REVIEW: Vernor Vinge's A FIRE UPON THE DEEP

Vernor Vinge's A Fire Upon The Deep is an instant classic science fiction novel. It won the Hugo Award for Best Science Fiction novel of 1992 and is considered one of the finest examples of its genre.

Vinge also won the Hugo award in 2000 for A Deepness In The Sky and again in 2007 for Rainbows End. A Deepness in the Sky is an astonishing novel, written in the same fictional universe as A Fire Upon The Deep, sometimes called the Zones of Thought. (See MadProfessah's A review.)

A Fire Upon The Deep has a very complicated but engrossing plot (of course).

The basic story is about what happens to two young children Johanna and Jefri who are accompanying their scientist parents when the family is forced to evacuate a region of space to avoid a dangerous anomaly, crash-land on a planet and the kids are orphaned. The inhabitants of the planet are one of science fiction's most intriguing creations: Tines, furry four-legged creature which resemble dogs in appearance and intelligence but when they bond together in groups of four or more they become sentient beings. Vinge is at his amazingly sympathetic when depicting aliens and their novel civilizations. The Tines' culture resembles a medieval feudal society emerging from the Bronze Age which has had two aliens (who happen to be adolescents) with 30th century technology.

The plot develops in surprising ways and Vinge deals with the youth of the protagonists amazingly well. The two are separated relatively early in the book and join rival factions of the Tines, the overall resolution is exciting and engrossing.

A Fire Upon The Deep is a classic work that should be read (and re-read) by anyone remotely interested in alien civilizations, high technology and youthful heroes.

Mass Market Paperback: 624 pages.
Publisher: Tor Science Fiction.
Date: February 15, 1993.

OVERALL GRADE: A.

PLOT: A.
IMAGERY: A+.
IMPACT: A-.
WRITING: A-.

REVIEW: Vernor Vinge's A DEEPNESS IN THE SKY

Vernor Vinge's A Deepness in the Sky is a tour de force sequel of sorts to the instant classic sci-fi novel A Fire Upon the Deep. I mooched Deepness awhile ago and finally read it over the Chrismuhkwah break last year.

What Vinge excels at is inventing, descrbing and fleshing out completely alien world with cultures, mores and societal rules completely different from what we have seen before. In this case he creates two cultures: one is an interstellar mercantile based society where profit, sales and customers are their central organizing principles; the other culture is filled with arachnid-like creatures living on a very special planet which goes into a cyclical 200-year long ice age every 200 years.

A Fire Upon The Deep and A Deepness in the Sky are part of the Zones of Thought series of which there are only two books so far, although Vinge was nominated for a Hugo Award in 2007 for Rainbows End (which he later won). There are reports that his next book will be a sequel to A Fire Upon The Deep.

A Deepness in the Sky is incredibly engrossing. The reader is immersed in both cultures and although one group is attempting to exploit the other it was hard for the reader to sit by powerlessly and watch the events unfold.

I won't say more about what happens in the plot but suffice it to say that you will not be disappointed. A Deepness in the Sky is an incredibly satisfying read.

OVERALL GRADE: A.



PLOT: A.
IMAGERY: A.
IMPACT: A-.
WRITING: A-.

2008 Hugo Award Nominations Announced

The 2008 Hugo Award nominations have been announced. These are the awards for the best works of science fiction released in the last year. The nominees for Best Novel this yare:

NOVEL
Brasyl, Ian McDonald (Gollancz; Pyr)
Halting State, Charles Stross (Ace)
The Last Colony, John Scalzi (Tor)
Rollback, Robert J. Sawyer (Analog Oct 2006 - Jan/Feb 2007; Tor)
The Yiddish Policemen's Union, Michael Chabon (HarperCollins; Fourth Estate)

In adddition, there are also categories for Dramatic Presentations.

DRAMATIC PRESENTATION: LONG FORM
Enchanted (Written by Bill Kelly. Directed by Kevin Lima. Walt Disney Pictures)
The Golden Compass (Written by Chris Weitz, based on the novel by Philip Pullman. Directed by Chris Weitz. New Line Cinema)
Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix (Written by Michael Goldenberg, based on the novel by J.K. Rowling. Directed by David Yates. Warner Bros. Pictures)
Heroes, Season 1 (Created by Tim Kring. NBC Universal Television and Tailwind Productions)
Stardust (Written by Jane Goldman & Matthew Vaughn, based on the novel by Neil Gaiman. Directed by Matthew Vaughn. Paramount Pictures)

DRAMATIC PRESENTATION: SHORT FORM
Battlestar Galactica: "Razor" (Written by Michael Taylor. Directed by Félix Enríquez Alcalá and Wayne Rose. Sci Fi Channel. [televised version, not DVD])
Doctor Who: "Blink" (Written by Stephen Moffat. Directed by Hettie Macdonald. BBC)
Doctor Who: "Human Nature"; "The Family of Blood" (Written by Paul Cornell. Directed by Charles Palmer. BBC)
Star Trek New Voyages: "World Enough and Time" (Written by Michael Reaves & Marc Scott Zicree. Directed by Marc Scott Zicree. Cawley Entertainment Co. and The Magic Time Co.)
Torchwood: "Captain Jack Harkness" (Written by Catherine Tregenna. Directed by Ashley Way. BBC Wales)

Last year, Vernor Vinge won for his novel Rainbows End and Pan's Labyrinth and Doctor Who's "The Girl in the Fireplace" won in the Dramatic Presentation category. I have recently finished reading the 2005 winner (Susanna Clarke's Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell) but I haven't written my review for the 2005 or 2007 winner. The 2006 winner (Robert Charles Wilson's Spin) was absolutely excellent. Amazingly, the fourth year in a row, Charles Stross has a nominated novel, so maybe this time he will win since critics seem to like his work but I have never been able to complete one of his books. John Scalzi is another very popular writer, but The Last Colony is not considered one of his better efforts. I know nothing about Rollback or Brasyl and I'm shocked to see Michael Chabon's work on the list instead of Junot Diaz' Pulitzer-Prize winning The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao. I loved Chabon's first book, The Mysteries of Pittsburgh but I could not even get past 50 pages of his Pulitzer-Prize winning The Adventures of Kavalier and Clay. Maybe this Stross novel is worth all the accolades it has received; it certainly sounds interesting.

In the dramatic presentation categories I would vote for Heroes, Season 1 and Star Trek New Voyages.