Engineman (1994)

The Solaris (2010) edition of this book is a reworking of the original material. It credits the original short stories that the novel was "fixed-up" from, which the 1994 Pan edition does not.

Engineman consists of a novel published for the first time in 1994, reprinted with eight short stories set in the same universe and originally published between 1987 and 1991. The novel and the short stories are full of interesting ideas: the ways different people deal with the experience of addiction; the possibility of a global-warming type threat to the afterlife; the question of whether any level of technology can confirm or disprove the experience of spiritual transcendence. Plus: aliens; two kinds of faster-than-light travel; a neurological condition in which sensory input to the brain is time-lagged; political conspiracy; a bit of romance. And yet, the writing falls short of the world's potential. Part of that is a very odd plotting choice the author makes: no sooner does he set up a mystery (he hints that a character's personality is shaped by a past tragedy; one character warns another that they may be in danger), than he promptly dispels it (you experience the tragedy in a flashback; the assassin arrives a page or two later). There's no sustained tension. At their best, Brown's ideas reminded me of Cordwainer Smith (for example, the social impact of replacing one kind of faster than light travel with another kind) and David Brin (for the sense of possibility and scale of the human universe). ( )