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End of an Era
Archaeologist Brandon Thackery and his rival Miles 'Klicks' Jordan fulfill a dinosaur lover's dream with history's first time-travel jaunt to the late Mesozoic. Hoping to solve the extinction mystery, they find Earth's gravity is only half its 21st century value and dinosaurs that behave very strangely. Could the slimey blue creatures from Mars have something to do with both?
252 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1994
49 people are currently reading
766 people want to read
About the author
Robert J. Sawyer
228 books2,488 followersRobert J. Sawyer is one of Canada's best known and most successful science fiction writers. He is the only Canadian (and one of only 7 writers in the world) to have won all three of the top international awards for science fiction: the 1995 Nebula Award for The Terminal Experiment, the 2003 Hugo Award for Hominids, and the 2006 John W. Campbell Memorial Award for Mindscan.
Robert Sawyer grew up in Toronto, the son of two university professors. He credits two of his favourite shows from the late 1960s and early 1970s, Search and Star Trek, with teaching him some of the fundamentals of the science-fiction craft. Sawyer was obsessed with outer space from a young age, and he vividly remembers watching the televised Apollo missions. He claims to have watched the 1968 classic film 2001: A Space Odyssey 25 times. He began writing science fiction in a high school club, which he co-founded, NASFA (Northview Academy Association of Science Fiction Addicts). Sawyer graduated in 1982 from the Radio and Television Arts Program at Ryerson University, where he later worked as an instructor.
Sawyer's first published book, Golden Fleece (1989), is an adaptation of short stories that had previously appeared in the science-fiction magazine Amazing Stories. This book won the Aurora Award for the best Canadian science-fiction novel in English. In the early 1990s Sawyer went on to publish his inventive Quintaglio Ascension trilogy, about a world of intelligent dinosaurs. His 1995 award winning The Terminal Experiment confirmed his place as a major international science-fiction writer.
A prolific writer, Sawyer has published more than 10 novels, plus two trilogies. Reviewers praise Sawyer for his concise prose, which has been compared to that of the science-fiction master Isaac Asimov. Like many science fiction-writers, Sawyer welcomes the opportunities his chosen genre provides for exploring ideas. The first book of his Neanderthal Parallax trilogy, Hominids (2002), is set in a near-future society, in which a quantum computing experiment brings a Neanderthal scientist from a parallel Earth to ours. His 2006 Mindscan explores the possibility of transferring human consciousness into a mechanical body, and the ensuing ethical, legal, and societal ramifications.
A passionate advocate for science fiction, Sawyer teaches creative writing and appears frequently in the media to discuss his genre. He prefers the label "philosophical fiction," and in no way sees himself as a predictor of the future. His mission statement for his writing is "To combine the intimately human with the grandly cosmic."
http://us.macmillan.com/author/robert...
Robert Sawyer grew up in Toronto, the son of two university professors. He credits two of his favourite shows from the late 1960s and early 1970s, Search and Star Trek, with teaching him some of the fundamentals of the science-fiction craft. Sawyer was obsessed with outer space from a young age, and he vividly remembers watching the televised Apollo missions. He claims to have watched the 1968 classic film 2001: A Space Odyssey 25 times. He began writing science fiction in a high school club, which he co-founded, NASFA (Northview Academy Association of Science Fiction Addicts). Sawyer graduated in 1982 from the Radio and Television Arts Program at Ryerson University, where he later worked as an instructor.
Sawyer's first published book, Golden Fleece (1989), is an adaptation of short stories that had previously appeared in the science-fiction magazine Amazing Stories. This book won the Aurora Award for the best Canadian science-fiction novel in English. In the early 1990s Sawyer went on to publish his inventive Quintaglio Ascension trilogy, about a world of intelligent dinosaurs. His 1995 award winning The Terminal Experiment confirmed his place as a major international science-fiction writer.
A prolific writer, Sawyer has published more than 10 novels, plus two trilogies. Reviewers praise Sawyer for his concise prose, which has been compared to that of the science-fiction master Isaac Asimov. Like many science fiction-writers, Sawyer welcomes the opportunities his chosen genre provides for exploring ideas. The first book of his Neanderthal Parallax trilogy, Hominids (2002), is set in a near-future society, in which a quantum computing experiment brings a Neanderthal scientist from a parallel Earth to ours. His 2006 Mindscan explores the possibility of transferring human consciousness into a mechanical body, and the ensuing ethical, legal, and societal ramifications.
A passionate advocate for science fiction, Sawyer teaches creative writing and appears frequently in the media to discuss his genre. He prefers the label "philosophical fiction," and in no way sees himself as a predictor of the future. His mission statement for his writing is "To combine the intimately human with the grandly cosmic."
http://us.macmillan.com/author/robert...
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 116 reviews
July 7, 2020
This is a fast and fun read with time travel and dinosaurs and alien interventions and scientific research and investigation... Good characters, fine plot, lots of fun... and did I mention dinosaurs and time travel and Martians... good old-time science fiction!
April 29, 2013
This is my 5th or 6th Sawyer novel and I'm seeing common themes of science, family, moral decisions and God. However while some of the themes are common this is a different plot from previous books of his (that I've read). The pace is a little faster and we have some pretty cool action scenes.
In a nutshell, time travel is invented and it turns out that it is actually easier and cost less energy to go farther back in time than to a time nearer our own. So we go back 65 million years before the extinction of the dinosaur. We learn a lot about the pre human /mammal world, the most amazing of which is the presence of intelligent alien life on earth. This is a low budget trip (hey it's from Canada) consisting of two paleontologists that have a difficult history together. This creates some of the drama and good characterization of the book.
Satisfying conclusion, with a little surprise. Very enjoyable read.
In a nutshell, time travel is invented and it turns out that it is actually easier and cost less energy to go farther back in time than to a time nearer our own. So we go back 65 million years before the extinction of the dinosaur. We learn a lot about the pre human /mammal world, the most amazing of which is the presence of intelligent alien life on earth. This is a low budget trip (hey it's from Canada) consisting of two paleontologists that have a difficult history together. This creates some of the drama and good characterization of the book.
Satisfying conclusion, with a little surprise. Very enjoyable read.
March 2, 2019
End of an Era is a novel variation on a time travel yarn (although I guess every time travel yarn is a novel variation). Thanks to a vaguely described scientific principle and an even more vaguly described time travel macine, the central characters are thrown back 60 something million years to the Mesozoic period, complete with Tyrannosaurs, Triceratops, Brontosauruses et al. But when they get there, things are a bit different than history (or pre-history) had led them to believe. SLIGHT SPOILER: The dinosaurs may have had compay before our visitors.
This is the first Robert J Sawyer book I'd read. It's fairly short and reads like an extended short story. Like Asimov, he likes to get straight into the storytelling without a lot of character development or scene setting. After reading some lenghty yarns recently, I enjoyed the change of pace but it also limits the attachment you develop to the characters and therefore the story. It's a great "what if" with some clever scientific theories and a clever twist. I'm keen to read more by this author now. I'd give it three and half stars if the system allowed, but three stars since it doesn't.
This is the first Robert J Sawyer book I'd read. It's fairly short and reads like an extended short story. Like Asimov, he likes to get straight into the storytelling without a lot of character development or scene setting. After reading some lenghty yarns recently, I enjoyed the change of pace but it also limits the attachment you develop to the characters and therefore the story. It's a great "what if" with some clever scientific theories and a clever twist. I'm keen to read more by this author now. I'd give it three and half stars if the system allowed, but three stars since it doesn't.
May 13, 2024
This is my least favorite of the Robert J Sawyer books I've read. I'm a fan of the time travel subgenre of science fiction and this book was touted in a blurb as a different take on time traveling back to the age of the dinosaurs, to the Mesozoic to be exact. It sure was a different take.
Our two time traveler scientists happen to be two brilliant fellows who unfortunately are two legs in a love triangle. I'm not sure why the leaders of the most important scientific mission in the history of mankind would pick two people with built-in personal tension between them.
When the two scientists go back in time they discover that the gravity in only half what is normal in the present and there are visitors already there from another planet in our solar system. The aliens happen to be in a war with yet another planet in the solar system and are using dinosaurs and their size and strength to aid them in their war effort. The aliens befriend the future earth men but all is not what it seems and tension builds as the plot races on. Our protagonists ultimately discover what is causing the drop in earth's gravity and the true nature of the aliens, but can they get back to the present in one piece? Oh, and remember, their actions could cause a divergence in the time line, like in Back to the Future.
This is a short novel and a very fast read. There is a lot of action. A person who enjoys time travel novels might enjoy this but for me the premise just got more ridiculous as it went on. There were just too many "HUH?!" moments. I still have a few more Sawyer novels on my shelf so he'll get another chance to entertain me .
Our two time traveler scientists happen to be two brilliant fellows who unfortunately are two legs in a love triangle. I'm not sure why the leaders of the most important scientific mission in the history of mankind would pick two people with built-in personal tension between them.
When the two scientists go back in time they discover that the gravity in only half what is normal in the present and there are visitors already there from another planet in our solar system. The aliens happen to be in a war with yet another planet in the solar system and are using dinosaurs and their size and strength to aid them in their war effort. The aliens befriend the future earth men but all is not what it seems and tension builds as the plot races on. Our protagonists ultimately discover what is causing the drop in earth's gravity and the true nature of the aliens, but can they get back to the present in one piece? Oh, and remember, their actions could cause a divergence in the time line, like in Back to the Future.
This is a short novel and a very fast read. There is a lot of action. A person who enjoys time travel novels might enjoy this but for me the premise just got more ridiculous as it went on. There were just too many "HUH?!" moments. I still have a few more Sawyer novels on my shelf so he'll get another chance to entertain me .
February 7, 2022
Romanzo interessante ma con alcuni difetti, sia oggettivi sia soggettivi.
Le parti più tecniche, di "hard SF" diciamo, sono noiose: e questo è un difetto soggettivo perchè se si entra troppo nel tecnico-scientifico, in un romanzo di fantascienza, per me si perde un pò di "sospensione dell'incredulità" e tutto risulta più noioso, appunto.
I difetti oggettivi sono: un finale che lascia l'amaro in bocca, dopo un penultimo capitolo che invece è ottimo e pone interessanti quesiti filosofici; la sottotrama del messaggio alieno che non porta da nessuna parte, e quindi è perfettamente inutile.
L'idea di narrare tutto in soggettiva, dal punto di vista dell'IA dell'astronave, è originale e funziona.
La trama è interessante e, forse, poteva essere espansa meglio, se l'autore ci avesse creduto un pò di più.
Le parti più tecniche, di "hard SF" diciamo, sono noiose: e questo è un difetto soggettivo perchè se si entra troppo nel tecnico-scientifico, in un romanzo di fantascienza, per me si perde un pò di "sospensione dell'incredulità" e tutto risulta più noioso, appunto.
I difetti oggettivi sono: un finale che lascia l'amaro in bocca, dopo un penultimo capitolo che invece è ottimo e pone interessanti quesiti filosofici; la sottotrama del messaggio alieno che non porta da nessuna parte, e quindi è perfettamente inutile.
L'idea di narrare tutto in soggettiva, dal punto di vista dell'IA dell'astronave, è originale e funziona.
La trama è interessante e, forse, poteva essere espansa meglio, se l'autore ci avesse creduto un pò di più.
July 22, 2016
If you missed this one, go back and find it. It is a wild ride. Hang onto your hat! Sawyer had me at dinosaurs and time travel but throw in some aliens and big life problems, wow.
August 7, 2022
Dinosaur books are typically outside my comfort zone. The interest never took hold in me as a child, and as I grew I found myself choosing movies in franchises other than the world of Jurassic Park. Sure, the idea that the world 65 million years ago was vastly different than it is today is fascinating, and it would be beyond exciting to see dinosaurs as they really were back then- but all we have to work with are fossil records.
What really hooked me into this story was the time travel element. I'm always intrigued with time travel stories, because I like to see how authors will use it. You've introduced this world-breaking ability, now what do you do with it?
Sawyer takes this idea and runs with it. He introduces gravity fluxes, blue jelly Martians, a second moon, a secondary timeline, and of course, tons of dinosaurs of all kinds. His time travelling characters were not expecting any of this- they were simply trying to discover what happened to cause the extinction of the dinosaurs. Klicks and Brandy try to deal with these new elements as best they can, all while attempting to do what they were sent back for. Without spoiling the complexities of the story or the ending, I will say that an asteroid is not what caused the extinction of the dinosaurs, and it has everything to do with the alien species that the paleontologists run into in the past.
Some of the things that really made me like this novel were not the major events, but the smaller, nuanced touches. I loved Brandon's description of the night sky, and how it was vastly different than what he was used to in the future, down to the other side of the moon being visible, a second, smaller moon, and the incredible amount of stars in the sky. Brandon saw other far off alien lights as well, which makes him wax a bit about how the universe was full of life during the time of the dinosaurs, and we missed alien contact by about 65 million years. I also really liked the idea of the asteroid belt once being a planet before it was destroyed. The change in gravity threw me, but it made sense that animals of that size would be able to evolve in an environment with much less gravity than what Earth currently has.
The one thing I cannot get on board with here is our main character, Brandon Thackery. I have known several Brandons/Brendens in my life, and NOT ONE of them has gone by Brandy, the name that our MC insists on going by. It may be an odd nitpick, but the nicknames don't stop at Brandy. He calls his best friend Klicks (real name Miles, har de har), his wife is Tess, the city he lives in is TO (Toronto) and he takes the time to explain to the reader about several complex archaeological/historical theories and processes, only to immediately shorten them into acronyms and never use the real name again. It's quite strange, and almost as if the author was being charged per word and was attempting to keep the fluff out.
The other thing about Brandon that bugged the hell out of me was the fact that he couldn't make a decision about anything. Klicks repeatedly rags on him about it, and for good reason. He hasn't voted in over 20 years, for example. He doesn't know how to help his dying father, so he does nothing. He refuses to make any decisions about the blue jelly aliens- how much to tell them, whether or not to ride in their spaceship (um, yes) and whether bringing them forward in time might be the right thing to do. These and many other decisions are hemmed and hawed over by Brandon to the point where I wanted to slap him upside the head for his indecision. I don't care how good of a paleontologist the man is, if there was a time travel machine, and an opportunity to send two people back 65 million years into the past... wouldn't you send back someone who had initiative, good reaction time and had the ability to make tough split second decisions? Why would you send some guy who is clearly still suffering from a broken marriage, literally can't make decisions to save his life, and is easily distracted- not to mention sending him back with the one person who actually ruined his marriage? Whose idea was this??
Nitpicks aside, I really had a good time with End of an Era. It was fresh, interesting, and explored a side of time travel that you don't normally see in novels. I'd recommend it to anyone who enjoys time travel, even if you're not into dinosaurs!
What really hooked me into this story was the time travel element. I'm always intrigued with time travel stories, because I like to see how authors will use it. You've introduced this world-breaking ability, now what do you do with it?
Sawyer takes this idea and runs with it. He introduces gravity fluxes, blue jelly Martians, a second moon, a secondary timeline, and of course, tons of dinosaurs of all kinds. His time travelling characters were not expecting any of this- they were simply trying to discover what happened to cause the extinction of the dinosaurs. Klicks and Brandy try to deal with these new elements as best they can, all while attempting to do what they were sent back for. Without spoiling the complexities of the story or the ending, I will say that an asteroid is not what caused the extinction of the dinosaurs, and it has everything to do with the alien species that the paleontologists run into in the past.
Some of the things that really made me like this novel were not the major events, but the smaller, nuanced touches. I loved Brandon's description of the night sky, and how it was vastly different than what he was used to in the future, down to the other side of the moon being visible, a second, smaller moon, and the incredible amount of stars in the sky. Brandon saw other far off alien lights as well, which makes him wax a bit about how the universe was full of life during the time of the dinosaurs, and we missed alien contact by about 65 million years. I also really liked the idea of the asteroid belt once being a planet before it was destroyed. The change in gravity threw me, but it made sense that animals of that size would be able to evolve in an environment with much less gravity than what Earth currently has.
The one thing I cannot get on board with here is our main character, Brandon Thackery. I have known several Brandons/Brendens in my life, and NOT ONE of them has gone by Brandy, the name that our MC insists on going by. It may be an odd nitpick, but the nicknames don't stop at Brandy. He calls his best friend Klicks (real name Miles, har de har), his wife is Tess, the city he lives in is TO (Toronto) and he takes the time to explain to the reader about several complex archaeological/historical theories and processes, only to immediately shorten them into acronyms and never use the real name again. It's quite strange, and almost as if the author was being charged per word and was attempting to keep the fluff out.
The other thing about Brandon that bugged the hell out of me was the fact that he couldn't make a decision about anything. Klicks repeatedly rags on him about it, and for good reason. He hasn't voted in over 20 years, for example. He doesn't know how to help his dying father, so he does nothing. He refuses to make any decisions about the blue jelly aliens- how much to tell them, whether or not to ride in their spaceship (um, yes) and whether bringing them forward in time might be the right thing to do. These and many other decisions are hemmed and hawed over by Brandon to the point where I wanted to slap him upside the head for his indecision. I don't care how good of a paleontologist the man is, if there was a time travel machine, and an opportunity to send two people back 65 million years into the past... wouldn't you send back someone who had initiative, good reaction time and had the ability to make tough split second decisions? Why would you send some guy who is clearly still suffering from a broken marriage, literally can't make decisions to save his life, and is easily distracted- not to mention sending him back with the one person who actually ruined his marriage? Whose idea was this??
Nitpicks aside, I really had a good time with End of an Era. It was fresh, interesting, and explored a side of time travel that you don't normally see in novels. I'd recommend it to anyone who enjoys time travel, even if you're not into dinosaurs!
June 26, 2021
Paleontologist Brandon Thackeray and co-worker Klicks have used a time-travel device to examine the end of the Cretaceous for evidence of an asteroid impact. Instead they find an Earth with one-third gravity, two moons and a bright green Mars in the night sky! When a strange goo invades them both and then retreats from their bodies to inhabit Troodons, they find that the goo is intelligent and uses creatures with limbs to carry them around inside. When the alien goo (which comes from a green Mars) starts becoming very inquisitive about the time device Brandon gets suspicious of their motives and with every right! When the alien goo takes over Klick’s body Brandon realizes they plan to invade future Earth. Robert J. Sawyer has given us a fast-paced mashup of The Time Machine and Invasion Of The Body Snatchers that will have you turning pages as fast as you can. Throw in a future where his wife has left him and a fierce rivalry with Klicks and you have an entertaining read if you ignore the handwavy causality.
January 31, 2021
This book was right up my alley and a really fascinating read, but the racism contained did lose it a few stars.
I'm actually surprised how much I enjoyed it minus the terrible race jokes. The characters were well developed, and it was fast paced and just the perfect length.
I'm actually surprised how much I enjoyed it minus the terrible race jokes. The characters were well developed, and it was fast paced and just the perfect length.
January 13, 2022
An interesting take on what wiped out the dinosaurs. Like all time travel sci-fi, you cannot think too hard about it. Sawyer is a big dinosaur aficionado and wrote this 4 years after Crichton wrote Jurassic Park. Not the authors best, but I still enjoyed it. Probably 3.5 stars.
April 22, 2017
Tight little time travel story, slightly silly but just the right length.
October 16, 2023
Took me awhile to warm up to the plot and took me even longer to warm up to the characters. My point is that stay with this book because it really takes off and everything comes together. It's a take on dinosaurs I have never read before.
March 7, 2022
The Short Answer
A solid sci fi adventure with an interesting premise and some fantastic ideas. Despite some lofty ambitions the book never really manages to quite rise to it's own concept and ends up feeling like a bit of a missed opportunity. It's still fun diversion that's worth reading to anyone who enjoys sci fi books with dinosaurs in them, but skippable for everyone else.
The Long Answer
I love dinosaurs, which is exactly why I randomly purchased this from a used book store without knowing anything about it. There simply aren't enough good books with dinosaurs in them! This one brought in a new premise I hadn't seen before, time travelers go back to study dinosaurs and almost immediately find them being controlled by aliens. Now they have to figure out why, and do they share knowledge about the upcoming extinction? This creates some very interesting ethical dilemmas.
Unfortunately none of these are really developed. They are brought up briefly, then the author moves on and quickly finds ways to make these arguments moot leaving the philosophy on par with a weaker Michael Crichton book like Prey. It's still fun, and gives us some enjoyable dinosaur action, but don't come into this book expecting a deep read.
There's also a reasonably unrelated subplot. It starts out super interesting and really adds an element of mystery to the book, but it ends up not really going anywhere. This is a shame because the book sets your expectations high and then doesn't meet them.
People have also mentioned racist jokes in their reviews. The book isn't really racist as it's two people of different races poking fun at each other's cultures in a way that hints at a history of trust and companionship between them. However it's still very jarring tonally and feels like it could have easily been accomplished without resorting to offensive jokes. In a different book this could be deep and revealing, here it feels crass and lazy. The same can be said for mentions of rape and abuse. Both are casually mentioned a few times as ways to quickly give characters motivational backstory, but since it's never dealt with properly it just feels like the author being lazy and taking shortcuts in character development. These moments are again very jarring tonally in a book that's otherwise a light hearted romp involving aliens controlling dinosaurs. It's not enough to condemn the book, but it creates some fairly unsightly blights in the writing.
All in all a fun but problematic diversion, which is a shame because it feels like it could have been so much more. Add 100 pages and really flesh out the stories and this would be an amazing book. Or alternatively take out 100 pages and remove the extraneous elements and it would be a really fun zippy adventure. It's still worth reading for people who need more dinosaurs in their sci fi, but everyone else can skip this one.
A solid sci fi adventure with an interesting premise and some fantastic ideas. Despite some lofty ambitions the book never really manages to quite rise to it's own concept and ends up feeling like a bit of a missed opportunity. It's still fun diversion that's worth reading to anyone who enjoys sci fi books with dinosaurs in them, but skippable for everyone else.
The Long Answer
I love dinosaurs, which is exactly why I randomly purchased this from a used book store without knowing anything about it. There simply aren't enough good books with dinosaurs in them! This one brought in a new premise I hadn't seen before, time travelers go back to study dinosaurs and almost immediately find them being controlled by aliens. Now they have to figure out why, and do they share knowledge about the upcoming extinction? This creates some very interesting ethical dilemmas.
Unfortunately none of these are really developed. They are brought up briefly, then the author moves on and quickly finds ways to make these arguments moot leaving the philosophy on par with a weaker Michael Crichton book like Prey. It's still fun, and gives us some enjoyable dinosaur action, but don't come into this book expecting a deep read.
There's also a reasonably unrelated subplot. It starts out super interesting and really adds an element of mystery to the book, but it ends up not really going anywhere. This is a shame because the book sets your expectations high and then doesn't meet them.
People have also mentioned racist jokes in their reviews. The book isn't really racist as it's two people of different races poking fun at each other's cultures in a way that hints at a history of trust and companionship between them. However it's still very jarring tonally and feels like it could have easily been accomplished without resorting to offensive jokes. In a different book this could be deep and revealing, here it feels crass and lazy. The same can be said for mentions of rape and abuse. Both are casually mentioned a few times as ways to quickly give characters motivational backstory, but since it's never dealt with properly it just feels like the author being lazy and taking shortcuts in character development. These moments are again very jarring tonally in a book that's otherwise a light hearted romp involving aliens controlling dinosaurs. It's not enough to condemn the book, but it creates some fairly unsightly blights in the writing.
All in all a fun but problematic diversion, which is a shame because it feels like it could have been so much more. Add 100 pages and really flesh out the stories and this would be an amazing book. Or alternatively take out 100 pages and remove the extraneous elements and it would be a really fun zippy adventure. It's still worth reading for people who need more dinosaurs in their sci fi, but everyone else can skip this one.
January 14, 2018
Sawyer is the best-known Canadian author of science fiction -- one of the most successful Canadian authors of any kind, actually -- but I’ve always found his books rather uneven. Some are absorbing while others (like the “WWW” series) are almost unreadable. This early effort is right in the middle of the pack.
Brandon Thackery is a paleontologist -- “a dinosaur guy,” he says -- who has been tapped for the first time travel journey back to the late Mesozoic. (It turns out that long-distance trips into time are far cheap in energy terms than very recent journeys, so distant prehistory is what’s available.) He’s paired up with Miles “Klicks” Jordan, a geologist-paleontologist and also his lifelong best friend, but Jordan has also hooked up with Brandon’s recently divorced wife, so there’s a certain amount of tension in the time machine. This being Canada, by the way, the vehicle was built on the cheap, with numerous trips to Wal-Mart, which is a nice bit of dry humor.
They haven’t been back among the triceratopses very long at all when they discover the presence of gelatinous blue aliens, who use the dinos as mind-controlled vehicles. They say they’re from Mars, and Brandon has to tell them that Mars will be a very dead place in the time he originates from. Should they try to save the alien species by taking them back to our present?
In alternating chapters, we follow a somewhat different Brandon as he discovers the computerized diary he keeps so assiduously has been replaced by an alternate version that relates a lot of nonsense about traveling back in time to study the dinosaurs. And this Brandon is still with his wife -- though he now can’t help becoming suspicious about his old friend, Klicks. So he goes off to find the woman physicist whose discoveries led to the invention of time travel in the first place. And then things really get complicated.
You’ll be a little confused at the beginning, just like the two Brandons, but Sawyer gradually lets you in on what’s happening, and does it in a credible way. You can usually identify one of Sawyer’s stories by the self-consciously “humane liberal” style, and this one is no exception, but it’s an enjoyable yarn, with lots of thought-provoking ideas. Not one of his best, but not bad at all.
Brandon Thackery is a paleontologist -- “a dinosaur guy,” he says -- who has been tapped for the first time travel journey back to the late Mesozoic. (It turns out that long-distance trips into time are far cheap in energy terms than very recent journeys, so distant prehistory is what’s available.) He’s paired up with Miles “Klicks” Jordan, a geologist-paleontologist and also his lifelong best friend, but Jordan has also hooked up with Brandon’s recently divorced wife, so there’s a certain amount of tension in the time machine. This being Canada, by the way, the vehicle was built on the cheap, with numerous trips to Wal-Mart, which is a nice bit of dry humor.
They haven’t been back among the triceratopses very long at all when they discover the presence of gelatinous blue aliens, who use the dinos as mind-controlled vehicles. They say they’re from Mars, and Brandon has to tell them that Mars will be a very dead place in the time he originates from. Should they try to save the alien species by taking them back to our present?
In alternating chapters, we follow a somewhat different Brandon as he discovers the computerized diary he keeps so assiduously has been replaced by an alternate version that relates a lot of nonsense about traveling back in time to study the dinosaurs. And this Brandon is still with his wife -- though he now can’t help becoming suspicious about his old friend, Klicks. So he goes off to find the woman physicist whose discoveries led to the invention of time travel in the first place. And then things really get complicated.
You’ll be a little confused at the beginning, just like the two Brandons, but Sawyer gradually lets you in on what’s happening, and does it in a credible way. You can usually identify one of Sawyer’s stories by the self-consciously “humane liberal” style, and this one is no exception, but it’s an enjoyable yarn, with lots of thought-provoking ideas. Not one of his best, but not bad at all.
February 6, 2025
End of an Era, by Robert J. Sawyer (1994)
Returning to Robert J. Sawyer and his 1994 novel, End of an Era. This book comes from near the beginning of Sawyer's writing career (everything else of his that I read came out much later), and so I'm curious to see if all the usual marks of a Sawyer novel are present: in addition to the frequent-and-specific references to Canada and life as a Canadian, I'm looking for a "hard sci-fi" story (one based on real research) and philosophical discussions about the implications of the science on human life. Thirty years ago, was Sawyer already the writer he is now? Also, End of an Era is a time travel novel, so I'm especially interested in how Sawyer handles the topic. I have already read his other, later time travel novel, FlashForward (reviewed here), written five years later, in 1999, though that book handled time travel differently (mental time travel, as human consciousness "jumped ahead" 21 years, before returning back to the present, giving every human being on Earth a glimpse of the future). From what I can tell, this book provides a more traditional time travel story, involving human beings who physically travel back in time in a time machine (similar to the most iconic time travel story, H.G. Wells' The Time Machine, which I reviewed here, though that book focused on the future, rather than the past).
The year of the book's setting is 2013 (19 years in the imagined future, from the year it was written). Our protagonist and narrator is Dr. Brandon "Brandy" Thackeray, a twenty-first-century vertebrate paleontologist. He's recently divorced (his wife Tess left him for another man), and his father is dying of cancer (the book begins with a hospital visit to see him, before the book's action really begins). Brandy has been selected to take part in an incredible journey/experiment: a trip back in time to the end of the Cretaceous period, to witness first-hand the K-T (Cretaceous–Paleogene) extinction event (the one that was responsible for the demise of the non-avian dinosaurs), or (at the very least) to gather some valuable "in person" information about that particular time period.
Brandy is part of a two-man time-traveling team, and his partner is Dr. Miles "Klicks" Jordan, a geologist who was once Brandy's best friend, but who- -we also learn- -is the same man that Brandy's wife left him for.
We really don't get much more background/characterization than this, at this point in the book (I'm two chapters in, so far), as Sawyer doesn't waste any time getting to the time travel; by page 38, we have arrived with Brandy and Klicks to the end of the Cretaceous period (contrast End of an Era with Michael Crichton's Timeline, where the time travel doesn't happen until 155 pages in, as Crichton takes his time establishing characters, corporations, and providing in-depth discussions of the nature of the multiverse and how wormholes work! See my review. But Sawyer does drop us a few tantalizing details regarding how time travel works, as well as an overview of the preparations made for the journey.
Time travel, we learn, was discovered by a Chinese scientist, Ching-Mei Huang, who is personally supervising Brandy's and Klicks's journey to the past, and is accomplished through what Sawyer calls "the Huang effect", through what is called a "throwback" (the word used by the characters for traveling back in time). This involves moving an object through time (camera recorders, originally, until the mission with Brandy and Klicks begins), while holding a "lock" on them. The lock can only be sustained for so long, and so the limit of the visit to such a distant time as the Cretaceous period is about 87 hours. Further, an exact date cannot be pinpointed, due to variables in the calculations (these aren't really explained), but by shooting for 65 million years BCE, Brandy speculates that they could end up as much as 330 thousand years after the K-T extinction event. Not ideal, but valuable information about the time period would still be abundant.
As for the time machine itself, Brandy describes it as a large, hamburger-shaped object called His Majesty's Canadian Time Ship Charles Hazelius Sternberg, nicknamed "The Sternberger", named in honour of Charles Hazelius Sternberg (1850–1943) a real-life Canadian paleontologist (I was actually familiar with one of his discoveries: a mummified, with-the-skin-intact duck-billed dinosaur, which he found in Wyoming in 1908). The Sternberger itself is a sort of metal sphere (or hamburger), housing a habitat, radio room/lab, water tank, and jeep garage. In case geography has changed over the course of 65 million years (and it would have, both thanks to land erosion and plate tectonics), and to prevent the Sternberger from materializing inside solid rock when arriving in the past, the Sternberger is designed for an impact landing, and so is dropped from an airplane moments before the activation of the Huang effect.
(I'm always interested in details like the ones above; they are often the best part of any time travel story, even though they often come before the story properly begins. We don't get as much info/explanation as Crichton provided in Timeline, but it's possible that more will come as the book continues).
As for the other typical features of a Robert J. Sawyer novel, we do indeed get the inevitable references to Canada/being Canadian, as Brandy works for the Royal Ontario Museum's paleontology department (a place I've had the pleasure of visiting more than once), while Klicks works for the Royal Tyrrell Museum in Drumheller, Alberta. As for Sawyer's typical plot-related scientific exposition, we get some in-depth (though surely dated, as the book is over 30 years old, now) discussion of the K-T event (the extinction of the non-avian dinosaurs) and some possible explanations for it (Brandy, we learn, is not convinced that the Chicxulub asteroid, which crashed near Mexico around the time the non-avian dinosaurs died out, is to blame, and offers some interesting reasons why). Only one thing missing, as I begin Chapter 3: there hasn't really been any philosophical discussion so far, as no moral questions have yet arisen, with regard to the science or circumstances of the characters (though I expect there will be, Sawyer being Sawyer).
And one last thing to comment on (and sort of a criticism, though not a time travel-related one): I can't help but think, on such an important mission (the first manned time travel mission), it would be a bad idea to recruit two experts who have such personal problems/resentment/hostility toward one another. Brandy's wife left him for Klicks, after all, and Klicks, in his interactions with Brandy, is nearly always antagonistic, as if gloating over the fact that Tess is now with him (Why does he behave like such a jerk? Brandy comes across as far more reasonable and responsible). But for an important and dangerous mission such as this, the first attempt to send living humans back in time (an effort surely more significant than even the Apollo 11 moon landing), it would be important to have a team whose members like each other, work well together, and will cooperate and rise above their disagreements. But that certainly isn't the case with the Sternberger team.
The only reason I can think of, as to why Sawyer might give us these men in this situation is the potential it will provide for drama. If I were to guess, I would say that we are going to get an Enemy Mine-style scenario, where perhaps they will be stranded in the past (the Sternberger might malfunction) and/or Klicks might be injured (attacked by a prehistoric predator?) and will have to rely on Brandy for survival (we'll see).
Regardless, End of an Era is off to an interesting start, and I look forward to some good dinosaur sightings/interactions.
I'll wrap up my look at the opening chapters of End of an Era by Robert J. Sawyer with my usual "Time Travel Breakdown" (TTB):
How is time “traveled”? (physically or mentally?): Physically
Time travel method? In a time capsule nicknamed "the Sternberger", using something called "the Huang effect", which has not yet been explained.
Years/times visited: from Alberta 2013 to what will one day be Alberta, some 65 million years ago
Possible paradoxes: can history be altered? Unknown.
Are multiple timelines possible? Unknown.
Thanks for reading!
Note: You can check out my other time travel-related reviews on my blog, where I also review movies and TV shows with a specific focus on time travel.
Here's the link: Dr. N's Imagination and Time Travel blog
https://imaginationandtimetravel.word...
Returning to Robert J. Sawyer and his 1994 novel, End of an Era. This book comes from near the beginning of Sawyer's writing career (everything else of his that I read came out much later), and so I'm curious to see if all the usual marks of a Sawyer novel are present: in addition to the frequent-and-specific references to Canada and life as a Canadian, I'm looking for a "hard sci-fi" story (one based on real research) and philosophical discussions about the implications of the science on human life. Thirty years ago, was Sawyer already the writer he is now? Also, End of an Era is a time travel novel, so I'm especially interested in how Sawyer handles the topic. I have already read his other, later time travel novel, FlashForward (reviewed here), written five years later, in 1999, though that book handled time travel differently (mental time travel, as human consciousness "jumped ahead" 21 years, before returning back to the present, giving every human being on Earth a glimpse of the future). From what I can tell, this book provides a more traditional time travel story, involving human beings who physically travel back in time in a time machine (similar to the most iconic time travel story, H.G. Wells' The Time Machine, which I reviewed here, though that book focused on the future, rather than the past).
The year of the book's setting is 2013 (19 years in the imagined future, from the year it was written). Our protagonist and narrator is Dr. Brandon "Brandy" Thackeray, a twenty-first-century vertebrate paleontologist. He's recently divorced (his wife Tess left him for another man), and his father is dying of cancer (the book begins with a hospital visit to see him, before the book's action really begins). Brandy has been selected to take part in an incredible journey/experiment: a trip back in time to the end of the Cretaceous period, to witness first-hand the K-T (Cretaceous–Paleogene) extinction event (the one that was responsible for the demise of the non-avian dinosaurs), or (at the very least) to gather some valuable "in person" information about that particular time period.
Brandy is part of a two-man time-traveling team, and his partner is Dr. Miles "Klicks" Jordan, a geologist who was once Brandy's best friend, but who- -we also learn- -is the same man that Brandy's wife left him for.
We really don't get much more background/characterization than this, at this point in the book (I'm two chapters in, so far), as Sawyer doesn't waste any time getting to the time travel; by page 38, we have arrived with Brandy and Klicks to the end of the Cretaceous period (contrast End of an Era with Michael Crichton's Timeline, where the time travel doesn't happen until 155 pages in, as Crichton takes his time establishing characters, corporations, and providing in-depth discussions of the nature of the multiverse and how wormholes work! See my review. But Sawyer does drop us a few tantalizing details regarding how time travel works, as well as an overview of the preparations made for the journey.
Time travel, we learn, was discovered by a Chinese scientist, Ching-Mei Huang, who is personally supervising Brandy's and Klicks's journey to the past, and is accomplished through what Sawyer calls "the Huang effect", through what is called a "throwback" (the word used by the characters for traveling back in time). This involves moving an object through time (camera recorders, originally, until the mission with Brandy and Klicks begins), while holding a "lock" on them. The lock can only be sustained for so long, and so the limit of the visit to such a distant time as the Cretaceous period is about 87 hours. Further, an exact date cannot be pinpointed, due to variables in the calculations (these aren't really explained), but by shooting for 65 million years BCE, Brandy speculates that they could end up as much as 330 thousand years after the K-T extinction event. Not ideal, but valuable information about the time period would still be abundant.
As for the time machine itself, Brandy describes it as a large, hamburger-shaped object called His Majesty's Canadian Time Ship Charles Hazelius Sternberg, nicknamed "The Sternberger", named in honour of Charles Hazelius Sternberg (1850–1943) a real-life Canadian paleontologist (I was actually familiar with one of his discoveries: a mummified, with-the-skin-intact duck-billed dinosaur, which he found in Wyoming in 1908). The Sternberger itself is a sort of metal sphere (or hamburger), housing a habitat, radio room/lab, water tank, and jeep garage. In case geography has changed over the course of 65 million years (and it would have, both thanks to land erosion and plate tectonics), and to prevent the Sternberger from materializing inside solid rock when arriving in the past, the Sternberger is designed for an impact landing, and so is dropped from an airplane moments before the activation of the Huang effect.
(I'm always interested in details like the ones above; they are often the best part of any time travel story, even though they often come before the story properly begins. We don't get as much info/explanation as Crichton provided in Timeline, but it's possible that more will come as the book continues).
As for the other typical features of a Robert J. Sawyer novel, we do indeed get the inevitable references to Canada/being Canadian, as Brandy works for the Royal Ontario Museum's paleontology department (a place I've had the pleasure of visiting more than once), while Klicks works for the Royal Tyrrell Museum in Drumheller, Alberta. As for Sawyer's typical plot-related scientific exposition, we get some in-depth (though surely dated, as the book is over 30 years old, now) discussion of the K-T event (the extinction of the non-avian dinosaurs) and some possible explanations for it (Brandy, we learn, is not convinced that the Chicxulub asteroid, which crashed near Mexico around the time the non-avian dinosaurs died out, is to blame, and offers some interesting reasons why). Only one thing missing, as I begin Chapter 3: there hasn't really been any philosophical discussion so far, as no moral questions have yet arisen, with regard to the science or circumstances of the characters (though I expect there will be, Sawyer being Sawyer).
And one last thing to comment on (and sort of a criticism, though not a time travel-related one): I can't help but think, on such an important mission (the first manned time travel mission), it would be a bad idea to recruit two experts who have such personal problems/resentment/hostility toward one another. Brandy's wife left him for Klicks, after all, and Klicks, in his interactions with Brandy, is nearly always antagonistic, as if gloating over the fact that Tess is now with him (Why does he behave like such a jerk? Brandy comes across as far more reasonable and responsible). But for an important and dangerous mission such as this, the first attempt to send living humans back in time (an effort surely more significant than even the Apollo 11 moon landing), it would be important to have a team whose members like each other, work well together, and will cooperate and rise above their disagreements. But that certainly isn't the case with the Sternberger team.
The only reason I can think of, as to why Sawyer might give us these men in this situation is the potential it will provide for drama. If I were to guess, I would say that we are going to get an Enemy Mine-style scenario, where perhaps they will be stranded in the past (the Sternberger might malfunction) and/or Klicks might be injured (attacked by a prehistoric predator?) and will have to rely on Brandy for survival (we'll see).
Regardless, End of an Era is off to an interesting start, and I look forward to some good dinosaur sightings/interactions.
I'll wrap up my look at the opening chapters of End of an Era by Robert J. Sawyer with my usual "Time Travel Breakdown" (TTB):
How is time “traveled”? (physically or mentally?): Physically
Time travel method? In a time capsule nicknamed "the Sternberger", using something called "the Huang effect", which has not yet been explained.
Years/times visited: from Alberta 2013 to what will one day be Alberta, some 65 million years ago
Possible paradoxes: can history be altered? Unknown.
Are multiple timelines possible? Unknown.
Thanks for reading!
Note: You can check out my other time travel-related reviews on my blog, where I also review movies and TV shows with a specific focus on time travel.
Here's the link: Dr. N's Imagination and Time Travel blog
https://imaginationandtimetravel.word...
September 8, 2013
Loved Robert J. Sawyer’s standalone novel, The End of an Era. Time travel has been discovered and two unlikely travelers, two paleontologists from the 21st century, Canada -- (naturally since Sawyer’s novels often depict the awesomeness of Canadian culture – eh?) – with Brandy, a guy with many flaws and quite the Everyman in every respect, who just lost his wife to his best friend, Klicks, who is also aboard the same time ship.
Of course the resulting tensions between the two create a ripe atmosphere of humor as well as regret and some jealousy and shame, as they both discover the world of the Cretaceous Era. Turns out there are aliens! And they’re naturally viral, taking over dinosaurs for their own.
And the Earth’s gravity is lighter – we find out why. And the true intentions of these Hets is kept quiet – and we find out how. Brandy and Klicks are unsure how to proceed. Should they take the risk and bring them back to their own time, since this race is currently extinct? Or continue their research into what killed the dinosaurs?
Sawyer argues well with lots of science words and technology bandied about, about the lack of funding in research, the strain of relationships that creating a career which takes you miles from your wife for extended periods of time (though 60 million is a bit much), and the lack of evidence that one single asteroid did wipe out the dinosaurs.
Actually we do find out what actually killed them off. It’s fictitious, a lot of fun and suspenseful.
Also plenty of flashbacks are used as a device to get into Brandy’s head. We even get entertained by an alternate time line, where the “now” Brandy discovers the “time travelling Brandy’s” diary on a computer. The book is a bit fuzzy how that happened.
Overall, an entertaining read, could not put it down. Recommended.
Of course the resulting tensions between the two create a ripe atmosphere of humor as well as regret and some jealousy and shame, as they both discover the world of the Cretaceous Era. Turns out there are aliens! And they’re naturally viral, taking over dinosaurs for their own.
And the Earth’s gravity is lighter – we find out why. And the true intentions of these Hets is kept quiet – and we find out how. Brandy and Klicks are unsure how to proceed. Should they take the risk and bring them back to their own time, since this race is currently extinct? Or continue their research into what killed the dinosaurs?
Sawyer argues well with lots of science words and technology bandied about, about the lack of funding in research, the strain of relationships that creating a career which takes you miles from your wife for extended periods of time (though 60 million is a bit much), and the lack of evidence that one single asteroid did wipe out the dinosaurs.
Actually we do find out what actually killed them off. It’s fictitious, a lot of fun and suspenseful.
Also plenty of flashbacks are used as a device to get into Brandy’s head. We even get entertained by an alternate time line, where the “now” Brandy discovers the “time travelling Brandy’s” diary on a computer. The book is a bit fuzzy how that happened.
Overall, an entertaining read, could not put it down. Recommended.
January 21, 2013
Whenever the author mentioned something scientifically questionable, I folded the lower corner of that page. By the end of the read, the bottom of the book looked like origami. I almost had put the book down for that reason, but continued on. It turns out that there was a treasure to be found in that decision. Although the "science" part of the science fiction was terrible, the "fiction" part has good merits. There are creative ideas in here concerning the history of Earth.
Further knocking the star rating down were unlikeable main characters. They are meant to be the educated, heads of their fields. But not only do they not get their own profession's facts straight (more folded page corners for those,) they also constantly make unintelligent decisions. This helps as a plot device, but makes the characters less believable. Some of that behavior is excusable for at least one of the characters due to his emotional state, but it still felt like it was too much.
Further knocking the star rating down were unlikeable main characters. They are meant to be the educated, heads of their fields. But not only do they not get their own profession's facts straight (more folded page corners for those,) they also constantly make unintelligent decisions. This helps as a plot device, but makes the characters less believable. Some of that behavior is excusable for at least one of the characters due to his emotional state, but it still felt like it was too much.
December 20, 2021
Aside from the cool storyline, the substance of this novel is depraved.
It opens with the hero dishonorable defiance of his father's final wishes, descends into him cooperating with the black man he lets cuckold him with his childfree wife, and then the novel devotes further racial commentary on the disfigured bit noble failure of the Chinese scientist, the sacrificial lamb Israeli scientist that heals the broken world, and the evil space Nazis who deserve to be genocided because bad. At the end, the hero blames the space Nazis for his father's illnessm
So the morale of the story is reprehensible: cowardice, dishonor, genocide, and self-hatred are to be preferred to growth, learning, progress and development.
But the story is very good, so two stars
It opens with the hero dishonorable defiance of his father's final wishes, descends into him cooperating with the black man he lets cuckold him with his childfree wife, and then the novel devotes further racial commentary on the disfigured bit noble failure of the Chinese scientist, the sacrificial lamb Israeli scientist that heals the broken world, and the evil space Nazis who deserve to be genocided because bad. At the end, the hero blames the space Nazis for his father's illnessm
So the morale of the story is reprehensible: cowardice, dishonor, genocide, and self-hatred are to be preferred to growth, learning, progress and development.
But the story is very good, so two stars
October 6, 2013
Il primo romanzo di R.J.Sawyer già mette in luce alcune delle tematiche che spesso ricorreranno nei romanzi successivi: l'Intelligenza Artificiale, il viaggio spaziale, gli umani con problemi. Ha una grande capacità di riprendere vecchie idee (nel romanzo in questione Hal 9000 e le leggi Asimoviane) e di svilupparle in modo diverso, spesso originale. Un romanzo ben scritto, con alcuni spunti notevoli.
October 17, 2009
Not sure if this story was *meant* to be a comedy, but I laughed a lot. It certainly has chutzpah too - it takes quite a bit of guts to propose and seriously examine such a ... creative and (pardon the pun) novel explanation for both the size dinosaurs reached and the method of their extinction.
November 7, 2014
More interesting science wrapped in shitty prose with obsessively reoccurring themes.
Someone always has a unibrow.
Someone is a Unitarian.
A professed atheist always ponders God.
We are given excessive detail on everyone's hair/skin/eye colour and clothing.
I'm moving on to a new author now.
Someone always has a unibrow.
Someone is a Unitarian.
A professed atheist always ponders God.
We are given excessive detail on everyone's hair/skin/eye colour and clothing.
I'm moving on to a new author now.
March 26, 2019
This book was a hoot! Dinosaurs, time travel, quantum mechanics, and Martians! What's not to love? Nothing. This book has everything you could possibly hope to want. It's amazing. Read it. Enjoy it. It's so much fun!
Read
March 10, 2009Time travel! Dinosaurs! Aliens! Action! Fatalistic Twelve Monkeys time schema!
It in no way surprises me that this was one of my favorite books circa 1995.
It in no way surprises me that this was one of my favorite books circa 1995.
August 4, 2015
My least favorite Robert J. Sawyer novel. Creaky and over-elaborate plot, unlikeable characters.
August 6, 2019
AWESOME STORY! I was thrilled with this creative science-fiction tale, re-writing the Dinosaur extinction with a blend of Martian invasions and viral pestilence.
The literary style is very modern, in fact, it is about as fresh and lean as any I've read in some time. There was a lot of snarky verbal exchanges between the two time travellers, Brandon and Klicks, replete with ethnic jokes and petty slights, passive-aggressive taunts, and subconscious hatred. This is belied by a romantic entanglement over their shared love, Tess, a scientific colleague who divorced Brandon to be with Klicks. The white-and-black race dynamic between Brandon and Klicks was also set squarely in today's era, reading like a cuckold erotic story at times - imagine, a strong, vivaceous Black man stealing a white husband's wife - inside a time travel story to the Dinosaur era! I would never have imagined that type of real, authentically gripping emotional hurt inside a science fiction book.
The setting is staged plainly but without extensive, laborious detail. I liked that. In spite of that lean touch of setting, I still got the sense that I was in the Dinosaur age, with a full consideration of the lower gravity of the era, the heat and humidity, and the types of dinosaurs that were then and there. The plot took a very interesting turn when intelligent Martian invaders were introduced, but whereas a “what if” of Mars plus Dinosaurs may feel overdone or far-fetched at first thought, I was shocked and engaged by the twist - these Martians controlled the Dinosaurs as viral parasites, conquering the planet to "Marsiform" the planet. And only by one decision - a moral evaluation of these "Hets" (Martian conquerors) by Brandon Thacherty, were they found to be destructive and ultimately defeated. And the twist, -SPOILER- that these Hets are now the cause of all our modern pestilence (viruses, disease, plagues) is so innovative as to change my own look at the modern world.
I feel anyone who looks at scientific research as the work of lame, sterile nerds should read this book. They are heroes for the modern world! With authentic, romantic and emotional issues! I loved this! It also offers a far more thriling look at the Dinosaurs than I would ever have gained from a school textbook; I loved it because of the innovative scientific ideas, and, as a bonus, it provided tons of scientific education in the process.
The literary style is very modern, in fact, it is about as fresh and lean as any I've read in some time. There was a lot of snarky verbal exchanges between the two time travellers, Brandon and Klicks, replete with ethnic jokes and petty slights, passive-aggressive taunts, and subconscious hatred. This is belied by a romantic entanglement over their shared love, Tess, a scientific colleague who divorced Brandon to be with Klicks. The white-and-black race dynamic between Brandon and Klicks was also set squarely in today's era, reading like a cuckold erotic story at times - imagine, a strong, vivaceous Black man stealing a white husband's wife - inside a time travel story to the Dinosaur era! I would never have imagined that type of real, authentically gripping emotional hurt inside a science fiction book.
The setting is staged plainly but without extensive, laborious detail. I liked that. In spite of that lean touch of setting, I still got the sense that I was in the Dinosaur age, with a full consideration of the lower gravity of the era, the heat and humidity, and the types of dinosaurs that were then and there. The plot took a very interesting turn when intelligent Martian invaders were introduced, but whereas a “what if” of Mars plus Dinosaurs may feel overdone or far-fetched at first thought, I was shocked and engaged by the twist - these Martians controlled the Dinosaurs as viral parasites, conquering the planet to "Marsiform" the planet. And only by one decision - a moral evaluation of these "Hets" (Martian conquerors) by Brandon Thacherty, were they found to be destructive and ultimately defeated. And the twist, -SPOILER- that these Hets are now the cause of all our modern pestilence (viruses, disease, plagues) is so innovative as to change my own look at the modern world.
I feel anyone who looks at scientific research as the work of lame, sterile nerds should read this book. They are heroes for the modern world! With authentic, romantic and emotional issues! I loved this! It also offers a far more thriling look at the Dinosaurs than I would ever have gained from a school textbook; I loved it because of the innovative scientific ideas, and, as a bonus, it provided tons of scientific education in the process.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
March 23, 2020
So when I picked this book I failed to read the summary very well. As a result once the martians showed up I was taken entirely off guard. Which was good it lead me to be even more interested in what came next.
This book touched on some interesting scifi ideas. Time travel. Lesser gravity jn the past leading to dinosaur gigantism. Dinosaurs being genetically designed to be weapons for a biological host to drive. The biological hosts were virus based life forms that were sentient. They were kind of like Unity in Rick Morty. Mars was Earth like and habitable. There was a planet between Mars and Jupiter. Mars Tess planets were at war since the Tessians didnt want to be hosts. By present time they destroy eachother so Mars uninhabitable and Tess is gone. Oh and we had a second moon. It and the dinosaurs were destroyed by the destruction of the gravity reducers. Which were taken out by programming since apparently this race which was exceptionall skilled with gravity were otherwise similar to human technology. By the end once everything is done the main character is in an alternate future where time travel never happened and his wife never left him etc. When he finds the lady who made the time machine she abandoned her research so it never happened. She theorized that life's origin was a result if the future. That future being made edits to the past... "time travel is inevitable".
It also had this stupid thing where the guy he goes to the past with was his best friend who is now with his wife so he hates him now. It was stupid.
Anyways this was a creative and entertaining read.
This book touched on some interesting scifi ideas. Time travel. Lesser gravity jn the past leading to dinosaur gigantism. Dinosaurs being genetically designed to be weapons for a biological host to drive. The biological hosts were virus based life forms that were sentient. They were kind of like Unity in Rick Morty. Mars was Earth like and habitable. There was a planet between Mars and Jupiter. Mars Tess planets were at war since the Tessians didnt want to be hosts. By present time they destroy eachother so Mars uninhabitable and Tess is gone. Oh and we had a second moon. It and the dinosaurs were destroyed by the destruction of the gravity reducers. Which were taken out by programming since apparently this race which was exceptionall skilled with gravity were otherwise similar to human technology. By the end once everything is done the main character is in an alternate future where time travel never happened and his wife never left him etc. When he finds the lady who made the time machine she abandoned her research so it never happened. She theorized that life's origin was a result if the future. That future being made edits to the past... "time travel is inevitable".
It also had this stupid thing where the guy he goes to the past with was his best friend who is now with his wife so he hates him now. It was stupid.
Anyways this was a creative and entertaining read.
December 15, 2017
End of an Era is a re-read for me, something I don't do very often but, years ago, Robert J. Sawyer became one of my favorite science fiction writers and I was delighted to hear about this blog tour. I'll always do what I can to bring attention to this author's work...and, by the way, having met him ten years ago when my daughter's and my bookstore was the exclusive bookseller and he was guest of honor at RavenCon, I can attest to him being a really nice guy.
I don't remember now which book of Mr. Sawyer's I read first but I do remember being drawn in by the idea of oddly behaving dinosaurs and time-traveling scientists, not to mention gooey aliens and an alternate timeline in which our hero has to study his own jaunt as if it happened to someone else. I fangirl over dinosaurs anyway so this was a no-brainer pick and I, quite honestly, thought it was brilliant. The concept of aliens existing with and using the dinosaurs is fascinating and the wild discoveries begin as soon as our time travelers get there.
So, did this story hold up after probably fifteen or sixteen years? Oh, yes, indeed, and I'm inspired to re-read more of Mr. Sawyer's books, most likely beginning with the brilliant Neanderthal Parallax Trilogy or maybe the Quintaglio Trilogy or it could be The Terminal Experiment or....This is fun science fiction at its best and most accessible; is it perfect science? No, not really, but I prefer the adventurous kind anyway ;-)
I don't remember now which book of Mr. Sawyer's I read first but I do remember being drawn in by the idea of oddly behaving dinosaurs and time-traveling scientists, not to mention gooey aliens and an alternate timeline in which our hero has to study his own jaunt as if it happened to someone else. I fangirl over dinosaurs anyway so this was a no-brainer pick and I, quite honestly, thought it was brilliant. The concept of aliens existing with and using the dinosaurs is fascinating and the wild discoveries begin as soon as our time travelers get there.
So, did this story hold up after probably fifteen or sixteen years? Oh, yes, indeed, and I'm inspired to re-read more of Mr. Sawyer's books, most likely beginning with the brilliant Neanderthal Parallax Trilogy or maybe the Quintaglio Trilogy or it could be The Terminal Experiment or....This is fun science fiction at its best and most accessible; is it perfect science? No, not really, but I prefer the adventurous kind anyway ;-)
April 17, 2022
Brandon and Klicks are two scientists who are the first to use the newly invented time machine. Brandon is a palaeontologist and his mission is to try to determine the factors that brought about the extinction of the dinosaurs. The time displacement possible with this new machine is inversely proportional to the energy required. Therefore it turns out the time machine is useful to palaeontologists almost exclusively.
When they arrived in the late Mesozoic, things are not as they expected.
If you plan on reading this book, don’t read the blurb on the back cover. As is usual, after finishing the book I read the back and it gives away too much of the story. I’d rather discover for myself and be surprised along the way.
Not up to the standard of Sawyer’s other works. It is an enjoyable tale that satisfies in its own way.
When they arrived in the late Mesozoic, things are not as they expected.
If you plan on reading this book, don’t read the blurb on the back cover. As is usual, after finishing the book I read the back and it gives away too much of the story. I’d rather discover for myself and be surprised along the way.
Not up to the standard of Sawyer’s other works. It is an enjoyable tale that satisfies in its own way.
November 19, 2025
I always love reading Robert J. Sawyer books: they’re intellectual but are told simply and logically, like when (if?) you had a great science teacher who challenged AND entertained you.
END OF AN ERA was written in the ‘90s, and the “special effects” were a bit dated: the scientists’ time travel ship had a store-bought refrigerator bolted to the floor and a jeep stored within it as well.
But once the journey back to the days of the dinosaurs gets going, the story gets gradually better and better as it combines science with some emotional content regarding a conflict within the men have been experiencing from their own past, and it works toward a satisfying conclusion.
It’s not Robert J Sawyer’s best work, but it’s a pleasant read that has some real surprises at the end that brought it all together for a meaningful and heady ending.
END OF AN ERA was written in the ‘90s, and the “special effects” were a bit dated: the scientists’ time travel ship had a store-bought refrigerator bolted to the floor and a jeep stored within it as well.
But once the journey back to the days of the dinosaurs gets going, the story gets gradually better and better as it combines science with some emotional content regarding a conflict within the men have been experiencing from their own past, and it works toward a satisfying conclusion.
It’s not Robert J Sawyer’s best work, but it’s a pleasant read that has some real surprises at the end that brought it all together for a meaningful and heady ending.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
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