Three Books of Known Space

Known Space (Publication Order) #tboks

by Larry Niven

Let three complete books in one take you on a dazzling journey into science fiction's most famous future history: Known Space!
WORLD OF PTAVVS
Kzanol was a thrint from a distant galaxy. He had been trapped on Earth in a time-stasis field for two billion years. Now he was on the loose, and telepath Larry Greenberg knew everything he was thinking. Thrints lived to plunder and enslave lesser planets . . . and the planet Kzanol had in mind was Earth!
A GIFT FROM EARTH
Shrouded in lethal mists, the world named Mount Lookitthat was never meant for humans. Life existed only on one plateau, unreachable except from space. But still the planet had been colonized, and the settlers struggled to survive under a ruthless dictatorship on a rebellion-proof world . . . until fate dealt them a wild card named Matthew Keller, whose secret talent might just be their only hope!
TALES OF KNOWN SPACE
A classic collection of stories that traces humankind's expansion and colonization throughout the galaxy from the twentieth century to the thirty-first . . .
AND MORE: Larry Niven's latest thoughts on the evolution--both creative and "historical"--of known space, as well as an updated Timeline of Known Space and a complete Niven bibliography!

Contents:
Introduction: My Universe and Welcome Back!
The Coldest Place
Becalmed in Hell
Wait It Out
Eye of an Octopus
How the Heroes Die
The Jigsaw Man
World of Ptavvs
At the Bottom of a Hole
Intent to Deceive
Cloak of Anarchy
The Warriors
Madness Has Its Place
A Gift From Earth
There Is a Tide
Safe at Any Speed
Afterthoughts
Bibliography: The Worlds of Larry Niven

Genres: Science Fiction, Fiction, Space Opera, Anthologies, Collections, Science Fiction Fantasy, Short Stories

577 pages, Paperback

First published November 1, 1996

About the author

Laurence van Cott Niven's best known work is Ringworld (Ringworld, #1) (1970), which received the Hugo, Locus, Ditmar, and Nebula awards. His work is primarily hard science fiction, using big science concepts and theoretical physics. The creation of thoroughly worked-out alien species, which are very different from humans both physically and mentally, is recognized as one of Niven's main strengths.

Niven also often includes elements of detective fiction and adventure stories. His fantasy includes The Magic Goes Away series, which utilizes an exhaustible resource, called Mana, to make the magic a non-renewable resource.

Niven created an alien species, the Kzin, which were featured in a series of twelve collection books, the Man-Kzin Wars. He co-authored a number of novels with Jerry Pournelle. In fact, much of his writing since the 1970s has been in collaboration, particularly with Pournelle, Steven Barnes, Brenda Cooper, or Edward M. Lerner.

He briefly attended the California Institute of Technology and graduated with a Bachelor of Arts in mathematics (with a minor in psychology) from Washburn University, Topeka, Kansas, in 1962. He did a year of graduate work in mathematics at the University of California at Los Angeles. He has since lived in Los Angeles suburbs, including Chatsworth and Tarzana, as a full-time writer. He married Marilyn Joyce "Fuzzy Pink" Wisowaty, herself a well-known science fiction and Regency literature fan, on September 6, 1969.

Niven won the Hugo Award for Best Short Story for Neutron Star in 1967. In 1972, for Inconstant Moon, and in 1975 for The Hole Man. In 1976, he won the Hugo Award for Best Novelette for The Borderland of Sol.

Niven has written scripts for various science fiction television shows, including the original Land of the Lost series and Star Trek: The Animated Series, for which he adapted his early Kzin story The Soft Weapon. He adapted his story Inconstant Moon for an episode of the television series The Outer Limits in 1996.

He has also written for the DC Comics character Green Lantern including in his stories hard science fiction concepts such as universal entropy and the redshift effect, which are unusual in comic books.

http://us.macmillan.com/author/larryn...

Reviews

[Christopher · Rating 2 out of 5]

This omnibus brings together three tales set in Larry Niven's Known Space universe that had only sporadically been available since their publication in the 1960s.

WORLD OF PTAAVS was Larry Niven's first novel, published in 1966, and with its 2106 setting it is one of the first stories chronologically in the Known Space canon. It is clearly a weak work, and offers only hints of the wonderful ideas that Niven was to write about later. It begins two billion years before the present with the alien Kzanol, a member of the Thrintun race, which had the ability to control others telepathically and are the Slavers mentioned in later Known Space works. After the drive on Kzanol's ship burns out, he puts himself into a stasis field and aims himself at Earth, supposing that only 90 years will pass until he is rescued. However, eons go by while he lies in stasis after falling into Earth's oceans. In the near-future, a scientist believes that he can break open Kzanol's stasis field and enlists the help of Larry Greenberg. A telepath, Greenberg's job is to read the alien's mind for several seconds before the field is reactivated. However, Kzanol's telepathic abilities overwhelm Greenberg, and Greenberg comes to believes he is Kzanol. The two Kzanol's set out to Neptune, racing against each other to claim the telepathic amplifier that Kzanol sent there, with which one could enslave all of Earth. Lucas Garner, an agent with the UN, gives chase.

WORLD OF PTAAVS was clearly written in the mid-60's. There is only one female character, and she is a stereotypical June Cleaver housewife. Niven was unable to foreesee the advent of powerful personal computing, and the computers of the novel output their information on paper strips like stocktickers. One amusing part of the novel for modern audiences is a reference to "West Berlin." Even the science of the story is outdated, one part refers to landing on Neptune, but Neptune is a gas giant without a solid surface.

A GIFT FROM EARTH is a tale of a rebellion on the colonized world, a Venus-like cauldron with only one habitable area, the giant mountain Mt. Lookitthat. When the slowboats sent by the UN reached it, the crew, who had worked hard for 30 years to bring the ship to Plateau, decided to set up a dictatorship over the colonists, who were frozen in statis during the journey. The Crew's power over the Colonists is their control of the Hospital and their ability to punish criminals by the death penalty and extract their organs to prolong the life of those loyal to the Crew. This story is set in the first half of Niven's Known Space universe (2000-2400), and shows the same obsession over the death penalty and organ transplantation as other works of that era, such as the Gil "the Arm" Hamilton stories collected in FLATLANDER. Change comes to Plateau in the form of a UN ramrobot carrying blueprints for improved alloplasty (using gadgets instead of organs). Such a development threatens the existence of the status quo and the Crew scrambles to deal with the situation. The Sons of Earth, a Colonist rebel group, decide to seize the moment. Their new hero is Matt Keller, an unassuming young man with a physic power of invisibility through making others not notice him. The novel is full of improbable developments, and Matt's power essentially makes him a superman, which means there's little intrigue or depth because Matt can get through anything. Again, characters seem like they came out of 1960's America, as the women are submissive and everybody has American names, plus nobody seems to use the metric system.

TALES OF KNOWN SPACE was the second collection Known Space short stories. Unlike the first collection, NEUTRON STAR, it is lackluster. NEUTRON STAR collected the golden age Known Space stories of the late-60's. TALES OF KNOWN SPACE, on the other hand, was compiled after the decline in Niven's writing and collects material from both before the golden age (1964-65) and after (1972-75). Several of the stories are among the earliest in the chronology of Known Space stories, charting Man's exploration of Venus and the outer planets from 1975-1990 (Niven was a little optimistic). They suffer from poor science and bad characterization (everyone's American, there are no female characters, and no one seems to have heard of the metric system), and it's painful to think that these stories are in the same universe as NEUTRON STAR and RINGWORLD. Next are a couple of stories about Mars, and a couple with Lucas Garner, all of which are instantly forgettable. There's a look at a social experiment, the "anarchy park" in the 1972 story "Cloak of Anarchy," and also one of the worst Beowulf Shaeffer stories, the unbelievably awful "The Borderland of Sol." The short "Safe At Any Speed", set in 3100, is supposedly about how the spread of the Teela Brown luck gene will change human society; strangely the story was written before Niven even introduced the concept of genetic luck.

There are a few okay stories. "The Jigsaw Man" is one of Niven's earliest stories to deal with the theme of organ transplantation and expanded use of the dealth penalty, with its protagonist condemned to death for mere traffic violations. "The Warriors" marks the first appearance of the Kzinti, who went on to become a major part of Known Space. "There is a Tide" introduces Louis Wu, who went on to become the protagonist of RINGWORLD.

I'd recommend this omnibus only after someone has read the classics of the Known Space universe--NEUTRON STAR, FLATLANDER, and RINGWORLD.

[Lock · Rating 4 out of 5]

A good place to start with Larry Niven's Known Space books, and a great science fiction collection in general.

[Terence · Rating 2 out of 5]

See my joint review of this and Neutron Star on the latter's page.

[Martin · Rating 4 out of 5]

I really enjoyed these short stories. It was interesting to fill out motlee of the known universe.

[Tim · Rating 5 out of 5]

After reading seven of the (so far) fourteen “Man-Kzin Wars,” I figured it was time for a break, so in a serendipitous event I ran across this treasure in a used bookstore. It consists of three previously published works, which apparently led up to the events of “Ringworld” and the “Man-Kzin Wars.”

“World of Ptavvs” and “A Gift from Earth” are novels, while “Tales from Known Space” is a collection of short and long stories; this last is put in what Mr. Niven sees as “chronological order” and gives a table of happenings in Known Space, with dates and references to the stories and the novels. I had seen this device in Robert A. Heinlein’s “Methuselah’s Children,” “The Past Through Tomorrow” and “Time Enough for Love,” and had referred to it numerous times when I read these works, very helpful.

The book starts off with several shorter works concerned with planetary exploration in our own Solar System, starting with Mercury. Several of the stories relate specifically to colonization on Mars, and Mr. Niven well describes the hazards and unforgiving atmosphere of the Martian landscape, as well as the psychological toll on humans who brave such a frontier and tragic results thereof. Another theme throughout these stories is extension of life through transplant technology, which makes rapid advances and extends life, but not without consequences. More about that below.

Yet another theme is the relationship (mostly tense) between Earthians, referred to as “flatlanders,” and “Belters,” colonizers of the Asteroid Belt, frontiersmen of a sort, with independent and antiauthoritarian attitudes. These figures also turn up in the “Ringworld” and “Man-Kzin Wars” books. Relatedly, one such unique asteroid, dubbed the “Confinement Asteroid,” is described as – well, let me quote here:

“Early explorers had run across a roughly cylindrical block of solid nickel-iron two miles long by a mile thick, orbiting not far from Ceres. They had marked its path and dubbed is S-2376. Those who came sixty years ago were workmen with a plan. They drilled a hole down the asteroid’s axis, filled it with plastic bags of water, and closed both ends. Solid fuel jets spun S-2376 on its axis. As it spun, solar mirrors bathed in light, slowly melted it from the surface to the center. When the water finished exploding, and the rock had cooled, the workmen had a cylindrical nickel-iron bubble twelve miles long by six in diameter…They rotated the bubble to provide a half gee of gravity, filled it with air and with tons of expensive water, covered the interior with a mixture of pulverized stony meteorite material and garbage seeded with select bacteria. A fusion tube was run down the axis, three miles up from everywhere; a very special fusion tube, made permeable to certain wavelengths of light. A gentle bulge in the middle created the wedding-ring lake which now girdles the little inside-out world. Sun-shades a mile across were set to guard the poles from light so that snow could condense there, fall of its own weight, melt and run in rivers to the lake.”

This development was the final one in ensuring independence from Earth, largely because it made childbirth possible (Niven theorizes that childbirth is impossible in space; I’d wonder what NASA would say about that now). This certainly presages the description of the Ringworld in many important dimensions, and I felt it was quite cleverly done. I also saw similarities with Arthur C. Clarke’s “Rendezvous with Rama” (Read the first one, skip the next three).

“The World of Ptavvs” takes us a bit afield, with the discovery in contemporary times of a “statue” at the bottom of the ocean which is several million years old; turns out that it’s a thrintun, a race that has extremely well-developed psi powers, with which he/she uses to control slaves. A Ptavv is a thrint that hasn’t fully developed “The Power;” such thrints are basically treated like inferior beings, little higher than slaves. Well, this thrint had crash-landed his spacecraft and had gone into suspended animation for all this time. Of course we have those wacky scientists that wish to revive and study this well-preserved specimen, with quite disastrous consequences, for you see, this here thrint looks upon humans as ptavvs and therefore subject to – well, subjugation. So our friend (Kzanol’s his name) manages to escape, with the remainder of the book concerned with the attempts to find and recapture him. Fun times.

“A Gift from Earth” is related to a colonized planet called Mount Lookitthat. This is one of several planets colonized by about 2100, including We Made It, Jinx, and Wunderland, all of which are referred to in the “Ringworld” and “Man Kzin Wars” books. The only habitable places on Mt. Lookitthat are two large plateaus which are situated above a poisonous-fog layer. The colonists had been brought in large ships which continue to be used as sources of electricity and other power. Occasionally, a smaller, unmanned ship arrives with supplies, or advances in technology that will help the colonists. In that context, there are, of course, administrative/police personnel, which are referred to collectively as “Crew,” as they had been the crew of the large transport ships. The main way to ensure continued and long life for the inhabitants is by transplant technology, and those organs are provided by euthanizing criminals and harvesting said organs. There is, not surprisingly, a revolutionary band from among the “not-Crew,” which has been in existence, protesting such a fate for any criminal, and wishing to destroy the “Hospital,” a euphemism for the euthanizing center/organ bank. With this background, one of the small ships arrives containing – well, let’s say, something that could well alter the balance of power. This is a fascinating tale, not only of projected technology but also of social and moral issues related to it.

These are, to my mind, the main ideas of this book and Mr. Niven’s vision of our future. There are quite a number of smaller notions and many more detailed aspects of all these stories, which makes for very fascinating reading. I wish I had read all these before reading “Ringworld,” as that would have given me a comprehensive background for it. And, to tell the truth, these earlier works are better ones than the “Ringworld” books (see my reviews). Five stars!

[D J Rout · Rating 4 out of 5]

It's particularly useful to have Tales of Known Space: The Universe of Larry Niven, The World of Ptavvs and A Gift from Earth together in one book, and placed in chronological order with the Known Space timeline. Niven's updated afterword from 1995 adds some useful information, and in any case I, personally, dote on every word he writes.

Sadly, this book doesn't include the other Known Space novel, Protector, but then it would be four books of Known space. We can hope for a bright future where such a thing could be.

[Dan · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is a collection of three books, one of which is a collection of short stories. I liked the book overall but the stories vary wildly in quality. Some I would rate 2 stars, some 4 stars. Overall I would give this 3 1/2 stars if I could do half stars.

One thing I would like to talk about is reading order. I read the main Ringworld series before. I am reading the whole thing using the order suggested here: http://news.larryniven.net/concordanc...

If you are reading the Ringworld series for the first time, I do not recommend this order. I feel like the suggested order spoils at least the first two books a little bit. I recommend reading the five main Ringworld books first and in order, Ringworld, The Ringworld Engineers, The Ringworld Throne, Ringworld's Children, and Fate of Worlds.

If you really want to read the other books as you go, I would suggest Ringworld, Neutron Star and/or Crashlander, The Ringworld Engineers, and then Three Books of Known Space.

[Chak · Rating 2 out of 5]

I think this collection would be better enjoyed by the Larry Niven completist, instead of a casual reader of his work (like myself). The most interesting part of reading this, for me, was to see how much Niven improved as a writer (both in technical skill, and in imagination), as this collection starts off with his first works.

One of the stories, “A Gift From Earth,” was fascinating. It had the unfortunate quality that I’ve seen in some other male-authored 60s-era scifi — of demeaning strong female characters to merely playing a sex role. But there was a lot of social commentary about bigotry, criminal justice, and the way technological progress bends (or completely changes) morality that more than made up for it.

[Josh · Rating 2 out of 5]

This is my second Niven book, after Ringworld. My sense is that Niven is so in love with his ideas and his universe that he doesn't really care if the reader understands what is going on. I think my big problem with "hard SF" is that the writer expends so much time on what is clearly bullshit that I succumb to the temptation to just skim, but then they miss important parts to understand what exactly is going on (this happened with both of the novels included in this collection, but especially so with A Gift From Earth).

[Kimberly A. TenEyck · Rating 5 out of 5]

I really enjoyed this book. I had begun reading Ringworld when I discovered there was more to the Known Space story in previous books. I have a much better basis for understanding Ringworld having read this collection first. The stories vary as they were written at different times but are all enjoyable. Is it a bit dated? Perhaps. At times. But isn’t that to be expected with any classic literature? What matters is that they are good stories and excellently written. I’m very pleased to have discovered this author and his body of work!

[Garry · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is one of those old-school geek reads. It's not that it is incredibly entertaining but you have read enough by the author that you are always glad to see a little bit more of him. I'll have to say that the Known Space universe is a great example of careful world-building. The characterization and plotting is not always the best, but the world itself just sticks in your head. Organ-legging itself has brought about several nightmares.

[Eliasz · Rating 3 out of 5]

Well, I can recommend this book only to those who consider themselves as true Larry Niven fans.
This is really monotonous, formal and boring stories, working only towards world-building, not the story building. This applies also to “Ringworld”, but Ringworld itself is more interesting then Known Space universe that adjusted to it.
So don’t waste your time on this and instead read books that are good by themselves, not in the shining of previous fiction.

[Clayton · Rating 4 out of 5]

I am not generally a short-story fan, but this collection of stories are all tightly integrated by a single author about a single physical setting, but stretching out over centuries. So there was a story-telling continuity from front to back, further supported but two (or three?) very strong novella-length pieces. I will probably seek out more Larry Niven material.

[Mike Reynolds · Rating 1 out of 5]

Greatly disappointed. If I had read these three books by Larry Niven would not have ever read anything else written by him. The characters were flat and one dimensional, the stories unimaginative.

Couldn't make myself finish reading them.

[Wonkybadonk · Rating 5 out of 5]

The World of Ptavvs was great! I liked learning more about the Slavers and the Tnuctipun.

[bill · Rating 5 out of 5]

Why are there no moves?

The only thing I've ever seen of NVs was a Star Trek cartoon adaptation. What is wrong with Hollywood?
A lot.

[Beth Cato · Rating 2 out of 5]

I've been making an effort to read more classic science fiction, so my brother lent this book to me. It includes three books within, though the short story contents are spread out to make everything chronological within Niven's Known Universe. The two novels are WORLD OF PTAVVS and A GIFT FROM EARTH, with the stories from TALES OF KNOWN SPACE.[return][return]I had some difficulties with Niven's style. It's abrupt and dated--you can tell they were written in the 1960s and '70s. His leads are all men of certain personality types, and certain stylistic crutches emerge, such as the men entering a social setting and falling for a woman who then betrays them in some way. The women all felt very flat or negative in type; at one point, a rebel woman who portrayed strength entered a home and immediately began preparing supper for the men. It's also funny how the technology is very advanced in many regards, such as fission drives and organ harvesting, yet everyone still uses typewriters.[return][return]As a modern reader and writer, I also found it bothersome how the point of view might change several times within a scene. Whiplash![return][return]The work I enjoyed the most was A GIFT FROM EARTH. It contained very unique plot twists and focused on an unusual form of telepathy, and did a good job of portraying complex good and bad guys.[return][return]In all, I'm glad I read the volumes, if no other reason than that I can say I read them. My brother has told me that I'd probably like some of Niven's other work more, but I'm not in any rush to read him anytime soon. I appreciate that these books are classics, but I'm very glad that stylistic elements and female characters have evolved a great deal in the past forty years.

[Ratiocination · Rating 5 out of 5]

A pretty good Niven intro, all told. Some of the stories in Tales of Known Space are noticeably rough as early work; others are better, and he'd hit his stride more by World of Ptavvs and A Gift From Earth. Also nice for the completist-- none of the component books are easy to find, and World of Ptavvs in particular is quite rare. Even as a long-time Niven fan, I'd never read it prior to this omnibus.

I still might recommend Neutron Star or Crashlander over this one among Niven anthologies as a first go, or even suggest going straight to Ringworld among the novels, but this one is well worth the read thereafter.

[Michelle · Rating 3 out of 5]

A spotty and uneven collection of stories of Known Space, the universe that the Ringworld series is set in. I wasn't surprised that the writing was all over the place, though: this collection includes Niven's first story, published in 1966, so he could only improve from there.

Some things amused me greatly, the best of which was the space suit with the pipe for tobacco smoking built right in. Apparently Niven never thought that smoking would go out of style, even in deepest darkest space.

I guess I'd recommend this collection for someone who doesn't want to miss a single Known Space story, but otherwise I'd skip it.

[Reads with Scotch · Rating 3 out of 5]

I am not a big fan of short stories but there were a few really good novellas in here as well.
Over all I dig the way this guy thinks. He definitely has a fetish for things going wrong with space exploration. It seems to be a reoccurring plot device regardless of the level of technology deployed by the characters in the stories. From man's first travels and mans final travels there always seems to be a failure of some type. This was a good introduction to Niven, Gives one a good taste of his style.

[John Lawson · Rating 4 out of 5]

A compilation of Known Space short stories and two full novels.

WORLD OF PTAVVS describes humanity's first contact with the billion-year extinct Slavers, a race with psychic powers that make the Vulcans look like carnies.

A GIFT OF EARTH describes life within a totalitarian state upon one of Earth's colonies and the exploits of a common man with unique, yet preposterous psychic gifts.

I sense a theme here, but maybe it's just coincidence.

I enjoyed the short stories more than the novels.

[Will · Rating 4 out of 5]

If you like Niven you will like this.