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Echopraxia by Peter Watts
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Echopraxia (edition 2014)

by Peter Watts

Series: Firefall (2)

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6432436,153 (3.71)17
It's the eve of the twenty-second century: a world where the dearly departed send postcards back from Heaven and evangelicals make scientific breakthroughs by speaking in tongues; where genetically engineered vampires solve problems intractable to baseline humans. And it's all under surveillance by an alien presence. Daniel Bruks is a field biologist in a world where biology has turned computational. He's turned his back on humanity, but awakens one night to find himself at the center of a storm that will turn all of history inside-out. He's trapped on a ship bound for the center of the solar system. A vampire and its entourage of zombie bodyguards lurk in the shadows behind. And dead ahead, a handful of rapture-stricken monks takes them all to a meeting with something they will only call The Angels of the Asteroids.… (more)
Member:lottpoet
Title:Echopraxia
Authors:Peter Watts
Info:Tor Books (2014), Edition: First Edition, Hardcover, 384 pages
Collections:Your library
Rating:****
Tags:novel, Read 2015

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Echopraxia by Peter Watts

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» See also 17 mentions

Showing 1-5 of 24 (next | show all)
Loved the first part but just could not get into this here second part






( )
  nitrolpost | Mar 19, 2024 |
This is more or less the same book as Blindsight where any attempt at plot and characterisation has gone out of the window. The same unpleasant tone remains, which makes you question your reasons for continuing. Why did I? Not sure. ( )
  djh_1962 | Jan 7, 2024 |
I loved Blindsight so much I think of it as a top 3 scifi favorite ever for me and even wrote the author to say how much I loved it (he answered, is a great guy and with a great sense of humor, so military I am surprised he is not one of us, the military). I compared it in its review somewhat to Reynolds, but said Watts was better by being focused.
Well, in this one he goes full Reynolds,meaning a lot of extremely imaginative hard sf background, carried forward by a creaking, overburdened narrative chassis. It starts great and then just stalls for half the book. When it picks up again, I was already bored and not invested in the story any more.
So. Probably a 5/5 for hard scifi fans, and for engineers. More of a 3/5 for those looking for a more intense and mission-focused story, like myself.
PS. It is not Blindsight 2. It happens in parallel. Good to know, because to many that came as a disappointing surprise. ( )
  milosdumbraci | May 5, 2023 |
I came to this book directly after Blindsight, still buzzing from its challenge and depth. In some ways this book is bigger and more profound than Blindsided, but in others it is less engaging and accessible.

Echopraxia backs off the investigation of consciousness and free will, to look at how God can exist in the context of a rational universe. It's a dizzying exploration of faith, the mind, science and the bounds of human identity...but it can be tedious in a way that Blindsight never was. ( )
  JimDR | Dec 7, 2022 |
Worse than Blindsight, but that is because Blindsight was so good.
It is worse than Blindsight in a number of ways. It touches different themes, but more lightly. Also at the end of Blindsight you get some answers, while here you get even more doubts. Also is different not to have answers because you are dealing with an alien, than not having answers because you are a roach and everybody thinks of you as a pet.

Still recommended. ( )
  NachoSeco | Oct 10, 2022 |
Showing 1-5 of 24 (next | show all)
A paranoid tale that would make Philip K. Dick proud, told in a literary style that should seduce readers who don't typically enjoy science fiction. ... Watts' nihilistic meditation on evolution and adaptation is by turns disturbing and gorgeous, with a biologist's understanding of nature's indifference. ... This scientifically literate thriller's tight prose and plot create an existential uneasiness that lingers long after the book's end.
added by libron | editKirkus Reviews (Jul 17, 2014)
 

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Author nameRoleType of authorWork?Status
Peter Wattsprimary authorall editionscalculated
Anderson, RichardCover artistsecondary authorsome editionsconfirmed

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For the BUG.
Who saved my life.
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Fifty thousand years ago there were these three guys spread out across the plain and they each heard something rustling in the grass. The first one thought it was a tiger, and he ran like hell, and it was a tiger but the guy got away. The second one thought the rustling was a tiger and he ran like hell, but it was only the wind and his friends all laughed at him for being such a chickenshit. But the third guy thought it was only the wind, so he shrugged it off and the tiger had him for dinner. And the same thing happened a million times across ten thousand generations - and after a while everyone was seeing tigers in the grass even when there weren't any tigers, because even chickenshits have more kids than corpses do. And from those humble beginnings we learn to see faces in the clouds and portents in the stars, to see agency in randomness, because natural selection favours the paranoid. Even here in the 21st century we can make people more honest just by scribbling a pair of eyes on the wall with a Sharpie. Even now we are wired to believe that unseen things are watching us.
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It's the eve of the twenty-second century: a world where the dearly departed send postcards back from Heaven and evangelicals make scientific breakthroughs by speaking in tongues; where genetically engineered vampires solve problems intractable to baseline humans. And it's all under surveillance by an alien presence. Daniel Bruks is a field biologist in a world where biology has turned computational. He's turned his back on humanity, but awakens one night to find himself at the center of a storm that will turn all of history inside-out. He's trapped on a ship bound for the center of the solar system. A vampire and its entourage of zombie bodyguards lurk in the shadows behind. And dead ahead, a handful of rapture-stricken monks takes them all to a meeting with something they will only call The Angels of the Asteroids.

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