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Undertow
Elizabeth Bear was born on the same say as Frodo and Bilbo Baggins, but in a different year. This, coupled with her childhood tendency to read the dictionary for fun, has led inevitably to penury, intransigence, and the writing of speculative fiction. Her hobbies include incompetent archery, practicing guitar, and reading biographies of Elizabethan playmenders.
She is the recipient of the John W. Campbell Award for best New Writer and the author of over a dozen published or forthcoming novels, including the Locus Award-winning Jenny Casey trilogy and the Phillip K. Dick Award-nominated Carnival. A native New Englander, she spent seven years near Las Vegas, but now lives in Connecticut with a presumptuous cat. "From the Paperback edition."
She is the recipient of the John W. Campbell Award for best New Writer and the author of over a dozen published or forthcoming novels, including the Locus Award-winning Jenny Casey trilogy and the Phillip K. Dick Award-nominated Carnival. A native New Englander, she spent seven years near Las Vegas, but now lives in Connecticut with a presumptuous cat. "From the Paperback edition."
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Published July 31, 2007
About the author
Elizabeth Bear
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 69 reviews
July 27, 2024
As the name might suggest, this sci-fi thriller sucked me in with the promise of revolution against human colonizers on a planet styled after the Louisiana bayous, and kept pulling me along with the constant twists and reveals about characters’ identities and loyalties, as well as the tech at play and the nature of the planet and its inhabitants. It does have a slight “too many things” problem, in that it moves so fast there isn’t time to develop all of these threads to the depth that some readers may want. Still, while I would really like to know more about the Slide tech, or the mechanisms of human cloning, or the culture of the ranids, or why exactly Cricket has issues with her dad…we get what is needed for the story to function!
"André dated an archinformist. Personally, he thought what he did was more ethical. He just killed people. Cricket took apart their lives, everything they might have backed up, relegated to hard memory...Only wet memory was safe from her and her data-mining fellows...And without people like her...the kinds of manipulations conjures like Ziyi Zhou and licensed coincidence engineers performed would be impossible."
If you believe the blurb on the back, the main character of this is André Deschênes, an assassin who wants to get out of the business and learn “conjuring”, a technique that involves manipulating probabilities to create desired events. However, this is actually a multiple POV book – and Bear uses this writing style very effectively to show the reader different sides of the action and create a sense that everyone has their own plans and secrets, and keep you guessing about who might double-cross who and why. The other most notable POV characters are Cricket, a skilled data miner who dates André but is NOT his girlfriend (she would like to be clear about that); Jean Krok, a freelance conjure man with ties to the ranid resistance; and Gourami, a ranid oil-worker-turned-reluctant-revolutionary.
"it occurred to him...that some truths were not of the nature that people could be expected to handle. He wished he could say it was some sort of a spiritual revelation, but mostly it was the wisdom born of nightmares. You think you're fine. You think you got through it all right. And then you wake up sure the cold sweat on your face is blood, so real you can taste it."
Gourami is definitely my favorite, in part because se is genuinely a sweetheart (especially compared to the three humans just mentioned), but also because se is unexpectedly relatable. Most of us are not assassins, high-powered hackers, or former mercenaries turned magicians, and killing someone would be a novel and upsetting experience. At the start of the story, Gourami is just chilling at home, enjoying the comforts of human technologies (hot soup and space-Netflix), not at all interested in getting involved in the resistance movement. But then se tries to do a good deed, and gets drawn into the complicated political machinations of the story. And it is all very disorienting and traumatizing – yet, by the end, Gourami not only So, yay!
Now, you may have notices the word “se” in that last paragraph. The frog-like ranids (who, as in many cultures on earth have done, simply refer to themselves as “persons” rather than by a native species name) are, for lack of a better word, a non-binary species/culture. I saw one review say that the concept of endoparent vs. exoparent recreates female and male too closely – I disagree for two reasons! First, on the biology end, exoparents contribute gametes, endoparents swallow (unrelated-to-them) fertilized eggs into their brood pouches to take care of. So the endoparent is more like a surrogate/foster mom in terms of role. I’m a little unclear on whether there is a single type of gamete or you have one exoparent contributing eggs and another sperm and, if the latter, whether each individual can produce both or if there are biological males and females (though they definitely don’t have sexual dimorphism in size or secondary sexual characteristics, because that’s something they think is weird about humans). And it would make sense that that is unclear because, second…gender is a social category, not a biological category. I’m pretty sure, based on what we see, that being an endoparent or an exoparent is not biologically determined and, while the social roles related to that are slightly different, ranid endoparents are not raising their hatchlings with an expectation of being one or the other, and everyone refers to everyone else as “se”.
Now, given that, and the previous Bear book I’d read (Carnival), I was a bit disappointed not to get any human queerness! I would say “you can’t have everything”…but you actually could have, at least in the background! I guess at least it is acknowledged as a thing that exists: "'There's a man,' [the fortune teller] said, after a few quiet moments...It was as good a starting place as any, and unless she was an orphaned lesbian, likely to provoke some kind of a response."
Overall, though, a very entertaining book with some cool sci-fi ideas, some nice themes about shitty people learning to be less shitty and all sorts of people gaining courage to stand up for what matters, with a bit of a stick-it-to-the-colonizer-corporations social conscience.
"André dated an archinformist. Personally, he thought what he did was more ethical. He just killed people. Cricket took apart their lives, everything they might have backed up, relegated to hard memory...Only wet memory was safe from her and her data-mining fellows...And without people like her...the kinds of manipulations conjures like Ziyi Zhou and licensed coincidence engineers performed would be impossible."
If you believe the blurb on the back, the main character of this is André Deschênes, an assassin who wants to get out of the business and learn “conjuring”, a technique that involves manipulating probabilities to create desired events. However, this is actually a multiple POV book – and Bear uses this writing style very effectively to show the reader different sides of the action and create a sense that everyone has their own plans and secrets, and keep you guessing about who might double-cross who and why. The other most notable POV characters are Cricket, a skilled data miner who dates André but is NOT his girlfriend (she would like to be clear about that); Jean Krok, a freelance conjure man with ties to the ranid resistance; and Gourami, a ranid oil-worker-turned-reluctant-revolutionary.
"it occurred to him...that some truths were not of the nature that people could be expected to handle. He wished he could say it was some sort of a spiritual revelation, but mostly it was the wisdom born of nightmares. You think you're fine. You think you got through it all right. And then you wake up sure the cold sweat on your face is blood, so real you can taste it."
Gourami is definitely my favorite, in part because se is genuinely a sweetheart (especially compared to the three humans just mentioned), but also because se is unexpectedly relatable. Most of us are not assassins, high-powered hackers, or former mercenaries turned magicians, and killing someone would be a novel and upsetting experience. At the start of the story, Gourami is just chilling at home, enjoying the comforts of human technologies (hot soup and space-Netflix), not at all interested in getting involved in the resistance movement. But then se tries to do a good deed, and gets drawn into the complicated political machinations of the story. And it is all very disorienting and traumatizing – yet, by the end, Gourami not only So, yay!
Now, you may have notices the word “se” in that last paragraph. The frog-like ranids (who, as in many cultures on earth have done, simply refer to themselves as “persons” rather than by a native species name) are, for lack of a better word, a non-binary species/culture. I saw one review say that the concept of endoparent vs. exoparent recreates female and male too closely – I disagree for two reasons! First, on the biology end, exoparents contribute gametes, endoparents swallow (unrelated-to-them) fertilized eggs into their brood pouches to take care of. So the endoparent is more like a surrogate/foster mom in terms of role. I’m a little unclear on whether there is a single type of gamete or you have one exoparent contributing eggs and another sperm and, if the latter, whether each individual can produce both or if there are biological males and females (though they definitely don’t have sexual dimorphism in size or secondary sexual characteristics, because that’s something they think is weird about humans). And it would make sense that that is unclear because, second…gender is a social category, not a biological category. I’m pretty sure, based on what we see, that being an endoparent or an exoparent is not biologically determined and, while the social roles related to that are slightly different, ranid endoparents are not raising their hatchlings with an expectation of being one or the other, and everyone refers to everyone else as “se”.
Now, given that, and the previous Bear book I’d read (Carnival), I was a bit disappointed not to get any human queerness! I would say “you can’t have everything”…but you actually could have, at least in the background! I guess at least it is acknowledged as a thing that exists: "'There's a man,' [the fortune teller] said, after a few quiet moments...It was as good a starting place as any, and unless she was an orphaned lesbian, likely to provoke some kind of a response."
Overall, though, a very entertaining book with some cool sci-fi ideas, some nice themes about shitty people learning to be less shitty and all sorts of people gaining courage to stand up for what matters, with a bit of a stick-it-to-the-colonizer-corporations social conscience.
Read
May 2, 2012I have reluctantly adopted the policy of not giving star ratings to books written by the woman I'm dating. ;)
Undertow is not without its weaknesses and suffers a bit from the cramming of several major concepts each worthy of a full novel-length exploration into one brisk book. Even so, the world is richly built, the ideas flow fast and furious, and the proceedings are limned with Bear's trademark intelligence and precision.
This novel makes an interesting triptych with H. Beam Piper's earlier Little Fuzzy, to which it is partly a response and homage, and Hannu Rajaniemi's later The Quantum Thief, with which it shares a complex vision of a datasphere-driven future in which visual reality can be 'skinned' both consensually and non-consensually within the eyes and brains of those viewing it.
Undertow is not without its weaknesses and suffers a bit from the cramming of several major concepts each worthy of a full novel-length exploration into one brisk book. Even so, the world is richly built, the ideas flow fast and furious, and the proceedings are limned with Bear's trademark intelligence and precision.
This novel makes an interesting triptych with H. Beam Piper's earlier Little Fuzzy, to which it is partly a response and homage, and Hannu Rajaniemi's later The Quantum Thief, with which it shares a complex vision of a datasphere-driven future in which visual reality can be 'skinned' both consensually and non-consensually within the eyes and brains of those viewing it.
January 12, 2015
So my kid has this ridiculously awesome car. It’s a Chrysler 300, it has those ridiculously stupid, or awesome, I can’t decide which, wheels that all them kids are crazy for these days. You know, where it is the illusion of being all rim with just the thinnest sheen of rubber that passes for a ‘tire.’
Seriously, the car is way too nice. It was purchased at a police auction, I think, and then was one of his friend’s, until he decided to get a truck. At such a time it ended up with my son.
Yay for him, he has this stupid/awesome chic magnet of a car. Somehow, over his Christmas break, he was off snowboarding, and I was stuck at the car shop getting his oil changed. He had the problem where one of his tires kept losing air, and he asked me to ask them to patch it.
‘Sure thing,’ they said, ‘no problem.’ I was personally surprised to learn that those tires even held air, again, they’re only about as thick as a sheet of paper. The wheels are all rim.
‘Looks like a nail was in the tire, not gonna be a problem,’ they said.
I sit in the lobby of the shop, and I wait. Thankfully, I’d taken a book with me, not this book, that would have made sense for me to tell this story then, but the book I read before I read this book. So they are at least connected, um, sort of.
Whatever, shut up.
After, and I’m not kidding here, about 3 hours, they finally come and get me, they drag me out into the shop floor, and they say something to me that I’d previously only heard on the Simpsons.
‘Sir, I’m afraid we legally can’t let you drive out of here on this tire.’
I shit you not. Those were the words that the man said to me. Serious as can be.
And thus went a blow-up that was worthy of an episode of punk’d. I called the man things I’ve never heard before. People ask writers where their stories come from, bystanders were coming to me afterwards and asking where my curses come from. I’d called him a liar, a thief, I accused him of being a spawn of incest, of taking his pleasure with the likes of farm animals and household appliances. I went on and on, and I and after about 30 minutes of that, I bought a new tire.
I’m not especially proud of what I did. But I had a home contractor that ruined my life for the better part of a year, and at the end of him ripping me off, stealing my money and other such things, he told me to expect his lawsuit. I had a short leash for this sort of thing.
But like I said before, I ended up buying a new tire. The rims, of course, don’t take normal tires, they take these things that are as thick as the sole of a sneaker, and as wide as a river. They cost accordingly to replace.
It was the day after Christmas, I decided it would be a surprise bonus Christmas gift for my party animal kid, who makes me do his crap work while he plays with his friends.
I leave, none too happy, but with a new tire.
One week later, I am reading this book, and my kid leaves for school, then comes back a few minutes later to tell me that his tire is flat. The same tire.
The same tire.
THE. SAME. TIRE.
He airs it back up, and this time I tell him to take his stupid car and his stupid wheels and stupid tires back to the shop and let those stupid people fix his stupid shitty car.
He calls me a few hours later and tells me I have to pick him up. Apparently, they gave him the ‘ol, I-can’t-legally-let-you-drive-out-of-here-on-this-tire speech.
What is it with these people? They have a game where they just see how awful they can be?
With the warranty for the tire, since it’s only a week old, they’ll knock $50 off a replacement, they say.
I decide to call, different guy this time, good for me, I can just repeat my curses from before without worrying about the same guy having to hear it twice.
After all is said, my son has another new tire, this one they at least relented and replaced it without charge. Me, I feel like I just carried the one ring all the way to Mount Doom only to find out later it was part of a set, that I didn’t save anyone.
They tell me to expect this tire to be flat within another week or so, with the tire ruined. They tell me that those rims won’t take a new tire. That rim is like the mighty Lion that walks into a new pride and kills all the cubs. It simply won’t brooke any challenger.
And through all that, I was reading this book. It was okay, but given the rep of the author I was expecting something that rose to the occasion of my high level of drama in my own life. But alas, it couldn’t. It had moments. But in all, I was underwhelmed by it.
The worst kind of book for me, really, because it wasn’t bad enough to warrant any sort of mockery, it was a genuinely fine story. I just want something great.
Seriously, the car is way too nice. It was purchased at a police auction, I think, and then was one of his friend’s, until he decided to get a truck. At such a time it ended up with my son.
Yay for him, he has this stupid/awesome chic magnet of a car. Somehow, over his Christmas break, he was off snowboarding, and I was stuck at the car shop getting his oil changed. He had the problem where one of his tires kept losing air, and he asked me to ask them to patch it.
‘Sure thing,’ they said, ‘no problem.’ I was personally surprised to learn that those tires even held air, again, they’re only about as thick as a sheet of paper. The wheels are all rim.
‘Looks like a nail was in the tire, not gonna be a problem,’ they said.
I sit in the lobby of the shop, and I wait. Thankfully, I’d taken a book with me, not this book, that would have made sense for me to tell this story then, but the book I read before I read this book. So they are at least connected, um, sort of.
Whatever, shut up.
After, and I’m not kidding here, about 3 hours, they finally come and get me, they drag me out into the shop floor, and they say something to me that I’d previously only heard on the Simpsons.
‘Sir, I’m afraid we legally can’t let you drive out of here on this tire.’
I shit you not. Those were the words that the man said to me. Serious as can be.
And thus went a blow-up that was worthy of an episode of punk’d. I called the man things I’ve never heard before. People ask writers where their stories come from, bystanders were coming to me afterwards and asking where my curses come from. I’d called him a liar, a thief, I accused him of being a spawn of incest, of taking his pleasure with the likes of farm animals and household appliances. I went on and on, and I and after about 30 minutes of that, I bought a new tire.
I’m not especially proud of what I did. But I had a home contractor that ruined my life for the better part of a year, and at the end of him ripping me off, stealing my money and other such things, he told me to expect his lawsuit. I had a short leash for this sort of thing.
But like I said before, I ended up buying a new tire. The rims, of course, don’t take normal tires, they take these things that are as thick as the sole of a sneaker, and as wide as a river. They cost accordingly to replace.
It was the day after Christmas, I decided it would be a surprise bonus Christmas gift for my party animal kid, who makes me do his crap work while he plays with his friends.
I leave, none too happy, but with a new tire.
One week later, I am reading this book, and my kid leaves for school, then comes back a few minutes later to tell me that his tire is flat. The same tire.
The same tire.
THE. SAME. TIRE.
He airs it back up, and this time I tell him to take his stupid car and his stupid wheels and stupid tires back to the shop and let those stupid people fix his stupid shitty car.
He calls me a few hours later and tells me I have to pick him up. Apparently, they gave him the ‘ol, I-can’t-legally-let-you-drive-out-of-here-on-this-tire speech.
What is it with these people? They have a game where they just see how awful they can be?
With the warranty for the tire, since it’s only a week old, they’ll knock $50 off a replacement, they say.
I decide to call, different guy this time, good for me, I can just repeat my curses from before without worrying about the same guy having to hear it twice.
After all is said, my son has another new tire, this one they at least relented and replaced it without charge. Me, I feel like I just carried the one ring all the way to Mount Doom only to find out later it was part of a set, that I didn’t save anyone.
They tell me to expect this tire to be flat within another week or so, with the tire ruined. They tell me that those rims won’t take a new tire. That rim is like the mighty Lion that walks into a new pride and kills all the cubs. It simply won’t brooke any challenger.
And through all that, I was reading this book. It was okay, but given the rep of the author I was expecting something that rose to the occasion of my high level of drama in my own life. But alas, it couldn’t. It had moments. But in all, I was underwhelmed by it.
The worst kind of book for me, really, because it wasn’t bad enough to warrant any sort of mockery, it was a genuinely fine story. I just want something great.
September 4, 2007
One sentence: Solid writing, nicely foreign future, good speculative use of the human impact of quantum physics, oddly un-foreign aliens.
I liked that the aliens, "ranids" or froggies in the vernacular, didn't have a species name. They call themselves "people" as most people do. Only the humans called them ranids. They were genderless, and this was done so well that at one point in the book there was what I assume was a spell-checker error and the neutral pronoun 'se' was suddenly 'she' which was jarring-- in my mind, the character certainly wasn't female, se was seself.
On the other hand, the ranids did have a binary reproductive split, either endo- or exo- parent, which both socially and biologically mapped a bit too closely to female and male for my satisfaction.
I liked what was done with quantum physics; the social and economic implications seemed well thought out and went further than most authors do except in the hardest of SF.
It seemed to me that at least one of the protagonists, André, was a character of colour, at least, going by a rather oblique hint. Did anyone else have that impression?
I found the book a bit unsatisfying in that although all of the characters had moved forward at the end, none of them had reached any kind of stable state; they had just transitioned to a new dynamic one. This is obviously perfectly reasonable and life-like, I just like resolution in my music and my novels; it's a personal preference.
I liked that the aliens, "ranids" or froggies in the vernacular, didn't have a species name. They call themselves "people" as most people do. Only the humans called them ranids. They were genderless, and this was done so well that at one point in the book there was what I assume was a spell-checker error and the neutral pronoun 'se' was suddenly 'she' which was jarring-- in my mind, the character certainly wasn't female, se was seself.
On the other hand, the ranids did have a binary reproductive split, either endo- or exo- parent, which both socially and biologically mapped a bit too closely to female and male for my satisfaction.
I liked what was done with quantum physics; the social and economic implications seemed well thought out and went further than most authors do except in the hardest of SF.
It seemed to me that at least one of the protagonists, André, was a character of colour, at least, going by a rather oblique hint. Did anyone else have that impression?
I found the book a bit unsatisfying in that although all of the characters had moved forward at the end, none of them had reached any kind of stable state; they had just transitioned to a new dynamic one. This is obviously perfectly reasonable and life-like, I just like resolution in my music and my novels; it's a personal preference.
January 1, 2011
Crunchy SF about the mining exploitation of a planet with a population of amphibious aliens, and corporate wrongdoing, and people who can alter probability with their minds, and redemption, and time forks.
To be fair, this book had the misfortune to intersect my life during a deeply frustrating snowed-in interlude, some bad travel, and today a – let’s just call it the aftermath of New Year’s and leave it at that. So not good context.
But still, meh. There’s a lot of stunt writing here – completely nongendered alien point-of-view, a climax of collapsing and expanding alternate realities – and it all just rubbed me as trying too goddamn hard. And everything else fell a little flat. Like I’d be reading along, and I’d think, ah, okay, these are background details alpha and beta that are supposed to lend depth to this supporting character. More of the same feeling that the book spent way too much time trying to be a thing and not actually being it.
Also, it didn’t magically cure my hangover, so I’m taking a star off for that.
To be fair, this book had the misfortune to intersect my life during a deeply frustrating snowed-in interlude, some bad travel, and today a – let’s just call it the aftermath of New Year’s and leave it at that. So not good context.
But still, meh. There’s a lot of stunt writing here – completely nongendered alien point-of-view, a climax of collapsing and expanding alternate realities – and it all just rubbed me as trying too goddamn hard. And everything else fell a little flat. Like I’d be reading along, and I’d think, ah, okay, these are background details alpha and beta that are supposed to lend depth to this supporting character. More of the same feeling that the book spent way too much time trying to be a thing and not actually being it.
Also, it didn’t magically cure my hangover, so I’m taking a star off for that.
October 8, 2014
I've had books by this author in my to-read pile and finally grabbed this out to read.
Why have I waited this long!!!! Bear is astonishing. Clear voiced, confident, compelling. Her world building is outstanding and her story kept me on the edge of my seat till the end.
I'm now a new fan and will be pulling out all the other books I've missed. Go. Grab yours!
Why have I waited this long!!!! Bear is astonishing. Clear voiced, confident, compelling. Her world building is outstanding and her story kept me on the edge of my seat till the end.
I'm now a new fan and will be pulling out all the other books I've missed. Go. Grab yours!
June 9, 2010
I'm finding myself having to revise my opinion of Elizabeth Bear. I read her "Blood and Iron" for my book club in 2006, and really didn't like it very much. But I was told, "Her sf is much better than this venture into fantasy" - (I should mention here that I have this vague feeling that I then read 'Carnival', I think around June 2007, but I appear to have neglected to review it and I can't remember it, which is really not good. Although I have another vague feeling that I liked it.) Anyway, so this month I read 'Undertow' and actually really really liked it. It reminded me of Phyllis Gotlieb's 'Flesh and Gold' - which was one of my favorite books of last year's reading. Like that book, this book deals with the exploitation of a peaceful aquatic race by planetary colonists, but it's definitely its own story.
Greene's World is a planetary backwater, considered to be a peaceful place by many, a place to escape the vicious politics of 'Central,' a way to avoid the past. The main industry is a mining operation, where most of the workers are an aquatic, frog-like native species, generally considered to be sub-human and pre-industrial by the human colonists of the city of Nova Haven.
But the politics of Novo Haven are not so non-existent that there isn't enough work for Andre Deschenes, a pure-business assassin-for-hire, who justifies his work to himself by believing that the people whom he is hired to knock off would be killed by someone else if he didn't do it, likely in a less humane manner.
But when Andre is hired to knock off a woman who is suspected to be involved in trying to foment a revolution amongst the natives - and who also happens to be a close friend of Andre's girlfriend - he is unwittingly drawn into a web of interplanetary politics, hidden exploitation, an unknown alien culture, new technology, and a suspicion that Greene's World is more important than Central has let on - indeed, the very existence of humanity's interplanetary empire may depend on it.
Highly recommended.
Greene's World is a planetary backwater, considered to be a peaceful place by many, a place to escape the vicious politics of 'Central,' a way to avoid the past. The main industry is a mining operation, where most of the workers are an aquatic, frog-like native species, generally considered to be sub-human and pre-industrial by the human colonists of the city of Nova Haven.
But the politics of Novo Haven are not so non-existent that there isn't enough work for Andre Deschenes, a pure-business assassin-for-hire, who justifies his work to himself by believing that the people whom he is hired to knock off would be killed by someone else if he didn't do it, likely in a less humane manner.
But when Andre is hired to knock off a woman who is suspected to be involved in trying to foment a revolution amongst the natives - and who also happens to be a close friend of Andre's girlfriend - he is unwittingly drawn into a web of interplanetary politics, hidden exploitation, an unknown alien culture, new technology, and a suspicion that Greene's World is more important than Central has let on - indeed, the very existence of humanity's interplanetary empire may depend on it.
Highly recommended.
October 21, 2026
Confusingly, a bunch of the reviews below are not for the novel by Elizabeth Bear but seem to have something to do with a woman named Maura. There are no characters named Maura in this book.
August 11, 2018
Elizabeth Bear is possibly the worst author at writing conclusions that I have ever read. Sometimes, if I'm on an e-reader, I don't even realize at first that that WAS the end, because it feels abrupt and unsatisfying.
BUT:
I adore her. I will read and buy anything she writes (and I rarely buy books, choosing mostly to public library it). I AM reading everything she has written. Because her worlds are lush, her prose and action sequences are unlike anything you have ever read or ever will read, and I adore her characters. Adore them. I don't just admire the skill with which they are drawn--I cry and laugh and fall in love with every bit of their blood and bone and spirit, as if they were real.
Undertow is no different. Like her other books from the early naughts, the science-y stuff isn't seamless (she gets better with time), but it's FASCINATING, surprising, and never seems to be there just for show--it always serves a plot purpose and always makes you think about the choices we're making TODAY that could lead us to THERE.
The alien species (the "ranids") as characters and plot device were especially stunning. I won't say more but this was by far the best part of the book.
The Louisiana-like feel of the setting was also extremely enjoyable and fresh.
In short, like ALL her other books, it kept me drinking it in in great gasping draughts from beginning to end. I couldn't wait to find out how it ended and I wished, once I got there, that I could keep on living in that world forever. If you like Elizabeth Bear already, you will love this one; and if you can tolerate the weaknesses, there are incredible and rare treasures of enjoyment here.
BUT:
I adore her. I will read and buy anything she writes (and I rarely buy books, choosing mostly to public library it). I AM reading everything she has written. Because her worlds are lush, her prose and action sequences are unlike anything you have ever read or ever will read, and I adore her characters. Adore them. I don't just admire the skill with which they are drawn--I cry and laugh and fall in love with every bit of their blood and bone and spirit, as if they were real.
Undertow is no different. Like her other books from the early naughts, the science-y stuff isn't seamless (she gets better with time), but it's FASCINATING, surprising, and never seems to be there just for show--it always serves a plot purpose and always makes you think about the choices we're making TODAY that could lead us to THERE.
The alien species (the "ranids") as characters and plot device were especially stunning. I won't say more but this was by far the best part of the book.
The Louisiana-like feel of the setting was also extremely enjoyable and fresh.
In short, like ALL her other books, it kept me drinking it in in great gasping draughts from beginning to end. I couldn't wait to find out how it ended and I wished, once I got there, that I could keep on living in that world forever. If you like Elizabeth Bear already, you will love this one; and if you can tolerate the weaknesses, there are incredible and rare treasures of enjoyment here.
February 25, 2020
4.5 stars--I should probably round up
This was really good, probably among the best I've read this year. I should probably set some time aside and throw down a few words.
This was really good, probably among the best I've read this year. I should probably set some time aside and throw down a few words.
May 3, 2013
While this book took a little while to get into, I definitely appreciated the build up once the plot began to unfold. Cyberpunk meets alien suppression and exploitation meets assassin meets turning on a chance. Indeed, this tale brought together several tropes and spat out something unique and highly memorable. Told mostly from Andre’s point of view, and an interesting view it is, we see his impersonal approach to his job, assassinating folks. He also has a somewhat impersonal approach to his love life with Cricket. But then things change, and get weird, and very cool. The Charter Trade Company wants folks dead, a valuable mineral mined and off planet before anyone notices, and doesn’t care who gets injured along the way. That includes a good friend of Cricket’s and the Jean’s lover.
The Rannids are introduced bit by bit giving the reader time to get to know them. They think differently, and hence, their actions don’t always make sense to their human overlords. They have no visible sign of advanced civilization, which has left Charter Trade Company legally able to exploit them and remove the planet’s resources. But they are far more complex, able to communicate world wide through vibrations in the water, treasuring stories. Humans have many stories in many forms, and so many Rannids learn to read human lips (lacking the natural auditory equipment to hear human speech) in order to enjoy these stories.
Jean, in introducing Andre to these planet natives, may not only save Andre’s retched existence but also the planet. Jean is a Conjurer, a man who can and does affect chance outcomes. Andre has this latent ability in himself but lacks the training, and the mindset. I found Andre’s storyline the most fascinating because he starts off the least human (psychologically) and grows so much as a character by the end of the book. Listening to the culture of the Rannids unfold bit and bit as Andre would learn of them piece by piece kept me coming back for just one more chapter before bed.
The Rannids are introduced bit by bit giving the reader time to get to know them. They think differently, and hence, their actions don’t always make sense to their human overlords. They have no visible sign of advanced civilization, which has left Charter Trade Company legally able to exploit them and remove the planet’s resources. But they are far more complex, able to communicate world wide through vibrations in the water, treasuring stories. Humans have many stories in many forms, and so many Rannids learn to read human lips (lacking the natural auditory equipment to hear human speech) in order to enjoy these stories.
Jean, in introducing Andre to these planet natives, may not only save Andre’s retched existence but also the planet. Jean is a Conjurer, a man who can and does affect chance outcomes. Andre has this latent ability in himself but lacks the training, and the mindset. I found Andre’s storyline the most fascinating because he starts off the least human (psychologically) and grows so much as a character by the end of the book. Listening to the culture of the Rannids unfold bit and bit as Andre would learn of them piece by piece kept me coming back for just one more chapter before bed.
November 18, 2016
This is a tough book to rate. It started out incredibly slow and did not get going until nearly 2/3's of the way through the book, around chapter 9. It does an interesting job of covering a lot of Sci-Fi topics ranging from cyberpunk, to cloning, to aliens, time travel and more. It only covered any of these topics at a superficial level though and none really seemed to integrate deeply into the narrative.
The book doesn't do a great job explaining a lot of details about the world. Various encounters with ancillary characters, foreign aliens, and other aspects are highly glossed over. I had trouble connecting with any of the characters as well and in the end I sort of wondered "why do any of these matter?" The story could have just as effectively been told without the encounters with the aliens and in the end their entire existence in the story seemed so they could be used as a plot device to disable a communications platform in space, something the home world alien species could not do.
The later third of the story did come together nicely and made for some good tension. The climax of the conflict between the humans and the Greenesworld's inhabitants was good. The overall description of the Greenesworld inhabitants and their personification was well written and I enjoyed reading their interpretation of humans.
The book felt like it just needed more focus and some more weight to the characters involved. Despite the shortcomings, I feel like this is a story that could be adapted really well for a movie. With some editing or tweaking, some good sci-fi tropes could be explored on screen and the makeup of characters and the place setting I think would work well for that.
The book doesn't do a great job explaining a lot of details about the world. Various encounters with ancillary characters, foreign aliens, and other aspects are highly glossed over. I had trouble connecting with any of the characters as well and in the end I sort of wondered "why do any of these matter?" The story could have just as effectively been told without the encounters with the aliens and in the end their entire existence in the story seemed so they could be used as a plot device to disable a communications platform in space, something the home world alien species could not do.
The later third of the story did come together nicely and made for some good tension. The climax of the conflict between the humans and the Greenesworld's inhabitants was good. The overall description of the Greenesworld inhabitants and their personification was well written and I enjoyed reading their interpretation of humans.
The book felt like it just needed more focus and some more weight to the characters involved. Despite the shortcomings, I feel like this is a story that could be adapted really well for a movie. With some editing or tweaking, some good sci-fi tropes could be explored on screen and the makeup of characters and the place setting I think would work well for that.
August 9, 2013
This was a very challenging book, with lots and lots of stuff going on... I kept waiting for it all to come together, but it never quite clicked for me. I wasn't sure what was happening, but that was probably okay since the probability engineers were changing all of that as it happened anyway. It reminded me of some of Michael Swanwick's early work, in that I thought the word "punk" should be appended to a narrative label. Probability-punk or eco-punk or frog punk. (The aliens are really quite well depicted.)A lot of neat situations and characters are well described, but I just never quite grasped it all.
May 18, 2019
with 4.5/5 on this one. The plot is rich and detailed, the characters flawed and driven by strong motivations, and the aliens really feel alien. The worldbuilding and prose are both uniformly excellent. My only real complaint is that the sheer tonnage of ideas occasionally push the reader a bit too hard, and they have to take a breath before diving back in.
January 18, 2009
Q: How do you know when you've read a really good book?
A: When you put it down and go, "Wow."
And then after a few moments' consideration, you say, "Wow."
That would be Undertow.
A: When you put it down and go, "Wow."
And then after a few moments' consideration, you say, "Wow."
That would be Undertow.
February 22, 2013
Reminded me somewhat of the early works of Jon Courtenay Grimwood - wheels within wheels and nothing is quite what you expect. I liked it a lot and will seek out more by Bear.
June 20, 2019
I liked the scifi here, but it took me a while to get into.
October 23, 2024
cute ending but these two are soooooo dumb like it’s a mess and all the friends are numbskulls
October 4, 2019
You aren’t you. You aren’t the you you were this morning. Your consciousness provides a semblance of continuity, but if you’ve had an exigency incident, you’ve been an infinite number of people between then and now. There is no free will. It’s all an illusion.
This is a fantastic, even mind-blowing, book that is cleverly concealed behind a glacially slow start and a confusing cast of characters. If you feel yourself getting bored and wanting to DNF, try to stick with it a little longer. It’s a five star book bogged down by 2 star disorganization and bloating. The plot finally gets moving in the middle of Chalter 8.
There are alien societies, alternate realities, quantum physics, clones, assassins, evil overlords, double-crosses, and enormous quantities of political intrigue. But it’s slow and confusing.
Sometimes a plot twist or Big Reveal didn’t mean much to me, because the character involved had been mentioned only once before, in passing, and I had not registered him/her as important.
I had a hard time caring about any of the characters at first. I mean, our main (?) character is an assassin for hire, which is apparently a legal job since he does a lot of work for the government. I thought that was a little weird, but even weirder is when he gets a contract to kill his girlfriend’s best (?) friend, and he does it, with apparently no qualms, and his girlfriend knows and the target’s spouse knows and no one really seems to blame him. In fact, the assassin has been asking the spouse to mentor him in some vaguely magical not magic, and does t really worry that killing the guy’s girlfriend will change things between them. It’s just weird. It ends up making sense, but it’s tough to get there.
It should be noted that the text addresses this:
“He killed Lucienne.” Not stridently, but the stress was there under her voice, a suppressed whine. “Jean, how could you?”
“We’re holding this planet together with our teeth and fingernails. We’re going to need him, and the ranids, and everybody else we can find with an ounce of talent.”
About halfway through the book, it finally becomes VERY interesting, so I do recommend sticking with it. If you need enticement, read this semi-spoiler:
I found myself getting confused in the beginning, so I made a list of characters and other terms.
places and characters:
Greene’s World - the planet
ANDRÉ Deschênes - an assassin & wannabe conjurer
Maryanne - Andre’s cousin (on his father’s side, fwiw)
Zoë Deschênes - Andre’s older sister, a conjurer
Ziyi Zhou - an advanced conjurer
Bryson Pace - off-world journalist, Ziyi’s bf
Timothy Closs - Rim Company VP reports to Greene
Moon Morrow - Rim VP (off-world in Paris head office, outranks Greene)
Cricket Earl Murphy - a well connected archinformist (& gardener?), gf of Andre ()
Lucienne Spivak - gf of Jean, friend of Cricket - head of GreenWorld?
Tavish - ? dead former head of the guerilla group GreenWorld?
Jean Kroc aka Jean Gris - an advanced conjurer
Lisa Anne Angley - native affairs coordinator, killed in a barge explosion, maybe faked her own death
Dayvid Kountché - a cop on the take, “Jefferson’s man”
Jefferson Greene - head of Rim Company (CEO of Greene’s World Charter Trade Corporation), grandson of Greene’s World founder.
Nouel Huc - one of Andre’s contacts; an information broker.
Maurice Sadowski - Clos’s chief staff archinformist.
Amanda Delarossa - Greene’s World station chief of the Exigency Corps, head god-botherer
Dr Neil Schaffner - research scientist on GreenWorld - researching a pathogen
Dr McCarter - researcher working for Schaffner
Dr Gupta - an analyst? geologist? working for Rim Corp
Caetei- a ranid
Tetra - a ranid (a bodyguard?)
Parrot - a ranid (Caetei’s sibling?)
Gourami - a ranid, Caetei’s sibling
terminology:
GreenWorld - a splinter group of ELF (Extee Lib Foundation) - a sort of underground group agitating to protect the natives of the planet? (“frog-kissers”)
frog/froggie - derogatory (?) term for Greene natives, aka ranids. (Ranidae is the actual frog family so it’s not clear how “ranid” is ok but “frog” is derogatory. The text eventually addresses this, which was satisfying: “Because it’s so much less racist to call them ‘froggies’ in Latin?“)
humen- the ranid word for humans
coincidence engineering = conjuring, manipulating the probability streams to achieve a desired outcome (“luck”)
god-botherer - conjurer
Words I looked up:
riverine - related to or on the banks of a river; riparian.
louring- looking angry or sullen; darkening, threatening.
August 15, 2018
I really wanted to like this book. The themes she explored and the setting it takes place in are very compelling, but it just didn't pull together in a way that was emotionally worthwhile.
The characters don't have very distinct personalities, and even towards the end I could never muster up enough care about them to become seriously engaged in the plot - which was interesting, but didn't pick up until halfway through.
Many of the plot points and character history that would make the story engaging only start coming in once you hit the halfway mark. Before that you're dropped into a very foreign world with lots of jargon, unremarkable characters, and an attempted sense of 'intrigue' that at least to me came off as very confusing. Often I found myself rereading prior pages, not sure whether I missed something because I was zoning out, or if I'm supposed to not be sure where the character is or why they're doing what they're doing. Similarly, the way the characters interacted with each other was full of unclear subtext and political facades, and frequently I'd find myself aware that something was being communicated that I as a reader was supposed to understand, but I didn't understand it. And I am a person who generally likes subtlety in my books.
A lot of description is centered around the details of how the characters do mundane things. I could tell she was trying to describe events by the characters' reactions to them, but at least for me it didn't work and much of the book just came off as boring. There were pages where a good 50% of the text seemed like trivialities that did not enhance or change my understanding of the world. I can't tell if the writer has a very different psychology than my own, or it just wasn't executed very well. The topic of tea - whether people took it, how they took it, how they were holding it, and whether it was too hot or too cold - came up frequently.
That said, I've encountered much worse and I'd consider it perhaps worth reading if you're super into alien oceans and species, "big bad corporation destroying the environment" tropes, quantum entanglement/probability/multiverse fuckery, and politicking.
The alien race in particular I found very interesting, and the segments written from their perspective were by far my favorite part. The main alien character is the only character I really cared about, and I know that 6 months from now I will have forgotten almost everything about this book except the wet, reedy, familial atmosphere and social dynamics of those little amphibians.
The characters don't have very distinct personalities, and even towards the end I could never muster up enough care about them to become seriously engaged in the plot - which was interesting, but didn't pick up until halfway through.
Many of the plot points and character history that would make the story engaging only start coming in once you hit the halfway mark. Before that you're dropped into a very foreign world with lots of jargon, unremarkable characters, and an attempted sense of 'intrigue' that at least to me came off as very confusing. Often I found myself rereading prior pages, not sure whether I missed something because I was zoning out, or if I'm supposed to not be sure where the character is or why they're doing what they're doing. Similarly, the way the characters interacted with each other was full of unclear subtext and political facades, and frequently I'd find myself aware that something was being communicated that I as a reader was supposed to understand, but I didn't understand it. And I am a person who generally likes subtlety in my books.
A lot of description is centered around the details of how the characters do mundane things. I could tell she was trying to describe events by the characters' reactions to them, but at least for me it didn't work and much of the book just came off as boring. There were pages where a good 50% of the text seemed like trivialities that did not enhance or change my understanding of the world. I can't tell if the writer has a very different psychology than my own, or it just wasn't executed very well. The topic of tea - whether people took it, how they took it, how they were holding it, and whether it was too hot or too cold - came up frequently.
That said, I've encountered much worse and I'd consider it perhaps worth reading if you're super into alien oceans and species, "big bad corporation destroying the environment" tropes, quantum entanglement/probability/multiverse fuckery, and politicking.
The alien race in particular I found very interesting, and the segments written from their perspective were by far my favorite part. The main alien character is the only character I really cared about, and I know that 6 months from now I will have forgotten almost everything about this book except the wet, reedy, familial atmosphere and social dynamics of those little amphibians.
January 10, 2009
Disclaimer: This isnt as much a review of the book as it is a report on my enjoyment of the book, and its probably more useful as a way to check on my tastes and quirks than to decide whether to read the book[return][return]It's terribly hard to write a book and I am conscious I couldn't even write something half as good as an awful book. And this book is not awful at all! [return]But this is just to say I hate to criticise someone's hard work, but when I try to write a review books I often end up thinking about where the book could have been great if only... and then it sounds harsher than it should be.[return]--------------------------------------------[return][return]I started by feeling it was all far too familiar - a world at the edge, lots of people with a past, a corporation exploiting it, natives useful but in-the-way, revolutionaries, a bit of cybernetics, a heavy dollop of quantum... All done very well but not that original, or maybe I have read too many similar books in the past few years. So I was starting to classify as a competent book, very readable, nothing wrong but not that memorable...[return][return]Then I hit the bit that is written from the perspective of the natives and these are *hugely* enjoyable and fascinating. I'm enjoying these so much, and wanting to get more, and this would keep me reading no matter what she puts in between. I hope she keeps this up till the end, even though that could almost be to the detriment of the book (as a whole) since I care less for the human characters and the main plot as a result. But it will make the book memorable for me, that's already certain.[return][return]In the second half of the book things pick up, and the plot gets resolved exactly the way I had guessed it will from the hints in the first half. It moves fast, there's some creative use of language to describe the chaos, and it is fun. [return][return]The end focuses only on the humans and I was disappointed by that, I would have liked more about the natives.[return][return]I'll be reading some more of hers that's for sure
July 29, 2012
http://idearefinery.blogspot.com.au/2012/04/holiday-reading-four-reviews.html
I have read three of Elizabeth Bear's science fiction novels -- the Jacob's Ladder series -- and I loved them very much. They were complex, fast-paced, and hugely inventive. I want to describe her prose as jagged; it's sometimes a bit challenging, but I really like it. I feel like I need to concentrate when I read her books, to keep track of everything, and that's a feeling I enjoy.
In many ways, Undertow was no different, except that somewhere about two-thirds of the way through I lost the thread. It might have been because there were too many characters (or too many forgettable names). Whatever the cause I could still follow the action, but I'd lost track of why it was happening. That made the reading a somewhat hollow exercise, and though I picked it up again by the end, it was too late.
Undertow is (blessedly) a stand-alone novel. It takes place on the damp colony planet Greene's World, and involves a revolution of the frog-like natives, a conspiracy inside the dominant Rim Charter Trade Company, an unusual use of the many-worlds interpretation of quantum mechanics, and a few other things besides.
I couldn't tell you if the book's failing was in the writing, or my reading. My feeling is that Bear might have slightly overstretched with this one -- too many concepts and plots rubbing together, none of them given quite the time they needed to fully develop. Fortunately, it still contained enough of the things I love about Elizabeth Bear's writing that my enthusiasm for reading more of her work is undiminished.
I have read three of Elizabeth Bear's science fiction novels -- the Jacob's Ladder series -- and I loved them very much. They were complex, fast-paced, and hugely inventive. I want to describe her prose as jagged; it's sometimes a bit challenging, but I really like it. I feel like I need to concentrate when I read her books, to keep track of everything, and that's a feeling I enjoy.
In many ways, Undertow was no different, except that somewhere about two-thirds of the way through I lost the thread. It might have been because there were too many characters (or too many forgettable names). Whatever the cause I could still follow the action, but I'd lost track of why it was happening. That made the reading a somewhat hollow exercise, and though I picked it up again by the end, it was too late.
Undertow is (blessedly) a stand-alone novel. It takes place on the damp colony planet Greene's World, and involves a revolution of the frog-like natives, a conspiracy inside the dominant Rim Charter Trade Company, an unusual use of the many-worlds interpretation of quantum mechanics, and a few other things besides.
I couldn't tell you if the book's failing was in the writing, or my reading. My feeling is that Bear might have slightly overstretched with this one -- too many concepts and plots rubbing together, none of them given quite the time they needed to fully develop. Fortunately, it still contained enough of the things I love about Elizabeth Bear's writing that my enthusiasm for reading more of her work is undiminished.
September 16, 2021
Everything in this book was grounded in a reality, a science, even the art of the conjure. The reality resonated as sound, even if it was beyond me at times, rooting this densely packed novel of assasins seeking conjure training, escaped clones seeking a new existence, activists risking themselves for a better world, corporation leaders getting more than they invested themselves into when they exploit a world for a profit, and members of a native race beyond our ideas of gender, primitive in some ways, yet treasuring that which too many value too little, such as story; wove their voices into an overall narrative of a planet’s crisis. All of the characters were caught up in the events beyond their control on Greene’s World, doing what they can to cope and win. Greene’s World, the planet deserved another a better name than a tribute to the intergalactic corporation exploiting it, disturbing its natural environment and awakening forces which destroyed everything they’d built, some of those forces sentient. What started out as a quest for self-discovery, a murder, and an attempt at another character’s redemption became a hunt, a flight across the planet, and the corporation’s desperate attempts eliminate their mistakes (or anyone who knew about their mistakes) eventually heating into a worldwide conflict where reality fragmented. Not just the characters, but the plot and the action rounded themselves out, becoming more and more fully-fleshed and multi-layered. Densely packed with action, yet offering much to think about, I’ve seldom gotten so much out of a single book. This is another one which deserves to become a classic…it packs that much in a single punch.
May 24, 2012
Good solid SF. The concept of "conjuring", or altering probability by an extrapolation of Schrodinger's observer principle is very interesting. If you aren't familiar with Schrodinger's thought experiment, check out http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Schr%C3%.... It is interesting that Bear takes the thought experiment not as orginally intended (as showing how absurd applying quantum observations to our reality is). Instead, she takes the concept and runs with it. The idea is that an observer can actually exert their will and shift probabilities.
My favorite thing about the setting was the ubiquitous brain enhancements (hard memory) combined with quantum speed connection to anywhere in the universe (connex). Note that I listened to this, so I may spell things incorrectly. I thought this was well done, if a little hand-wavy in the physics of a "slide" and "matter transfer".
At its core, this is a bit of a cloak and dagger adventure story. It's a good one. Character-wise, it's a little thin. The best developed character is actually an alien, who is not one of the main characters.
One nit: Elizabeth Bear must have some kind of strange OCD behaviors. I honestly can't believe the sheer number of times she uses the word 'palm' (i.e. as part of your hand). It got to where it really annoyed me. She also seems obsessed with tea and coffee. For fun, count how many times someone drinks tea or coffee, always very hot. These two things got to be distracting.
A good read overall.
My favorite thing about the setting was the ubiquitous brain enhancements (hard memory) combined with quantum speed connection to anywhere in the universe (connex). Note that I listened to this, so I may spell things incorrectly. I thought this was well done, if a little hand-wavy in the physics of a "slide" and "matter transfer".
At its core, this is a bit of a cloak and dagger adventure story. It's a good one. Character-wise, it's a little thin. The best developed character is actually an alien, who is not one of the main characters.
One nit: Elizabeth Bear must have some kind of strange OCD behaviors. I honestly can't believe the sheer number of times she uses the word 'palm' (i.e. as part of your hand). It got to where it really annoyed me. She also seems obsessed with tea and coffee. For fun, count how many times someone drinks tea or coffee, always very hot. These two things got to be distracting.
A good read overall.
February 20, 2019
'Undertow' is a great, slow-building SF thriller where humanity has learned to manipulate quantum probability to take itself to the stars; on an industrial scale, to instantly send goods and information between distant star systems, and on a personal level, where certain skilled conjures can bend luck and probability to help themselves... or strike down enemies. It's also a system that chooses to prop itself up with the exploitation of the native aliens, and their environment. Bear has written a book about the choices people make, and what those can cost the people around them, and what sort of person that makes you into. I'm not sure it's a book that believes in redemption, but it's a book that believes that you have to try; definitely check this out if you like complicated, flawed characters, corporate espionage, and a morally gray world that still wants to do the right thing.
February 28, 2019
I'm fine with admitting sometimes that a book is just not meant for me - I am not its target audience. That was the case with Undertow. I have a rule for any book I read - I will give it one third of its length to build something that hooks me. Some books are slow to get going, and I understand that. If after one-third, I can't find anything to keep me invested (whether it's the plot, the characters, the setting, something), I'll put the book down.
Unfortunately, Undertow is one of those books. Don't get me wrong, this is a solidly written book. I have little complaints with the actual writing style. The prose is fine, the premise is original, and the alien nature of so much of it is actually really interesting. I just couldn't get into it as much as I wanted to. For fans of the genre, I'm sure this is a great one.
Unfortunately, Undertow is one of those books. Don't get me wrong, this is a solidly written book. I have little complaints with the actual writing style. The prose is fine, the premise is original, and the alien nature of so much of it is actually really interesting. I just couldn't get into it as much as I wanted to. For fans of the genre, I'm sure this is a great one.
October 6, 2008
I clearly am not well suited to this flavour of sci-fi. I try... I really do... but it kind of leaves me empty.
Usually I can finish the books, but not this one. Of the fiction I was reading (Anansi Boys, Gunslinger, Nothing but the Dog, etc.), this book was incredibly flat. Usually I hear the voices and see the sites like a movie. There was no humour, no depth, no *life*.I thought I'd try to wake it up with the audio CD. That was much worse. The reader was definitely not my style... and it seemed as though he wasn't terribly familiar with the work... or at the very least as if he weren't interested in it either.
I think if you like very serious science fiction, you might enjoy this. I clearly do not appreciate it enough!
Usually I can finish the books, but not this one. Of the fiction I was reading (Anansi Boys, Gunslinger, Nothing but the Dog, etc.), this book was incredibly flat. Usually I hear the voices and see the sites like a movie. There was no humour, no depth, no *life*.I thought I'd try to wake it up with the audio CD. That was much worse. The reader was definitely not my style... and it seemed as though he wasn't terribly familiar with the work... or at the very least as if he weren't interested in it either.
I think if you like very serious science fiction, you might enjoy this. I clearly do not appreciate it enough!
March 8, 2015
Three and a half stars.
About halfway through I was thinking that Undertow was suffering from Too Many Ideas. But then things began to fall together. The plot thickened, the characters' pathways converged, and things, in short, got interesting. And of course ambition is never something to be sneered at.
And then there was the section where , which was extraordinary. Although I think this probably wasn't the best Bear novel to begin with for me (Carnival seems more my speed, although the preview of Dust was interesting), once it dragged me into its world, I found myself intrigued, entertained and, at a few points, amazed.
About halfway through I was thinking that Undertow was suffering from Too Many Ideas. But then things began to fall together. The plot thickened, the characters' pathways converged, and things, in short, got interesting. And of course ambition is never something to be sneered at.
And then there was the section where , which was extraordinary. Although I think this probably wasn't the best Bear novel to begin with for me (Carnival seems more my speed, although the preview of Dust was interesting), once it dragged me into its world, I found myself intrigued, entertained and, at a few points, amazed.
September 16, 2018
Any book that has an occupation of 'coincidence engineer' has something going for it. Undertow has some interesting propositions to set up its world: instantaneous interstellar travel but only for non-sentient matter; people have to take the slow boat. Quantum uncertainty that can be manipulated on the macro level to create 'luck'. Those things got me hooked and kept me interested, but there were also a few things that left me unsatisfied. People's reactions to events were sometimes puzzling. Even though you eventually learn why, the lack of any other characters questioning the dissonance was rather odd. The resolution also struck me as a bit magical, and not as satisfying as it could be. I've enjoyed Bear's later works greatly. This was still enjoyable, but had a few flaws.
February 27, 2023
This is set on a colonized frontier planet run by a corporation. Human travel is slower than light, but heavy augmented reality and instant communication makes it clear that we are in the far, far future. Assassination is legal and so is tinkering with probability and reality through something something quantum something.
More precisely, they are legal when they are licensed, which they generally are not unless they serve the powers that be. Wholesale exploitation the indigenous population is not legal, but the powers that be seem to care less about that.
This appears to be a relatively early book by Bear and it feels early. There's still a lot I like, but there's clunkiness in a few bits, especially the character development arc of one of the licensed assassins.
More precisely, they are legal when they are licensed, which they generally are not unless they serve the powers that be. Wholesale exploitation the indigenous population is not legal, but the powers that be seem to care less about that.
This appears to be a relatively early book by Bear and it feels early. There's still a lot I like, but there's clunkiness in a few bits, especially the character development arc of one of the licensed assassins.
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