Vengeance of Orion

Orion #2

by Ben Bova

Fresh from a space battle, Orion finds himself thrust back in time to confront gods in the ancient world, to Greece where he must prevent the Greek army from destroying the citadel of Troy, to Jericho to bring down the walls, to Egypt... If he fails, he will lose the only woman he has ever loved. But if he succeeds, the history of the world will be changed forever.Praise for the Orion Saga"Nonstop action and mind-bending concepts combine to make Orion absolutely unforgettable. . . . Bova brings it to life on a canvas spread over time and space."—Isaac Asimov"Slambang SF adventure mingles with speculative theology in this gripping story of an immortal's hatred, a mortal's love, and a death-struggle that spans a million years."—Spider Robinson on Orion"Six-time Hugo Award winner Bova doesn't disappoint!"—Los Angeles Daily News on Orion in the Dying Time"Bova's adroit use of detail makes the setting ring true; his depictions of historical personages as well as his fictional creations are psychologically sound. The sounds, the scents, and the sensibility of the ancient world permeate this well-wrought adventure."—Publishers Weekly on Orion and the Conqueror"Bova creates characters that come alive on the page. . . . It is perfectly paced so that the reader has trouble putting the book down."—The Clarion-Ledger on Orion in the Dying Time"Bova presents enough solid historical backing to give the story a ring of authenticity."—Starlog on Orion and the Conqueror"Rip-roaring science fiction . . . tightly-constructed and fast-moving."—Science Fiction Chronicle on Orion in the Dying Time"One of the best SF military series around."—VOYA on Orion Among the StarsAbout the AuthorBen Bova is a six-time winner of the Hugo Award and many other awards, including the John W. Campbell Memorial Award for Best Novel of the Year and the Lifetime Achievement Award of the Arthur C. Clarke Foundation. He is the former editor of Analog and Omni magazines, and the author of over a hundred books, both fiction and non-fiction. Bova has served as president of both Science Fiction & Fantasy Writers of America, Inc. and the National Space Society. He lives in Florida.

Genres: Science Fiction, Fantasy, Fiction, Alternate History, Time Travel, Adventure, Science Fiction Fantasy

353 pages, Kindle Edition

First published January 1, 1988

About the author

Ben Bova was born on November 8, 1932 in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. In 1953, while attending Temple University, he married Rosa Cucinotta, they had a son and a daughter. He would later divorce Rosa in 1974. In that same year he married Barbara Berson Rose.

Bova was an avid fencer and organized Avco Everett's fencing club. He was an environmentalist, but rejected Luddism.

Bova was a technical writer for Project Vanguard and later for Avco Everett in the 1960s when they did research in lasers and fluid dynamics. It was there that he met Arthur R. Kantrowitz later of the Foresight Institute.

In 1971 he became editor of Analog Science Fiction after John W. Campbell's death. After leaving Analog, he went on to edit Omni during 1978-1982.

In 1974 he wrote the screenplay for an episode of the children's science fiction television series Land of the Lost entitled "The Search".

Bova was the science advisor for the failed television series The Starlost, leaving in disgust after the airing of the first episode. His novel The Starcrossed was loosely based on his experiences and featured a thinly veiled characterization of his friend and colleague Harlan Ellison. He dedicated the novel to "Cordwainer Bird", the pen name Harlan Ellison uses when he does not want to be associated with a television or film project.

Bova was the President Emeritus of the National Space Society and a past President of Science-fiction and Fantasy Writers of America (SFWA).

Bova went back to school in the 1980s, earning an M.A. in communications in 1987 and a Ph.D. in 1996.

Bova has drawn on these meetings and experiences to create fact and fiction writings rich with references to spaceflight, lasers, artificial hearts, nanotechnology, environmentalism, fencing and martial arts, photography and artists.

Bova was the author of over a hundred and fifteen books, non-fiction as well as science fiction. In 2000, he was the Author Guest of Honor at the 58th World Science Fiction Convention (Chicon 2000).

Hollywood has started to take an interest in Bova's works once again, in addition to his wealth of knowledge about science and what the future may look like. In 2007, he was hired as a consultant by both Stuber/Parent Productions to provide insight into what the world is to look like in the near future for their upcoming film "Repossession Mambo" (released as "Repo Men") starring Jude Law and Forest Whitaker and by Silver Pictures in which he provided consulting services on the feature adaptation of Richard Morgan's "Altered Carbon".

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

Reviews

[Liz Muir · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book is a mixture of history, fantasy and science fiction. Orion,the main character finds himself alive after he and the love of his life/lives have been killed in an explosion on a spaceship. He was transported through time to Ancient Greece where he finds himself on the side of the Greeks in the Trojan war. Although Orion starts in a position lower than a slave, his exceptional abilities bring him to the notice of Odysseus and other well known Greek heroes.
At times Orion enters a hyper alert state that brings him into the presence of the Golden One/Apollo who is his, and mankind’s creator, and other Greek Gods. The Golden One wants the Troy to win but Orion thinks otherwise.
The story follows the progress of the Trojan war bringing history to life and presents a different take on the Trojan horse that is rather more believable than what we were taught in school. Following the war Orion escorts Helen of Troy to Egypt via Jericho where again we are presented with a different take from the bible on why the walls fell, again more believable.
Ben Bova is a natural storyteller who combines fact and fiction beautifully. I really enjoyed this book.

[Anne Patkau · Rating 4 out of 5]

Orion narrates his sudden awakening as a slave. He lays seige to Troy with Odysseus, brings down the walls of Jericho, and raises rightful Prince Aramset to power of Pharoah in Egypt. But the Greek "gods" are only powerful future humans: Apollo his master, Athena his beloved. The enlivening of long adored mythology, into a single tale, is beyond thrilling, mired by divine entanglements. (Name spellings are tricksy, maybe blame Greeks, not Bova.)

Does a hero lie to both sides who entrust him to negotiate? "Without hesitating, I lied" p77. Destroy a beautiful city and innocents? "I felt no exultation" p135. Sacrifice his lover, already pawn to men? "warm fire in my arms .. made love again" p175, "bartered her like a piece of furniture or a gaudy ornament" p293. He blames others. "But I knew, that what I did, I did for myself" p293. (I added commas, for clarity.)

Orion wants to be free, but humans never are. "The goal of life is death" p111. His companions serve as reflective side-kicks, only seen in the mirror of his self-image: blinded, old storyteller Poletes, bed-warmer Helen, and guide Nefertu, minor city diplomat. All are tangled in convoluted political wranglings. I prefer fast action scenes, when fights tear off the cobwebs.

Humans immortalized over centuries to heroes are brought back down to earth (movie potential) by their conversations, vivid detail of hair, build, dress, mannerisms, attitudes. Identical twins, though simply divided by rigid Jekyll and Hyde morals, are preferable to clones as plot device. (TV "Orphan Black" stars Canadian Tatiana Maslany as clones http://www.bbcamerica.com/orphan-blac...) Final verdict = worth the hours in lands of legend, maybe try outside series next.

Afterword
Bova claims science fiction "must deal fairly with the known laws of science, and reasonable extrapolations thereof" p341. But what is "reasonable" limit to extrapolate? Black hole time travel pushes limits to me. Legends influence more than historical evidence. The maxim that technology can seem like magic has been around long enough to seem truth. http://www-users.c ims.york.ac.uk/susan/cyc/l/law.htm. Thus my Fantasy shelf includes "science fiction" that creates worlds unlike our own.

Bova reasons believably. Horse-hide covered seige engines may have been known to Hittites, not Acaians (Odyseeus). City walls may have collapsed while priests marched in Bible's Book of Jericho. "Egyptians were intelligent enough to realize that killing male children would not alter the Jewish birthrate; killing female children would .. later generations of Jewish scribes were so thoroughly male-oriented that they changed the story to agree with their concepts of male importance and dominance" p340.

[Mike · Rating 2 out of 5]

Vengeance of Orion is book 2 in Bova's Orion series. I read the first book many years ago and book 2 has been sitting on my shelf since then.

It is what I would call historical science fiction. This is science fiction set in the past, around the time of the fall of Troy. It reminds me of Dan Simmons Ilium as it cover some of the same historical incidents.

Overall an easy read, but nothing that makes me want to read more of the series just now.

[Joe Kessler · Rating 3 out of 5]

This first Orion sequel is interesting in its own right, but not nearly as good as its predecessor. That previous novel introduced humanity's demigod champion by hurtling him progressively backwards in time, having to stop an adversary in each era determined to throw history off its tracks. Here, the character starts the book by materializing in the twelfth century BCE on the outskirts of Troy, where he soon finds himself caught up in the events of The Iliad. And I do mean those precise events -- for about the first half of this story, author Ben Bova is basically just retelling Homer with a new viewpoint protagonist in the mix. And that's the period he stays in for the rest of the volume, although after the city falls he moves on to help the Israelite tribes conquer Jericho and ultimately winds up navigating political intrigue in ancient Egypt. (In an afterword the writer justifies the sieges of Troy and Jericho potentially overlapping historically, though I feel that was probably a more reasonable conjecture upon publication in 1988 than it seems today.)

There's a certain fanfic vibe to some of this, or perhaps teen boy wish-fulfillment, given how the muscular hero manages to attract the beautiful Helen to his bed. And while I appreciate the implication that one of Orion's new friends will go on to become the famous blind poet, I'm not sure it's worth the cost of so many pages rehashing what will be a familiar plot to most readers. The warrior's own ignorance on that front is odd, too: he plainly has some memory of his prior lives, referencing advanced technology and quoting from the Shelley poem "Ozymandias," but he doesn't seem to have heard about any of the Greeks or Trojans beforehand or know how their legendary conflict will end. It's also very frustrating to see him so cavalier about rape as an inevitable consequence of war, at one point even acknowledging offhand that the soldiers under his immediate command are likely engaging in that act while pillaging after a conquest. Do something about that, buddy!

What this entry does best in my opinion is expand the sci-fi worldbuilding of the series. In the first book we met Orion's creator Ormazd, who took his name from the Zoroastrian god of light but was actually revealed as a far-future evolved / transcended human. Other beings of his ilk were alluded to, but the only one featured was the narrator's main love interest Anya who was time-traveling along with him. Here Bova includes a whole bunch more of them, along with the confirmation that they're the original inspirations behind the deities in every earth religion that recognizes any. The Golden One now calls himself Apollo, but also Jehovah and Amon. Anya is Athena, but also Isis. And they have a string of peers present at Troy -- Zeus, Hera, Hermes, etc. -- who likewise are all represented among the depictions of holy figures Orion later sees in Egypt. That's a heady concept that rather blew my mind as a younger reader, and it remains a neat facet to build into genre fiction today.

Unfortunately, the narrative structure supporting that revelation is somewhat less impressive, especially compared to the expansive terrain of the previous tale. I still like this installment and have enjoyed revisiting it decades after my first reading, but it's not quite dazzling enough to merit higher than 3-out-of-5 stars on the Goodreads scale.

[Content warning for fatphobia, slavery, torture, and gore.]

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[Tyler McStravick · Rating 3 out of 5]

Overall good. The impression I get is the author wanted to write a stand alone novel about the late Bronze Age collapse with a hero experiencing various stories that could be attributed to that period (Iliad and the Book of Joshua in the Bible) and tell them in a more “historically accurate” way. The Orion series was just the way to tack it on to an existing character but that seemed to create this disjointed sense of two competing visions: Orion loves “Athena” as she is called in this book but also falls for Helen, Orion wants to fight Helios who has to fall into insanity (which is seemingly impossible for a near god) so Orion isn’t completely helpless from the ire of all the gods, and Ahriman is a god(?) able to intercede for Orion (for what reason). The narrative also suffers from the authors lack of understanding of this period of history known from the contemporary archaeology and a lack of understanding of the latter stories set in the period he is referencing. The stories and the history also try to compete and don’t mesh with one another (why would the Achaens, regarded as equal to the Hittites, be so much more incompetent than a small band of Hittite deserters?). Overall a good time like the last book but suffers from too many competing ideas and lacks the scifi backbone of the last book.

[Steven · Rating 4 out of 5]

**** 4.1 STARS **** words 112,141

Vengeance of Orion is another very good book in Ben Bova's Orion series.

This time Orion is sent back as a slave sailing to the Trojan War. If you've seen the 2004 film Troy, you know what to expect. All of the great characters are there: Odysseus, Agammemnon, Achilles, and more. There are other historical scenarios in other parts of the world that Orion finds himself in. Whilst these are good and interesting historical events, the Trojan War is the best bit in Vengeance of Orion.

So, not quite as good as the first book, Orion, but a very good follow-up. Looking forward to the third in the series.

[George · Rating 4 out of 5]

Book #2 of the Orion series is a mixture of history, fantasy and science fiction. It begins with the Iliad story and continues through Egypt and is set in the bronze age. Main character is a person of heroic proportions, not quite a Greek god, but nearly so. He escorts Helen of Troy through some post-Trojan war experiences. Fun story and on to book #3.

[Robert Knudsen · Rating 5 out of 5]

I love this series

This is a fast-paced series,I love how well the characters are written and the fast-paced storyline. The story keeps getting better and better,you won't be disappointed in this series

[David · Rating 2 out of 5]

Duration: 11:18

[William O. · Rating 3 out of 5]

Not bad. Interesting enough that I’ll read the next book on the series. I liked the settings of Troy and Egypt.

[Chuck · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is probably my favorite of the Orion series so far. I've had a hell of a time getting hold of all the novels since they're out of print.

But this has the all the really great elements of the Orion books. Orion continues his travels through time, seemingly at the mercy of the powerful beings who claim to have created both him and the human race and who have godlike powers, but who are nonetheless as petty and as scheming as mere mortals.

If this reminds anyone of Greek mythology, it should; it is in the background of ancient history that the Orion series unfolds. Orion is doomed to wander history; he is supposedly doing the will of the god called the Golden One who bears a suspicios resemblance to Apollo. However, Orion has a deep sense of right and wrong, and, for the most part, does what he thinks is best in the situation he finds himself in. Much of the time his actions work against the will of the "god"; other times, he winds up fulfilling it.

This particular book rests on an intersting series of historical coincidences: that the Greeks sacking of Troy and the fall of Jericho happened roughly at the same time, and that the fall of the Hittites and a major transformation in Egyptian society also occurred in this epoch. What Bova does is, through Orion, have the same perosn on hand to witness all of these events. Except for one fact, the changinf of which he explains in an afterword, Bova wrote so that his story "squares" with the best historical information that was avaialble at the time he wrote.

The result is an action packed, fast moving, thoroughly engaging science fiction romp that teaches a lot about history and classical mythology. If you know your Homer, the novel comes doubly alive.

Lest classical mythogy seem boring to you, I promise that this is a great, great read whether you know the old tales or not. It's really terrific.

I've actually tried to contact Bova about the possibility of getting the series back into print and about whether he intends to write anymore. So far, all I got was a polite non answer from a web master, but I shall persevere! The books are that good; I usuall don't "go gaga" over books or series like this, but the series is terrific.

[Jeff Stockett · Rating 4 out of 5]

There are two things I love about the Orion books.

I love Orion's character, his near super human abilities, his desire to do the right thing coupled with his very human feelings of anger and vengeance.

The second thing I love is the rewriting of history. I love to experience the familiar stories but from a different perspective, a retelling that fills in the gaps that have been lost to history and gives a plausible explanation.

This book has plenty of both. We get to know Orion even better, we get to see him dominate in battle, and we get to experience some fun history. This time around, Orion is Osiris from Egyptian mythology, he fought in the Trojan war and assisted Joshua in bringing down the walls of Jericho.

Definitely a worthwhile read. I loved it when I was 15, and I loved it today.

[Andreas · Rating 2 out of 5]

Widely considered to be Bova’s masterpiece, I never really figured out these books (and yet for some reason I read three of them). Our titular hero loses his memory, fights evil as he jumps back and forth in different eras of past and future. These jumps are more or less out of his control. He constantly loses and regains his beloved. The first book is decent, but after that it’s really just rinse and repeat and they blend into each other in my memory. I gave up after book three.

http://www.books.rosboch.net/?p=460

[Sanam · Rating 4 out of 5]

Definitely better than the first! I really like the character development of Orion in this book. In the first one he was simply a machine for a task. He tried to rebel against the Gods but failed. What I like about this book is that he is no longer transported by the gods. His anger has taught him to battle the gods, and by the end (in Egypt) we see that he has finally risen to the point where humans treat him as a god. I'm currently reading the next one, and I'm guessing Set will teach him, unknowingly, how to bring the gods down

[Thomas Wiest · Rating 4 out of 5]

This was an interesting follow up to the original. Instead of skipping around in time, he skips around the middle east. I really liked how defiant the protagonist was in this book, it made me really relate. I really liked when Orion said something to the affect of "You're not gods, you just have better technology."

[Linda · Rating 2 out of 5]

This second book of Bova's Orion series falls on the line between science fiction and fantasy. The historical aspects of the book are quite interesting and held my attention, but the characters are all fairly one dimensional. It's a book I wanted to like more but it fell short of its potential

[~eljefe · Rating 4 out of 5]

Good ol' fun action sci/fi, blending mythology with civilization historicity.

[Allen Petro · Rating 4 out of 5]

Not as good as the first Orion Book, but still a great read.

[Michael · Rating 5 out of 5]

Much better than the first book.

[Robert]

Outside of historical and theological inaccuracies this book was a pleasant diversion.

[Shamesdean · Rating 5 out of 5]

Orion finds himself thrust into the middle of the Trojan was by his Golden mystical oppressor. A great Sci-Fi historical type novel. Looking forward to the next in the series.

[Jonathan · Rating 3 out of 5]

Enjoyable trawl through history.