Transformation

Transcendental Trilogy #3

by James E. Gunn

Transformation continues the high-minded space opera by science fiction grandmaster James Gunn which began with Transcendental.

Riley and Asha have traveled across the galaxy, found the Transcendental Machine, and been translated into something more than human. They’ve returned to Earth and won over the artificial intelligence which once tried to destroy the Transcendental Machine.

Now they must save the fringes of the Federation.

Planets at the edge of the Federation have fallen silent. The arrogant Federation bureaucracy grudgingly send Riley and Asha to investigate. They join forces with a planetary A.I., a paranoid Federation watchdog, and a member of a splinter group who vows to destroy the A.I. No one trusts anyone or their motives.

They need to find common ground and the answer in order to confront an enemy more ancient and powerful than the Transcendentals.

At the Publisher's request, this title is being sold without Digital Rights Management Software (DRM) applied.

Genres: Science Fiction

192 pages, Kindle Edition

First published June 20, 2017

About the author

American science fiction author, editor, scholar, and anthologist. His work from the 1960s and 70s is considered his most significant fiction, and his Road to Science Fiction collections are considered his most important scholarly books. He won a Hugo Award for a non-fiction book in 1983 for Isaac Asimov: The Foundations of Science Fiction. He was named the 2007 Damon Knight Memorial Grand Master by the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America.

Gunn served in the U.S. Navy during World War II, after which he attended the University of Kansas, earning a Bachelor of Science in Journalism in 1947 and a Masters of Arts in English in 1951. Gunn went on to become a faculty member of the University of Kansas, where he served as the university's director of public relations and as a professor of English, specializing in science fiction and fiction writing. He is now a professor emeritus and director of the Center for the Study of Science Fiction, which awards the annual John W. Campbell Memorial Award for best novel and the Theodore Sturgeon Memorial Award at the Campbell Conference in Lawrence, Kansas, every July.

He served as President of the Science Fiction Writers of America from 1971–72, was President of the Science Fiction Research Association from 1980-82, and currently is Director of The Center for the Study of
Science Fiction. SFWA honored him as a Grand Master of Science Fiction in 2007.

Gunn began his career as a science fiction author in 1948. He has had almost 100 stories published in magazines and anthologies and has authored 26 books and edited 10. Many of his stories and books have been reprinted around the world.

In 1996, Gunn wrote a novelization of the unproduced Star Trek episode "The Joy Machine" by Theodore Sturgeon.

His stories also have been adapted into radioplays and teleplays:
* NBC radio's X Minus One
* Desilu Playhouse's 1959 "Man in Orbit", based on Gunn's "The Cave of Night"
* ABC-TV's Movie of the Week "The Immortal" (1969) and an hour-long television series in 1970, based on Gunn's The Immortals
* An episode of the USSR science fiction TV series This Fantastic World, filmed in 1989 and entitled "Psychodynamics of the Witchcraft" was based on James Gunn's 1953 story "Wherever You May Be".

Reviews

[Joe Karpierz · Rating 2 out of 5]

TRANFORMATION (I'm going to drop the "A novel" for purposes of this review) concludes SFWA Grandmaster James Gunn's "The Transcendental Machine" trilogy begun in 2013 with TRANSCENDENTAL and continued in 2016's TRANSGALACTIC. The trilogy started on a high note but took a dip with TRANSGALACTIC. Unfortunately, the decline continues in the final novel, and a trilogy that started with a lot of promise
ends in disappointment.

Riley and Asha return have been through a lot. They were part of a voyage the purpose of which was to find the Transcendental Machine. They found that machine, stepped into it, and ended up on opposite sides of the galaxy while being transformed into something greater than they were--something Transcendent. They spent TRANSGALACTIC trying to find each other in order to unite against the Pedia, an AI which wanted the Transcendental Machine destroyed.

In TRANSFORMATION, we learn that planets on the edge of the Federation have gone silent. Members of the Federation council agree to send Riley, Asha, Tordor (the Dorian leader of the Federation council, Earth's Pedia, and Adithya, a member of a group that is out to destroy the Pedia since they believe it has hampered the growth of humanity, out to the fringes of Federation space to
investigate the cause of the planets going silent and report back if possible. Only Riley and Asha trust each other, while various permutations and combinations of the other three travelers do not trust each other--other than the Pedia, who is incapable of mistrust, I would suppose. Tordor has the galactic coordinates of the silent planets, and off the group goes to investigate.

The novel turns into a travelogue, as the crew visits several planets, each one different than the last, with different societies, physical characteristics, stages of decline. Other than the first planet, on which everyone had died, the societies on the other planets had one thing in common: they had regressed in one manner or another, with the result being that each society had lost what knowledge they had, especially of the Federation. The travelers eventually determined the path of what they believed was an alien force destroying each civilization. And of course, the path leads directly to Federation Central. The result is a race to the next planet in the hope of encountering the malevolent force and stopping it before it continues its path of destruction.

I don't think it's going to be much of a spoiler to say that they do indeed catch up with the invaders and have the confrontation they are looking for. While the result of that confrontation is, in essence, satisfying for the characters, it certainly isn't for the reader.

This is a book--check that, a trilogy--of big ideas. The problem is that this book, and the trilogy as a whole, doesn't live up to the potential of those big ideas. The Transcendental Machine
transformed those who went through it into something more, but that idea seemed to be abandoned, at the very least pushed into the background. It really didn't come into play in TRANSFORMATION. The ending was abrupt and unsatisfying. Gunn reveals to the reader
the nature of the invading force, but never follows up on it. There's a whole lot more that is begging to be said about the invaders and what the Federation should do about them. Instead, the story abruptly ends with no satisfying resolution to the problem.

Another problem I had with the trilogy as a whole and TRANSFORMATION in particular is that there is no real thread tying all three books together. The trilogy is entitled "The Transcendental Machine", but while the titular machine plays a big part of the first novel, its influence in the later novels decreases to the point where it is almost non-existent. While Riley and Asha appear in all three novels and do play major parts in the narrative, it's not clear that the first book really has
much of anything to do with the third.

I enjoyed TRANSCENDENTAL, was disappointed in TRANSGALACTIC, and felt cheated by TRANSFORMATION, especially the ending. Overall, The Transcendental Machine is a disappointing work and quite possibly a sad end to the brilliant career of a giant in the field.

[Stuart Dean · Rating 3 out of 5]

Planets on the edge of the Federation are going silent. Ships sent to investigate don't come back. Until one does, with the entire crew dead, apparently having killed each other. Riley and Asha go to Federation Central and volunteer to investigate. They go out, the two altered hoomans, a hooman clone, a hephalump, and an AI. They go from planet to planet, each time finding all the people dead from differing versions of mental instability. These transcendental people may have developed some superpowers but they sure didn't get any smarter. Each time, someone goes out, finds everyone dead or dying, almost get dead, then escape. They do this several times, learning little. Then they make a discovery.

It's all just an avenue for Gunn to show his world building skill. Each planet had different people, some molemen, some fish, some birds, some centaurs. Each time the evolutionary process is explained. Each time they barely escape, sometimes leaving behind some possible help, sometimes not. The clues to what is happening are few and far between. And then it ends.

It ends suddenly, and that's it. There won't be anymore. Gunn, instead of answering all the questions he raised inconveniently chose to die at the age of 97. How rude.

[Howell Murray · Rating 3 out of 5]

This ends the trilogy, and it was pretty entertaining. There was not a whole lot of character development, but where the author really shines is in creating many, many diverse worlds and races across our galaxy.

[Randal · Rating 2 out of 5]

It's an homage to vintage sci-fi ... that reminds me of the weak points of that era and its glorious strength. First the latter:
The ending is this mind-blowingly huge concept about the scale of space, natural v. artificial intelligence, godhood, etc., that would not seem out of place in a good Arthur C. Clarke novel. One star for the concluding 5% of the book.
Now to the former:
There's no characters in this book. There are placeholders with names where characters could go, but they are devoid of personality, motivation, etc.
The plot consists of the ship moving from planet to planet. As with the characters the locations are more planetary types than planets (the water planet, the eccentric orbit planet, the verdant planet, etc.) so it's more like a thought experiment of how intelligent life could evolve in wild variants than a plot.
The spaceship's inhabitants are superbeings, having gone through the Transcendence Machine. But they keep flying the spaceship away while the crew is in potential danger on the planets' surfaces ... just to the point where it's touch-and-go if they can be saved. It's like how movie bombs are always defused with a second left on the clock. You might think superbeings would have figured it out in one go, two at the most. And it's a pretty pointless plot device because there's no indication Gunn is going to let any of his cardboard characters perish before the end of the book.
Then there's the completely cringe-worthy alien seduction (that happens just off-stage).
One star for the first 95% of the book.