(Amy) So, I've mentioned before that Elizabeth Bear is an author I really want to like, but that so far the two books of hers I read have been near misses at best. This one, though, was a hit.

It's hard for me to pinpoint precisely where in the genre this falls - it's one of those books that feels like fantasy on first glance but is, upon further reading, a "sufficiently advanced technology" sort of magic, not the more handwavy kind. As a reader who has almost entirely moved away from the sort of SF that puts much effort into explaining its science, this is about as hard as I like to get - solid, concept-level science when appropriate, but not intruding itself unnecessarily into the story, and not concerned with fiddly and irritating levels of detail.

I look forward to the next Bear novel in my to-read pile - partially to see if the reason I liked this one so much better than the previous two is simply because I finally got the knack of reading her books, or if this one is indeed different in some way...

( http://weblog.siliconcerebrate.com/ze... )

(Alistair) Well, I don't know.

I enjoyed the book, certainly. And it's got plenty of interesting elements; the stock elements aren't too stock, the technologies at play are interesting - considerably softer than I like my science fiction, granted, when it comes to probability manipulation, but that's not a problem - and the characters both human and alien are well-drawn. And it's not like the plot wasn't... even if on occasion it did seem to be running away from the author just a tad.

But somehow or other, it just failed to gel for me. Interesting book; just didn't click. It happens.

Interestingly enough, while Amy liked this one more than her previous two Elizabeth Bear books, I did not like it so well as my previous one, Dust. As it happens, I'm reading another of hers now (although separated from it by the other ten on my booklog pile), Blood and Iron, so we'll see how that goes.

( http://weblog.siliconcerebrate.com/ce... ) ( )

Disclaimer: This isnt as much a review of the book as it is a report on my enjoyment of the book, and its probably more useful as a way to check on my tastes and quirks than to decide whether to read the book

It's terribly hard to write a book and I am conscious I couldn't even write something half as good as an awful book. And this book is not awful at all!
But this is just to say I hate to criticise someone's hard work, but when I try to write a review books I often end up thinking about where the book could have been great if only... and then it sounds harsher than it should be.
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I started by feeling it was all far too familiar - a world at the edge, lots of people with a past, a corporation exploiting it, natives useful but in-the-way, revolutionaries, a bit of cybernetics, a heavy dollop of quantum... All done very well but not that original, or maybe I have read too many similar books in the past few years. So I was starting to classify as a competent book, very readable, nothing wrong but not that memorable...

Then I hit the bit that is written from the perspective of the natives and these are *hugely* enjoyable and fascinating. I'm enjoying these so much, and wanting to get more, and this would keep me reading no matter what she puts in between. I hope she keeps this up till the end, even though that could almost be to the detriment of the book (as a whole) since I care less for the human characters and the main plot as a result. But it will make the book memorable for me, that's already certain.

In the second half of the book things pick up, and the plot gets resolved exactly the way I had guessed it will from the hints in the first half. It moves fast, there's some creative use of language to describe the chaos, and it is fun.

The end focuses only on the humans and I was disappointed by that, I would have liked more about the natives.

I'll be reading some more of hers that's for sure ( )

A fascinating world with some interesting properties. Interesting characters. Good story. ( )

Best book yet.

At least of her science fiction, anyway, I haven't read the rest. It seems that not content with being the 21st century Gordon R. Dickson with Military SF and Dragons, or the 21st century Randall Garrett with period sorcerer detectives, monster hunters, and animal companions, she is aiming for the 21st century Melissa Scott niche, too.

That is exactly what this book reminded me of, being instantly dumped into a milieu that is both recognisably human and alien, and just different, right from the start. This is something that Scott is great at, and showing the day to day situations of such people in the future and on other planets.

Quantum probabilities is what this is all about, as one particular planetary colony is a source for a very strange substance that facilitates interstellar communication and transport by quantum methods. Naturally, this makes the corporation in control a lot of money.

They use the local amphibious aliens as workers, 'coolies' mostly in fact as well as name to mine this substance, as they work well in the water.

The case of characters includes a hitman, a Scarlet Witchesque probability manipulator, an information broker, a secret agent, and your standard repressive corporate executives, and a few clones.

When one of these people is killed, the dying information burst she sends begins to uncover a lot of secrets, and leads to a complicated conflict involving the aliens, the locals, the governing corporation, and more than one probability storm.

Very well done.

4.5 out of 5

http://notfreesf.blogspot.com/2007/12/undertow-elizabeth-bear.html ( )

Humans have come to a water world that is already populated with a species of froglike aliens, and conflict is brewing between the natives and the company that is mining a source of quantum-entangled matter that is important to instantaneous interstellar communication. Bear depicts an intriguing future; I would've liked a more thorough tour of the infrastructure and the impact of the calamity at the climax of the book. ( )