 15 April 1921: birth of David Garth, who played Solicitor Grey in The Highlanders (Second Doctor, 1967-68) and a Time Lord…

  • Whoniversaries 14 April

    i) births and deaths 14 April 1935: birth of the late great Terrance Dicks, who began in 1968 as script editor for the last four Second Doctor…

  • Post a new comment

    Error

    switch
    default userpic

    Your reply will be screened

    Your IP address will be recorded 

    When you submit the form an invisible reCAPTCHA check will be performed.
    You must follow the Privacy Policy and Google Terms of use.
    Help
  • 22 comments

  • Whoniversaries 16 April

    i) births and deaths 16 April 1936: birth of Derrick Sherwin. On paper, he was producer of Doctor Who for only two stories and 14 episodes, the…

  • Whoniversaries 15 April

    i) births and deaths 15 April 1921: birth of David Garth, who played Solicitor Grey in The Highlanders (Second Doctor, 1967-68) and a Time Lord…

  • Whoniversaries 14 April

    i) births and deaths 14 April 1935: birth of the late great Terrance Dicks, who began in 1968 as script editor for the last four Second Doctor…