The Books of Vernor Vinge
|
|
Vernor Vinge is an American science fiction author who over the last three decades has produced some of the most critically-acclaimed works in the science fiction genre. Vinge has won the prestigious Hugo award three times over the last few years – for his novels “A Fire upon the Deep” in 1993, and “A Deepness in the Sky” in 2000, as well as the short story “Fast Times at Fairmont High” in 2002. Another significant achievement was to write the short story “True Names” in 1981, which is credited as being the first ever work of science fiction about the Internet, and by some as being the start of the “Cyberpunk” genre.
Vinge may be one of the best science fiction authors around but he is far from being the most prolific – a writing career of over 30 years has produced a mere seven novels and a dozen or so short stories. Until recently Vinge worked as a university lecturer in Maths and Computer Science, so hopefully he might get a bit more writing done now that he has retired from the job.
His stories invariably deal with the consequences of technological change – not usually dwelling too long on the scientific details, but concentrating on the effects that scientific advances will have on human society. One particular obsession is the concept of the “Singularity” - a technological advance that radically increases human or artificial intelligence. Vinge's theory is that once this Singularity has occurred society will change in ways that cannot readily be predicted, and it will become impossible to change it back. Another trademark of Vinge's stories is the presence of distinctly non-humanoid alien races, which tend to have more convincingly alien characterisation than aliens in most science fiction stories.
The Witling
Vinge's first novel was the relatively minor “The Witling”, published in 1976. A mere 192 pages long (by today's standards little more than a novella) it's not as well written as Vinge's later novels but it's still a decent story. The plot deals with a human survey ship several millennia in the future, which is sent to examine a world populated by a seemingly primitive humanoid race (it's never entirely clear whether they are aliens, or descended from humanity). After an accidental encounter with some of the natives, the explorers discover that the locals aren't as primitive as first expected when they destroy the survey ship, leaving the two explorers stranded. It turns out that the natives have the ability to teleport both themselves and other matter around, over long distances. Vinge shows how the society has developed around this ability, and explains some of the opportunities and pitfalls presented by this talent, the talent having significant uses in mining, travel, transportation and warfare. The description of the society – and their ability's effect on it - is probably the most interesting part of the book, although the main action concerning the efforts of the explorers to get to a radio on the other side of the world are still reasonably interesting.
The title of the book refers to a “pretender to wit” - someone who doesn't have the telepathic abilities taken for granted on this world, this refers to both the explorers and the heir to the world's largest Kingdom, who decides to help them on their quest. However, some of the locals aren't quite so willing to help and soon the explorers find themselves the target of a conspiracy. One particularly memorable sequence describes a cross-planet chase with extensive use of the native’s teleporting ability. The plot is reasonably entertaining and although ultimately nothing special it is enough to make the book worth reading, despite the slightly botched ending.
The quality of the writing and characterisation is average, and it's nowhere near as good as his later books but there are still a fair number of interesting ideas – especially considering the length of the book.
Grimm's World
Vinge's other early novel is “Grimm's World” - another sub-200 page sci-fi story, later re-released together with the short story “Grimm's Story” as the novel “Tatja Grimm's World”. This story takes place on another low-tech world – this time an isolated human colony which has fallen back towards a medieval society due to the lack of metals available on the planet. The most important character, Tatja Grimm, is a resourceful woman who rises from humble beginnings to rule the most powerful nation on the planet, with the aid of Svir, a naive astronomer with an unusual pet, a rare telepathic creature called a 'dorfox'. Taking over a nation is merely a mean to an end – her real goal is to make contact with an interstellar civilisation she believes periodically visits her world. However, when she finally makes contact she realises that the extra-terrestrials have their own agenda, which isn't necessarily in the best interests of her world. Fortunately, after a crash upon landing, the only method the malevolent outsider has of reaching his spacecraft is to reach the world's largest telescope on top of the world's highest mountain – Tatja therefore has to use all of her resources to stop him. Although Tatja is the focus of the story, most of the book is told from the perspective of Svir who is one of the few people she trusts – and who is easily manipulated by her.
Like “The Witling” this isn't one of Vinge's best works, although it's a competent story it lacks any particularly great speculative ideas and (by his standards) it's unusually conventional. Despite this, it is still a reasonably good read.
The Peace War
Vinge's next novel was another decade in coming, 1984's “The Peace War”. The technological gimmick here is the “Bobbler”, a device that can create spherical “bobbles”, impenetrable force fields within which time is frozen. Anyone trapped inside of a bobble is frozen while several decades pass in the outside world. The book is set in the mid-21st Century, several decades after the “Peace Authority” has achieved world domination, taking advantage of a deadly plague decimating humanity they used the Bobblers (under their sole control) to neutralise the world's military forces and seize control.
The Bobbler's inventor Paul Hohler, who opposed the Peace Authority's plans, has joined up with an loosely-organised group known as the Tinkers who have persisted in their attempts to advance scientific progress, despite the Peace Authority's ban on research. With the aid of Wili Wachendon, a young street orphan with a prodigious talent for mathematics, the Tinkers have managed to develop comparatively advanced technology, and when the bobbles start to break down – releasing their contents – they are in a position to take on the ailing Peace Authority. However, they have a Peace Authority agent in their midst.
Again, this book isn't Vinge's best work – it's nowhere near as groundbreaking as its sequel. The technology also feels slightly dated, the computing advances achieved by the Tinkers would probably have been impressive in the mid-1980s but now they don't seem that far in advance of real-world science. The story is reasonably entertaining but there's no great depth and the characterisation is distinctly average.
“The Peace War” and “Marooned In Realtime” are now only available together as a compendium volume called “Across Realtime”.
Marooned In Realtime
Much more interesting is the sequel, “Marooned in Realtime”. It starts fifty million years in the future, when a few thousand people are the sole survivors of humanity. An unknown event led to the disappearance without trace of the entire human race in the early 24th Century. The only people left afterwards were those frozen (either by accident or design) in bobbles during that event. They awaken to find themselves alone on an empty Earth, and are faced with the challenge of having to rebuild human civilisation. The survivors are a varied bunch, mostly from several decades before humanity's disappearance, including a group of former Peace Authority soldiers, and the main character – former policeman W.W.Brierson. The most influential of the survivors are the dozen or so people who were bobbled in the two decades before the disappearance – each has the advantage of the highly advanced technology of the time, giving them each the resources of a small 21st Century country. Unfortunately they each have their own agenda, and when the wife of the society's leader is murdered it is vital to find the killer to stop them from causing more harm. The main plot concerns Brierson's attempts to find the murderer, using traditional detective story techniques in the untraditional setting of Earth millennia in the future, whilst simultaneously wondering what happened to humanity, how human civilisation can be rebuilt, and whether they should even try. Brierson’s interviews with the various potential murder suspects allow him to slowly move towards the truth about the murder and allow the reader to gradually piece together what happened to humanity. Brieson’s job is not made any easier by the fact that some of his interviewees are more than they appear to be, and he is to some extent a suspect himself, after evidence arises suggesting he argued with the murder victim shortly before her death.
Any novel which uses the end of the human race as a sub-plot isn't lacking in ambition and this is a great piece of speculative fiction, with more ideas than a dozen lesser science fiction novels. The murder investigation plot is comparatively prosaic, but it is entertaining and it allows Vinge to illustrate the novel's speculative ideas within a traditional story structure. There are a huge number of ideas in here, principally a possible future for humanity, as well as how the planet might evolve without us and an interesting subplot detailing one character’s millennia-long quest to find another intelligent species beyond the solar system. The biggest drawback is having to read the comparatively mediocre “The Peace War” to fully appreciate some of the minor plot points. The plot is fascinating, the characters are likeable and the ideas are visionary – this is the first of Vinge's great Science Fiction novels.
“The Peace War” and “Marooned In Realtime” are now only available together as a compendium volume called “Across Realtime”.
A Fire Upon The Deep
Vinge's next novel was the memorably-titled “A Fire upon the Deep” which was released in 1992. Again, it was full of interesting ideas – the most fundamental of which is the 'Zones of Thought' concept. In the universe of this novel, the galaxy is divided into different zones – in each of those zones the laws of physics differ, with the laws of physics being more relaxed in zones further away from the galactic centre. In the centre of the galaxy are the Unthinking Depths where the laws of physics don't even allow for significant intelligence to involve. Further out is the Slow Zone, containing Earth, where the speed of light is the maximum possible speed. Beyond the slow zone is the 'Beyond' where faster-than-light travel is easy and advanced technology can be used. Beyond the Beyond is the Transcend, a region where the laws of physics allow things that people from the Slow Zone or the Beyond could never even comprehend. Most of the novel takes place in the Beyond, where thousands of interstellar civilisations interact with each other – one of the more minor civilisations being humanity.
The novel starts with a human expedition to the edge of the Transcend where they unwittingly awaken an Ancient Evil [tm] known as the Blight. Before the entity they have discovered can fully awaken and start on its heinous plan for galactic domination one of the expedition's ships manages to escape, carrying the expedition's families. This ship flies away as quickly as possible, eventually crash-landing on an unexplored world on the edge of the Slow Zone. The survivors find their problems have only begun as they find themselves caught in the middle of a war between the planet's inhabitants – a race they name the Tines. The Tines are dog-like creatures, individually not very intelligent, who join together in groups of three or four to form group minds with a single personality of roughly human intelligence which is an amalgam of the individual unit's personalities. The survivors get split between the forces of a brutal Tine dictator known as Flenser – who experiments on his people to find the perfect composition of a group mind - and the comparatively peaceful Woodcarver.
Meanwhile, out in the Beyond, the Blight that the humans awakened is spreading – enslaving several civilisations. A being from the Transcend called Old One travels to Relay, a space station in the Beyond to investigate the problem. The station's only human inhabitant – a female researcher called Rahvna, is called in to assist. She communicates with Old One via an intermediary – a human named Pham Nuwem whose body the Old One retrieved from a Slow Zone expedition and subsequently resurrected. Pham and Rahvna eventually come to the conclusion that the escaping expedition managed to carry away something important to the Blight and they have to travel to the far-off Tine's planet to retrieve it, with the aid of a couple of sentient alien pot-plants called Skroderiders. But it's not as simple as that, since the Blight is after them and many forces in the Beyond – including the much-feared Butterfly people – are blaming humanity for the problems in many flamewars on the galactic Usenet.
There's a lot of plot in this book, even the summary has to be quite lengthy and it's not even mentioned many of the interesting ideas and concepts that Vinge comes up with. Without doubt, the best bit of the book involves the Tines – they are one of the best characterised alien races ever created, the non-human aspects of their group minds are fully explored and they are both convincingly alien, and quite endearing. The Skroderiders are also interesting, although less alien than the Tines (despite being plants). The book also has a very compelling plot, both in the struggle for survival of the children trapped in the middle of the war between the Tines and Rahvna and Pham’s quest to stop the Blight and save the human civilisations in the Beyond.
Unfortunately the book has a few flaws, although the characterisation of the aliens is very well done, the characterisation of the human characters is perfunctory and the Blight is never characterised beyond being a Bad Scary Thing that wants to Destroy Stuff. Attempting to give an impression of a massively varied galactic civilisation was always bound to failure, and we're left with little real impression of what the Beyond is like. Although the use of a Usenet-style system for interstellar communication is an amusing conceit and does have some justification (bandwidth between stars, even in the Beyond, is expensive so a text-based medium is a good idea) it does feel a bit frivolous and some of the other aspects of the worldbuilding in the Beyond aren’t entirely convincing.
In summary, this is a book which is highly entertaining with plenty of nice ideas. Even though there are a few flaws this is still well deserving of its Hugo award, and its reputation as one of the classic novels of modern Science Fiction.
A Deepness In The Sky
Vinge's next novel was 1999's “A Deepness in the Sky”, a prequel to “A Fire upon the Deep”. Although it takes place in the same Zones-of-Thought universe, it's only loosely connected, the entire novel takes place in the Slow Zone, and the characters have no idea of the existence of the other Zones.
The plot centres on the planetary system of an eccentric variable star named OnOff, which lies dormant, virtually invisible, for two hundred years before bursting into life for several decades. The inhabitants of the planet are a race that the humans call 'Spiders', large sentient arachnid-like creatures that hibernate during OnOff's quiet centuries, awakening with their star. The spider's technological level is similar to twentieth-century Earth, and when human astronomers detect primitive radio emissions from their planet, two large human expeditions are despatched to OnOff to make contact with the aliens – at this point humans have had little contact with non-humans. The two expeditions are the Vinh trading fleet, a large group of interstellar merchants, and the 'Emergents' a fairly nasty aristocratic civilisation that enslaves its technical experts using a technique known as 'Focus' which enhances their worker’s abilities but destroys their personality. When they reach OnOff both fleets assume an uneasy standoff, while they study the spiders and wait for their technology level to rise sufficiently that trade becomes profitable. Before too long, there is a betrayal by the Emergents and the Vinh fleet finds itself under the control of the Emergent's brutal leader.
The main human characters are Ezr Vinh, a minor crew member whose girlfriend is enslaved by the Emergents, and Pham Nuwem (later seen in “A Fire Upon The Deep”), the original founder of the Vinh trading fleet, now pretending to be a minor technician under an assumed identity. Working together they must attempt to topple the Emergents, however they are under constant surveillance and any hint of what they plan would be enough to get them killed. Meanwhile, on the spider's world, an eccentric inventor Sherkaner Underhill attempts to challenge his culture's religious prejudices, whilst simultaneously driving forward technological progress.
Like Vinge's previous two novels, this book is packed with ideas and concepts – especially in Pham's flashbacks to his centuries-long life travelling between the various human colonies. The book is very cleverly plotted as well; there are a number of surprises when the author reveals the effects of the subtle, long-range planning of some of the characters. The writing is more consistent than in “A Fire Upon The Deep”, this doesn't share the same characterisation problems and although the Emergent's culture is unlikeable it is both original and believable. The Spiders are also well-portrayed, convincingly alien while still be anthropomorphised enough to allow the reader to empathise with their struggles - for example the prejudices Sherkaner is fighting against don't make any sense to a human, but the existence of prejudice is a trait we can relate to.
This is an excellent book, without some superb science fiction concepts and an intricate plot – probably Vinge's finest work to date and this book embodies everything a Great Science Fiction Novel should be.
The Collected Stories Of Vernor Vinge
As well as the novels, Vinge has also written a number of science-fiction stories, most of which (with the notable exception of “True Names”, available separately) are collected in “The Collected Stories of Vernor Vinge”. As ever, there are plenty of interesting ideas here, and despite being written over several decades, the stories are all of a consistently good quality – although none of them are outstanding, there are no bad stories here either.
Most notable is Vinge's Hugo-award-winning story “Fast Times At Fairmont High”, describing a group of mid-21st Century schoolchildren, as they tackle a challenging group project. By this time, computers have evolved enough that children have access to resources that would be unthinkable today, increasing both their potential and also the potential challenges. It's a convincing piece of future predicting, but the story itself is slight, and doesn't really go anywhere – it feels more like the set-up for a novel than a full story.
Other stories include a prequel to “Grimm's World”, and the story “The Ungoverned”, which takes place a century after the “Peace War”, as policeman W.W.Brierson (the main character in “Marooned In Realtime) has to deal with an invasion of the libertarian area he's supposed to protect by the Republic of New Mexico. However, the invaders have reckoned without the amount of self-protection the seemingly ordinary farmers in the area possess.
“The Blabber” is another decent story, this time telling the tale of a human boy with an exotic pet, which turns out to be one of the Tines from “A Fire Upon The Deep. The other ten or so stories are all reasonably interesting, without being particularly special – although they do have some nice pieces of future prediction, such as Vinge predicting a computer-generated “Lord of the Rings” film in a story written in the mid-1960s.
Rainbows End
Vinge’s latest book is 2006’s “Rainbows End”, a novel set in the same universe as the Hugo-winning short story “Fast Times at Fairmont High”. Compared to his previous novels the setting is comparatively prosaic, unlike the far-future deep-space setting of “A Fire upon the Deep” or the Post-singularity Earth of “Marooned in Realtime”, this novel is set in a mid-21st Century America that may have significant differences to the modern world, but is still recognisable. There have, inevitably, been some significant technological and scientific advances; most relevant to the plot are advances in computing and medicine. In Vinge’s future the Internet has become even more important than it is today and rather than accessing it on a screen or a traditional personal computer it is available virtually anywhere. Specially-designed contact lenses allow people to see information all around them and virtual worlds overlaid on reality, the uses of this vary from practical business, scientific or military applications to more frivolous activities such as virtual sports based on the principles of quantum uncertainty or user-designed fantasy worlds reinterpreting reality (virtual worlds based on Terry Pratchett’s “Discworld” series or an entertaining-sounding but sadly fictional series called the “Librarians Militant” feature prominently in the book). There have also been significant steps forward in human-computer interaction so things like keyboards or mice or other physical peripherals are now considered obsolete. The second big change is the development of radical treatments for a whole range of diseases and even a treatment that can reverse many of the effects of the ageing process.
The medical advances have the biggest impact at the start of the novel as the story’s protagonist Robert Gu finds himself alive, healthy and in a surprisingly youthful body after surviving 75 years of life and the debilitating effects of Alzheimer’s Disease. Robert’s return to being an active member of the human race isn’t entirely plain sailing, the world has changed during his infirmity and he is initially lost in the high-technology world. A world-famous poet in his younger days, he had only grudgingly learned how to use the comparatively primitive computers of the early 21st Century and he quickly finds that most of the technical knowledge he had is long obsolete. The one-time senior academic then suffers the additional humiliation of having to enrol in Fairmont High School’s adult re-education programme for the rejuvenated elderly, he finds himself sharing classes with people around his Granddaughter Miri’s age. Robert’s return isn’t entirely welcome to his family; he was frankly not a particularly nice person, domineering and bullying and determined to exert his superiority over everyone he could whether it was his academic colleagues or his family. Told upon emerging from the fog of Alzheimer’s that his wife died a few years ago, he finds himself forced to live with his grown son and daughter-in-law, both senior member of the US military.
Robert Gu’s readjustment to society and the effects those readjustments have on his character (and on his family and classmates) make up a lot of the book but they aren’t central to the main plot. The main plotline centres around efforts by the intelligence services of the Indo-European Alliance to investigate what they believe could be a potentially dangerous development of what they call a ‘YGBM’ technology. YGBM stands for ‘You’ve Gotta Believe Me’, a frivolous acronym for a very dangerous technology. Some analysts in the European Intelligence service have uncovered a subtle field test of a mind-control technology that subliminally changed the behaviour of viewers of a particular advert. Although the event they detect is harmless they realise its effectiveness indicates that someone, somewhere in the world, is close to developing a technology that would allow them to control the behaviour of anyone anywhere in the world. Their investigations indicate the source of the technology is at a high-tech research park owned the University of San Diego, but they are reluctant to involve their American counterparts is investigating further and want to avoid any overt operations that might mean the people behind the YGBM technology would notice their interest. To hide their tracks they recruit an intermediary, a hacker with an impressive reputation who hides behind a persona called Mr Rabbit. Mr Rabbit’s plan to infiltrate the laboratory covertly centres on manipulating the people around the University into creating a distraction and fooling some people into breaking in, believing they are merely making a quixotic protest against the University’s intention to destroy its library of books. One of the extensive network of people it recruits is Robert Gu, Robert’s access to his son and daughter-in-law (who are largely responsible for security on the West coast of America) makes him a useful tool, although Robert is completely unaware of how he is being manipulated.
“Rainbows End” is a good book, but not an exceptional one and after Vinge’s superb previous two novels it is a slight disappointment. Vinge’s future world is both interesting and plausible and his vision of a world where computers and networking are much more integrated into people’s daily lives is convincing and manages to both be enticing in its possibilities and frightening in the ways it could change everyone’s way of life. Vinge also manages to explain his future world clearly and concisely and there isn’t really anything weak about his world-building apart from an arguable over-use of contemporary references. The characterisation is also very good, Robert Gu may be more flawed than most of Vinge’s previous heroes (not that any of them were perfect, either) but he is always an interesting character and despite being frankly quite unpleasant at times he is charismatic enough to keep the reader’s interest. It is also easy to empathise with his confusion at the changes to the world around him. The supporting cast also features several other interesting and memorable characters and even the story’s villain has understandable motivations. The novel’s biggest problem (and even that is more a relative weakness rather than a huge flaw) is that the main plotline is frankly not particularly exciting. It is reasonably entertaining has a good ending but it just isn’t as compelling as the main stories in Vinge’s previous books.
In summary, this is another well-written book with some convincing and in-depth worldbuilding of a world changed by advances in computer technology. It is an interesting and entertaining read but falls some way short of being Vinge’s best novel.
Links
All content ©2003-2007 William Marnoch.
Comments? Agree/Disagree with the Reviews? Suggestions? Random Ramblings? Whatever you might want to say, feel free to e-mail me at william@wmarnoch.freeserve.co.uk .