The French-translation is pretty good and give a nice touch to the book. I'm pretty sure that the role of the translator often become an additional author of the book. On the story itself, the idea is clever. The rhythm is pretty good (beside being a large book) and the idea of the "quantum" viewer is really great. The only drawback is the soap-like story with the protagonists in the story. A really good work and an easy catch for sci-fi fans. ( )

Unlike other reviewers who seem less than enthused about this recently reissued collaboration between Arthur Clarke and Stephen Baxter, I found the Light of Other Days to be a good story and a fascinating play on the development of some almost believable new technology. The technology in question is the development of "wormcams", based on navigable worm holes that can eventually be used to view scenes anywhere in space or time past. I like the science, because it is based on a concept of time I can accept - the past is an immutable block universe left behind as it is generated by the quantum foam of the possibilities of the progression of present instants, on the growing surface. In this the future doesn't exist until activity occurs in the present. The authors don't spend a lot of time presenting this concept, but it provides a believable matrix for developments.

The scenario extends from the first development of the technology through its perfection as a commodity tool for spying on anyone anywhere and available to anyone, and the associated total loss of personal privacy. The characters involve a lady investigative journalist, the media mogul who funded the technology and its commercialization, his two sons and a few other characters.

Of all the Clarke/Baxter collaborations I have read, this probably has the best human characterizations and plot development. Very definitely a good read for anyone who likes technology-based sci-fi. ( )

Too much attention was paid to the main characters' soap opera relationships and not enough attention was paid to the revolutionary possibilities of the technology and its effects on the world. A very interesting concept with relatively poor execution. ( )

This book starts out in an interesting and effective manner. The marks of good storytelling leave you expecting that this is more than Clarke just slapping his name, once again, on another man's work. Unfortunately, the story quickly spins out of control, trying to combine too many plots, ideas, and styles without ever leading to a believable or satisfying conclusion. As an interesting look at the death of privacy, it does pretty well. As an interesting story, in and of itself, it does much more poorly. ( )

A rather bizarre (and not all that important) plot built around the effect upon the world of the invention of 'wormcams' - tiny wormholes that allow viewing of the past (or present). Privacy ends, religions are thrown into turmoil, history merges with psychology, crimes long since forgotten are re-opened...I find this concept particularly fascinating, and it's stuck with me since I read the book some years ago. The idea of a completely open society, where privacy is simply impossible, is thought-provoking - would the first generation born into it actually care? Would I? ( )