Sleeping Giants

Well, I'm going to have to expand my favorite authors list once again because Sylvain Neuvel has come into my life with the supremely compelling and well-written book entitled Sleeping Giants: Book One of the Themis Files. Guys, this book is so awesome that just by reading it on the train platform I invited bookish conversation with a stranger. The back blurb of this book is what initially caught my attention as it states the book is a mix of World War Z and The Martian (both books that I enjoyed). Also, the fact that it had whiffs (can a book blurb have whiffs?) of The Iron Giant. For someone who is terrified of robots and artificial intelligence, I sure do find a way to read a lot of books on the subject... Well, this story focuses on show more a group of people who are looking for pieces of a giant robot in the hopes that they can learn more about the makers of said robot and improve the lives of humanity all in one fell swoop. The writing style is very unique as the majority is done as a kind of interrogation by a nameless individual (I think from the CIA) with the various members of the team. Interspersed are also small journal entries which the reader is made aware are being reviewed by this nameless figure. It's all very cloak and dagger stuff which I really liked. It also meant that the story moved on at a fairly quick pace (it also helped that I really got into it). This is science fiction at it's very best, ya'll. Not to mention, there's a political mystery occurring right alongside which would appeal to pretty much any audience. If you're looking for a fast paced sci-fi mystery you can't go wrong with Sleeping Giants by Sylvain Neuvel. 10/10 show less

“-Yes. This, all that's happening now, this is your bat mitzvah. You can play with atoms, you can sit with the grown-ups.
-What does that mean for us?
-That means you won't be forgiven for childhood mistakes anymore.”

Wow! This is not what I expected at all. I thought it was going to be a light story about a girl befriending a robot, and this is not the case at all.

First, I have to start and say that during the first hundred pages, I hated the book. I was complaining so much about it and it was dragging on and on. I was reading so slowly because the style the book was written in (interview form, mostly) and the pace was not at all attractive to me. If you get this feeling, push on! Because last night I reached the end of part 2 and I show more could not put the book down. The book took an exciting turn and I was eating up the rest of the book and the format really grew on me. So many unexpected events and exciting plot points. I love the interviewer of the book. He's mysterious, caring, and such an interesting character. The others are amazing as well, even the villains. The author does a great job with character development. The epilogue was also fantastic and I cannot wait for the next book. This book is great for those that like a little bit of science fiction tied in with world politics. show less

A girl named Rose is riding her new bike near her home in Deadwood, South Dakota, when she falls through the earth. She wakes up at the bottom of a square hole, its walls glowing with intricate carvings. But the firemen who come to save her peer down upon something even stranger: a little girl in the palm of a giant metal hand.

Seventeen years later, the mystery of the bizarre artifact remains unsolved—its origins, architects, and purpose unknown. Its carbon dating defies belief; military reports are redacted; theories are floated, then rejected.

But some can never stop searching for answers.

Rose Franklin is now a highly trained physicist leading a top secret team to crack the hand’s code. And along with her colleagues, she is being show more interviewed by a nameless interrogator whose power and purview are as enigmatic as the provenance of the relic. What’s clear is that Rose and her compatriots are on the edge of unraveling history’s most perplexing discovery—and figuring out what it portends for humanity. But once the pieces of the puzzle are in place, will the result prove to be an instrument of lasting peace or a weapon of mass destruction?

An inventive debut in the tradition of World War Z and The Martian, told in interviews, journal entries, transcripts, and news articles, Sleeping Giants is a thriller fueled by a quest for truth—and a fight for control of earthshaking power.

MY REVIEW:

Holy crap! Holy crap! Holy crap!

This is such a fantastical and refreshing science fiction. Sylvain Neuvel has something here, perhaps, a best-seller?? I think so. The whole book is written in "interview" format, either one on one, or as a recording by the characters. The whole premise is astonishing, can you imagine?? Finding something so extraordinary! Man oh man! It felt like I was secretly listening in on top secret government conversations. The interviewer's identity is always hidden, which only added to the atmosphere of the novel. I don't want to say too much and spoil it for you all, but this is definitely a book you need to add to your TBR.

I received this book from Penguin Books and noticed that my cover was somewhat different from all the editions on here, which is kinda exciting. No, it's not an ARC either.

This novel has been compared to "The Martian" by many, but I believe Penguin's comparing the potential success of "Sleeping Giants" to that of "The Martian" and not the premise itself. The author has taken a subject matter often discussed openly in the media, of whether we are alone in the universe, and stepped it up a bit to show that not only are we NOT alone, but look what they can do! Human reaction is typical and expected, including a political and military standpoint, and would seem somewhat contrite except for the masterful way Neuvel writes it up.

Pay attention to this author, I anticipate and expect great things from Sylvain Neuvel! Well done! show less

I was so sure I'd like this. It has aliens! Giant robots! A documentary format! I ... did not at all like this, to the point where I'm giving up halfway through.

Really, though, I should have given up at 14%, where the book has one of the worst "I see this was written by a dude" moments I've encountered in any book this year. A military dude, talking with a shady figure whose name he does not know, who has power over his life, decides to lapse into a very sexual description of his superior officer's body in a FORMAL RECORDED INTERVIEW. It's completely out of character and even out of the character's voice; it's clearly included because a) the author couldn't stand for us not to KNOW that the commanding officer is hot, because obviously show more that's a key part of her character, and b) the author doesn't know how to write romantic attraction or sexual tension, but wanted that to be in the book anyway. Dude writers, this is a thing you can learn. There's an entire genre full of people who are good at it. If you don't want to learn, don't write it!

But I kept reading. I read until I was sure that the author couldn't handle the documentary format (folks, it is NOT easy, and this book is pretty much a textbook how-to-not), until I was sure that the "this was written by a dude" moments were going to continue throughout the book, until the racism started up, until I was sure that the coming reveals weren't going to be worth the pain of reading on.

And then I spent a few moments mourning this very cool concept, which died aborning. show less

Neuvel tells the story of the giant metal body through interviews and case files, and this format totally worked. I loved the voice of Neuvel's characters and the use of these files and interviews to move through time. Rather than filling in the gaps, the case files and interviews sometimes skip great periods of time and you as the reader get to figure out what happened in the interval. I thought it was so clever and I am thrilled it is the first of what I think will be a series. The biggest disappointment was the narrator/interviewer, who I never warmed up to. But overall I adored Sleeping Giants and I cannot wait to read more.

"If you fall in love with someone, there’s a good chance the person won’t love you back. Hatred, though, is usually mutual. If you despise someone, it’s pretty much a given they’re also not your biggest fan."

I have tried to be a fantasy reader, but it is just so far out of my wheelhouse that I usually can't get through an entire novel. Sleeping Giants was an exception. Rose Franklin (literally) falls into a giant glowing metal hand, and her life will never be the same. As a professional, she is assigned to the project to study the hand and learn from it. A team is assembled of a badass pilot, a linguist, a geneticist, and many others. An unnamed narrator oversees them all, monitoring the project. Little do they know how big this show more hand actually is.

I absolutely loved the interview/case file format of this novel and found it very compelling. I may have enjoyed that even more than the story. I think it was an absolute stroke of genius on the part of the author.

There were several twists in this novel that I didn't see coming, but unfortunately the ending just isn't one of them. What was supposed to be a big reveal just seemed obvious to me.

Still, I will be picking up the next in the series. I'm excited to see what else the author does with this format. show less

Have aliens visited earth? I'm not talking about the flying saucers of the mid-twentieth century and I'm certainly not talking about War of the Worlds scenarios. But what if aliens came to earth so long ago that humans were barely human yet. If they had come then how would we even know? Well, perhaps if they buried pieces of a machine all over the world so that they could only be found once humans had evolved to a certain level of technology we could learn about them. That is the premise of Sleeping Giants.

A young girl in South Dakota falls into a hole near her home. When she is found she is cradled in a huge metal hand and strange symbols adorn the walls surrounding it. That girl was Rose Franklin and she grows up to become a gifted show more physicist who is put in charge of a project to determine what the metal that makes up the hand is composed of because it weighs much less than it should and is unlike anything manufactured on earth. Then an Army helicopter pilot, Kara Resnik, crashes while flying a covert mission in Syria. The cause of the crash appears to be another giant puzzle piece and it appears the pieces will reveal themselves when a material that is used to detect nuclear weaponry is used. Resnik and her copilot are recruited to find the rest of the machine pieces. Completing the team is an unnamed official who is in charge of the project and reports to the White House and a French-Canadian linguist, Vincent Couture.The pieces are assembled in a top-secret underground bunker near the Denver Airport. Two people are needed to operate the machine but the only ones the controls respond to are Kara and Vincent. As the two grow closer Kara's co-pilot and occasional lover gets jealous. The green-eyed monster almost destroys the team but the unknown man isn't prepared to let this opportunity go. Despite opposition from other governments in the world the project continues. Maybe it will be just what the world needs.

Is the premise far-fetched? Sure, but it is ingenious and suspenseful. And it looks like this is just book One of a series. Can't wait to see what happens next. show less