Sister Alice

WARNING! Some familiarity with advanced particle physics required (well, at least a passing knowledge of the difference between baryonic matter and dark matter). Not for anyone who thinks that science fiction is all 'Star Wars' stuff.

Brian Aldiss' description of a certain kind of science fiction as 'wide-screen baroque' could have been invented for this book. Godlike, near-immortal super-potent humans rule the galaxy and play mud pies with universes. Inevitably, things go wrong when even gods overstep their powers and trigger the explosion of the galactic core. The person responsible - the Alice of the title - flees to her family home to await judgement but also to plot with her baby brother how to evade the consequences of her actions. show more (By 'baby brother' we mean someone probably only 500 years old or so.)

Add to this intrigues between the thousand Families who make up the ruling caste of super-humans, and we have another large-scale novel from Robert Reed.

Although I sometimes have problems with novels where the protagonists start engaging in metaphysical finger-painting and intellectually grappling with the space-time continuum (when some novelists start doing this sort of thing, they tend to overlook minor issues like 'plot' and 'characterization'), in this case I was pleased that Reed kept us quite well-focussed. Characterization in particular was quite well-done and certainly better than some of his earlier novels; and although some of the plot became quite abstract, by concentrating on individual protagonists, the novel didn't lose its way. show less

Set in the far future, 'Sister Alice' portrays a galaxy where a small sect of humans have amazing powers. God-like in their abilities, they change and mould the universe as they see fit. Formed into 1,000 "families" future humanity is set to try one last fatal experiment.

This book is fun to read. Sister Alice maintains suspense and has excellent characters: the mysterious Sister Alice; mocking Brother Perfect; peaceable Ord; sly Xo and furious Ravleen. It is well written (more artful than his other work, 'Marrow') and full of suspense; combined, this makes it difficult to put down and I got through the book in a few days.

This suspense has a flaw - its conclusion, which is unsatifying. Having painted a huge stage, filled it with show more grandiose characters and hinged the very universe on the plot the final few scenes fail to live to their billing.

However, after such a good read quibbling over a final few paragraphs is minor criticism. show less

To a certain extent I enjoyed this book but I found much of it confusing. And I did not understand the ending at all. Would recommend it only for the hardcore SciFi readers.

Brilliantly written large scale Science Fiction

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