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Across Realtime #2
Marooned in Realtime
Multiple Hugo Award winner Vernor Vinge takes readers on a fifty-million-year trip to a future where humanity's fate will be decided in a dangerous game of high-tech survival.
In this taut thriller, a Hugo finalist for Best Novel, nobody knows why there are only three hundred humans left alive on the Earth fifty million years from now. Opinion is fiercely divided on whether to settle in and plant the seed of mankind anew, or to continue using high-energy stasis fields, or "bobbles," in venturing into the future. When somebody is murdered, it's obvious someone has a secret he or she is willing to kill to preserve.The murder intensifies the rift between the two factions, threatening the survival of the human race. It's up to 21st century detective Wil Brierson, the only cop left in the world, to find the culprit, a diabolical fiend whose lust for power could cause the utter extinction of man.
Filled with excitement and adventure, Vinge's tense SF puzzler will satisfy readers with its sense of wonder and engaging characters, one of whom is a murderer with a unique modus operandi.
In this taut thriller, a Hugo finalist for Best Novel, nobody knows why there are only three hundred humans left alive on the Earth fifty million years from now. Opinion is fiercely divided on whether to settle in and plant the seed of mankind anew, or to continue using high-energy stasis fields, or "bobbles," in venturing into the future. When somebody is murdered, it's obvious someone has a secret he or she is willing to kill to preserve.The murder intensifies the rift between the two factions, threatening the survival of the human race. It's up to 21st century detective Wil Brierson, the only cop left in the world, to find the culprit, a diabolical fiend whose lust for power could cause the utter extinction of man.
Filled with excitement and adventure, Vinge's tense SF puzzler will satisfy readers with its sense of wonder and engaging characters, one of whom is a murderer with a unique modus operandi.
292 pages, Kindle Edition
First published January 1, 1986
116 people are currently reading
3342 people want to read
About the author
Vernor Vinge
123 books2,643 followersVernor Steffen Vinge is a retired San Diego State University Professor of Mathematics, computer scientist, and science fiction author. He is best known for his Hugo Award-winning novels
A Fire Upon The Deep
(1992),
A Deepness in the Sky
(1999) and
Rainbows End
(2006), his Hugo Award-winning novellas
Fast Times at Fairmont High
(2002) and The Cookie Monster (2004), as well as for his 1993 essay "The Coming Technological Singularity", in which he argues that exponential growth in technology will reach a point beyond which we cannot even speculate about the consequences.
http://us.macmillan.com/author/vernor...
http://us.macmillan.com/author/vernor...
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 266 reviews
July 18, 2015
This one hit the sweet spot for me. An imaginative tale of desperate missions of individual lives colliding with the compelling need to work collaboratively to save the human race, all placed in the frame on an unusual murder mystery.
Vinge had already used the concept of stasis fields, called bobbles, as a one-way time machine to the future to good effect in his “The Peace War”. The plot there involved a government, the Peace Federation, taking over by bobbling up armies, nukes, government headquarters of their enemies for an extended stay, and a plucky band that leads an heroic revolt against this tyranny. This book continues to harness the bobble tech in a myriad more brilliant ways.
In the universe of this book, the hero, Wil, is from the 80’s, the time Vinge was writing this book. As a police detective he made some enemies and ended up getting bobbled into a distant future in a subversion of official government uses of the technology. The problem with these exports of problem people is that their emergence from the bobbles beyond a few centuries finds an earth devoid of people, with only theories as to what happened to the human race. Wil ends up at a 25-million year future staging point for people bobbling forward over the span of three centuries before the Singularity. The leader of a high tech faction, Yelen Korolev, is starting a colony to rebuild the race and needs to recruit at least 100 more people to reach the 300 required for sufficient genetic diversity to assure success in rebooting humanity.
A bobble from the former Peace Federation is discovered, timed to open a 1,000 years hence. . So the incipient colonists bobble forward to that time, only to discover Yelen’s lover was left alone outside the bobble (aka marooned in realtime), where she eked out a primitive existence. The saboteur responsible is no less than a murderer. Wil’s special expertise is tapped Yelen to solve the crime. Solving it is expected to have the larger benefit of netting people whose aim is to make sure the colony effort fails.
If that seems quite an astounding set up for a murder mystery, the nailing down of motive, means, and opportunity among a bizarre range of suspects reaches even more into remarkable territory. One high-tech faction wants to bobble along into the future like tourists and keep going to witness the end of the universe. One artist nature lover may want all humans exterminated. One man, with possible accolytes, believes humanity disappeared with the Rapture of the Second Coming and expects another chance. Another faction believes an alien attack accounts for both the Singularity and threats to the band of survivors. For the investigation Wil is assigned the help of Della, a 9,000 year old soldier woman who has spent many years exploring galactic space for possible alien enemies. She is so weird and wired up with computers, Wil can’t help but keep her on his suspect list. All the while he investigates by interview, analyzing written records left by Yelen’s partner, and looking for cyber footprints of sabotage, he also can’t help trying to find the criminal responsible for his own shanghai and tragic life separation from wife and children. Meanwhile, the militaristic Peace Federation shows signs of wanting to take over the running of the motley band.
The characters may be a bit simplistic for many and the dialog a bit wooden, but I was well satisfied with the rich play of ideas for harnessing tech advances to save the future. Pretty good projections from Vinge’s point before the Internet was invented. It seemed sad but true that even with species survival at stake, the human proclivity for intrigue and scheming for power would remain such a challenge as portrayed here. Still we get a hopeful feeling out of the tale and not the grim dog-eat-dog crumble of civilization in many an apocalyptic or dystopian story written in recent years.
Vinge had already used the concept of stasis fields, called bobbles, as a one-way time machine to the future to good effect in his “The Peace War”. The plot there involved a government, the Peace Federation, taking over by bobbling up armies, nukes, government headquarters of their enemies for an extended stay, and a plucky band that leads an heroic revolt against this tyranny. This book continues to harness the bobble tech in a myriad more brilliant ways.
In the universe of this book, the hero, Wil, is from the 80’s, the time Vinge was writing this book. As a police detective he made some enemies and ended up getting bobbled into a distant future in a subversion of official government uses of the technology. The problem with these exports of problem people is that their emergence from the bobbles beyond a few centuries finds an earth devoid of people, with only theories as to what happened to the human race. Wil ends up at a 25-million year future staging point for people bobbling forward over the span of three centuries before the Singularity. The leader of a high tech faction, Yelen Korolev, is starting a colony to rebuild the race and needs to recruit at least 100 more people to reach the 300 required for sufficient genetic diversity to assure success in rebooting humanity.
A bobble from the former Peace Federation is discovered, timed to open a 1,000 years hence. . So the incipient colonists bobble forward to that time, only to discover Yelen’s lover was left alone outside the bobble (aka marooned in realtime), where she eked out a primitive existence. The saboteur responsible is no less than a murderer. Wil’s special expertise is tapped Yelen to solve the crime. Solving it is expected to have the larger benefit of netting people whose aim is to make sure the colony effort fails.
If that seems quite an astounding set up for a murder mystery, the nailing down of motive, means, and opportunity among a bizarre range of suspects reaches even more into remarkable territory. One high-tech faction wants to bobble along into the future like tourists and keep going to witness the end of the universe. One artist nature lover may want all humans exterminated. One man, with possible accolytes, believes humanity disappeared with the Rapture of the Second Coming and expects another chance. Another faction believes an alien attack accounts for both the Singularity and threats to the band of survivors. For the investigation Wil is assigned the help of Della, a 9,000 year old soldier woman who has spent many years exploring galactic space for possible alien enemies. She is so weird and wired up with computers, Wil can’t help but keep her on his suspect list. All the while he investigates by interview, analyzing written records left by Yelen’s partner, and looking for cyber footprints of sabotage, he also can’t help trying to find the criminal responsible for his own shanghai and tragic life separation from wife and children. Meanwhile, the militaristic Peace Federation shows signs of wanting to take over the running of the motley band.
The characters may be a bit simplistic for many and the dialog a bit wooden, but I was well satisfied with the rich play of ideas for harnessing tech advances to save the future. Pretty good projections from Vinge’s point before the Internet was invented. It seemed sad but true that even with species survival at stake, the human proclivity for intrigue and scheming for power would remain such a challenge as portrayed here. Still we get a hopeful feeling out of the tale and not the grim dog-eat-dog crumble of civilization in many an apocalyptic or dystopian story written in recent years.
January 30, 2024
2019 reread. This 1986 novel holds up really well, almost 35 years on. Jo Walton's is the review to read: https://www.tor.com/2009/08/07/vernor...
Back already? OK, what she said. The Singularity stuff: the idea that it might actually happen in RL is less popular now, but as an sfnal plot device, it's brilliant. And Vinge sets his fictional singularity in the early 23rd century, far enough off that, who knows? The bobbles, spherical stasis-fields that stop time inside them for a preset length (if that feature works right), are another wonderful Vinge invention, that he uses to great effect here. For Sense of Wonder: well, there's Tunc Blumenthal, the last character to leave Realtime, in 2210. He was working for a small family firm, manufacturing antimatter on the surface of the sun, by the kiloton.... What could possibly go wrong?
The writing and characterizations are pretty good, and that's what cost the book its fifth star on this third (I think) reread. It remains an excellent comfort-read for this reader. If you missed this one, or if it's been awhile, and you've like Vinge's other books, don't miss this one. Strong 4 stars.
MiR is the sequel to The Peace War (1984), a good SF novel that shares some continuing characters with the later book. But you don't need to have read tPW first, and this one is a whole lot better, I think.
Another good review: http://www.sfreviews.com/docs/Vernor%...
Back already? OK, what she said. The Singularity stuff: the idea that it might actually happen in RL is less popular now, but as an sfnal plot device, it's brilliant. And Vinge sets his fictional singularity in the early 23rd century, far enough off that, who knows? The bobbles, spherical stasis-fields that stop time inside them for a preset length (if that feature works right), are another wonderful Vinge invention, that he uses to great effect here. For Sense of Wonder: well, there's Tunc Blumenthal, the last character to leave Realtime, in 2210. He was working for a small family firm, manufacturing antimatter on the surface of the sun, by the kiloton.... What could possibly go wrong?
The writing and characterizations are pretty good, and that's what cost the book its fifth star on this third (I think) reread. It remains an excellent comfort-read for this reader. If you missed this one, or if it's been awhile, and you've like Vinge's other books, don't miss this one. Strong 4 stars.
MiR is the sequel to The Peace War (1984), a good SF novel that shares some continuing characters with the later book. But you don't need to have read tPW first, and this one is a whole lot better, I think.
Another good review: http://www.sfreviews.com/docs/Vernor%...
September 17, 2007
This was a fantastic little book. Curious - i was taken in by a little glitch in the system because in our library catalog, the book has a pub date of 2006, which i completely believed, all through the book. Actually, it was written in 1986, prior to many of the most significant developments of the internet age. Yet Vinge's predictions as to the development of technology over the course of time seemed right on track. Part of the history of the story involves a war that took place in 1997 - a fact that i thought odd, but took in stride. There's no rule that a novel has to take place in the future of this particular timeline, after all.
The story is that of Wil Brierson, a cop from the 21st century who is shanghaied into the future, past a mysterious event that wipes out almost the entire human race. When he comes out of stasis, he finds out that there are perhaps 300 human beings left. It gets more complex, and hard to describe - essentially, humans can put themselves in stasis for any amount of time. When the stasis is removed, it's as though nothing had happened to them, but the world around them has continued onwards. The stasis fields they use are called "bobbles" and are impenetrable by any means, even being plunged into a star. So, the survivors of humanity move forward through time, looking for a good time to settle down and try to rebuild. They decide on 50 million years in the future - a place in time where one bobble known to contain almost 150 people is known to be scheduled to open. 150 people could really help with the whole rebuilding of civilization.
Amidst this, one of the leaders and great minds behind the rebuilding process is murdered in a very interesting way - when the rest of the people go into their stasis for a century, she is left outside. With no one on Earth to talk to, and no way to break the bobbles or communicate with those inside, she lives by herself for forty years before dying.
Wil Brierson, the only policeman on Earth, is hired to find her killer.
Lately I've really come to enjoy a good mystery. But I haven't forgotten the sweet joy of great scifi, and it's a tremendous thing to find the two rolled together into one book. Marooned in Realtime is excellent fiction, chock full of great ideas about the near and distant future. Lovely lovely.
The story is that of Wil Brierson, a cop from the 21st century who is shanghaied into the future, past a mysterious event that wipes out almost the entire human race. When he comes out of stasis, he finds out that there are perhaps 300 human beings left. It gets more complex, and hard to describe - essentially, humans can put themselves in stasis for any amount of time. When the stasis is removed, it's as though nothing had happened to them, but the world around them has continued onwards. The stasis fields they use are called "bobbles" and are impenetrable by any means, even being plunged into a star. So, the survivors of humanity move forward through time, looking for a good time to settle down and try to rebuild. They decide on 50 million years in the future - a place in time where one bobble known to contain almost 150 people is known to be scheduled to open. 150 people could really help with the whole rebuilding of civilization.
Amidst this, one of the leaders and great minds behind the rebuilding process is murdered in a very interesting way - when the rest of the people go into their stasis for a century, she is left outside. With no one on Earth to talk to, and no way to break the bobbles or communicate with those inside, she lives by herself for forty years before dying.
Wil Brierson, the only policeman on Earth, is hired to find her killer.
Lately I've really come to enjoy a good mystery. But I haven't forgotten the sweet joy of great scifi, and it's a tremendous thing to find the two rolled together into one book. Marooned in Realtime is excellent fiction, chock full of great ideas about the near and distant future. Lovely lovely.
April 7, 2026
this book was only marginally better than the first book - Peace War— which is mot saying much.
The story falls in far future where a technology known as bobbles freeze everything inside to pop at a specific time in the future. Our main protagonists arrive in far future only to realize humanity has been wiped out and there are only a few hundred himans left- all of whom have been gathered together by a pair of women intent on restarting the himan race. But not everyone is in on this plan.
I had some issues with this book mostly in the huge inconsistencies of vinge’s writing. For example: the book is touted as a murder mystery to frame the story but i wasnt convinced a murder even happened. Poor vinge even had to have multiple characters point out “the obvious murder” despite no body and the character living another 40 years? We also dont have an investigation and the “case” is only solved by our inept cop who does no investigating magically figuring it out in the last chapter with almost no clues.
Oh, and Vinge was a mathematician— yet his number for the future, travelling among the stars, and even the character ages dont make any sense- even without a calculator it gets ridiculous.
The rest of my complaints would be spoilers- but suffice it say this was no Fire Upon the Deep. Disappointing.
The story falls in far future where a technology known as bobbles freeze everything inside to pop at a specific time in the future. Our main protagonists arrive in far future only to realize humanity has been wiped out and there are only a few hundred himans left- all of whom have been gathered together by a pair of women intent on restarting the himan race. But not everyone is in on this plan.
I had some issues with this book mostly in the huge inconsistencies of vinge’s writing. For example: the book is touted as a murder mystery to frame the story but i wasnt convinced a murder even happened. Poor vinge even had to have multiple characters point out “the obvious murder” despite no body and the character living another 40 years? We also dont have an investigation and the “case” is only solved by our inept cop who does no investigating magically figuring it out in the last chapter with almost no clues.
Oh, and Vinge was a mathematician— yet his number for the future, travelling among the stars, and even the character ages dont make any sense- even without a calculator it gets ridiculous.
The rest of my complaints would be spoilers- but suffice it say this was no Fire Upon the Deep. Disappointing.
December 8, 2023
This was a fun sequel to The Peace War which does a better job with character development and has a fun murder mystery to solve 500 million years after the first book. Similar to The Forever War, this book asks a lot of readers to imagine humans traveling thousands or even millions of years into the future. Where Haldeman chose stargates as his time-traveling devices, Vinge uses the great idea of bobbles: stasis spheres that hold anything inside them for predictable amounts of time during which the bobbles are indestructible. This is how humans skip over the Singularity which wipes out human life on Earth in 2900. The cause of that is never quite explained (maybe in Across Realtime?), but the important thing for this book is that sometime after the Singularity, a key woman to the future of humanity remains stranded on a humanless earth for 40 years. It is the mystery of her being "marooned in Realtime" that the plot revolves around. It is a highly readable and fun book, but not as good as his other trilogy, Zones of Thought: A Fire Upon the Deep / A Deepness in the Sky. I still think it is essential for sci-fi reading regardless.
Fino Reviews of Joan and Vernor Vinge Books:
: Fino Review: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...
: Fino Review: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...
: Fino Review: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...
: Fino Review: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...
: Fino Review: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...
: Fino Review: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...
: Fino Review: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...
: Fino Review: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...
Fino Reviews of Joan and Vernor Vinge Books:
: Fino Review: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...
: Fino Review: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...
: Fino Review: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...
: Fino Review: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...
: Fino Review: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...
: Fino Review: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...
: Fino Review: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...
: Fino Review: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...
July 13, 2015
Sharing a fair similarity in style and content to Asimov's classic Robots of Dawn, a far future human colony requires a famous detective to investigate the murder of one of their founders and is loosely partnered with a nine thousand year old partner. It meanders a bit but has a lot of interesting world descriptions, the characters are not exactly rounded but the protagonist is at least interesting. Vinge merges the golden age mystery with far future science fiction very well but I found myself looking for some kind of substance to all of it, unlike Asimov there was almost no commentary of societal or philosophical issues, preferring to focus on space battles across a hundred thousand years instead.
April 25, 2026
Marooned in Realtime handles the combination of mystery with vast speculative scope exceptionally well. Vernor Vinge takes the technological ideas introduced earlier in the series and uses them not just for spectacle, but to build an atmosphere of isolation, curiosity, and genuine suspense. The result is both intellectually engaging and consistently readable.
Survivors are scattered through time, waking into a future where humanity may have vanished. That idea carries an immediate emotional charge. The loneliness of enormous empty centuries, the uncertainty of what happened, and the practical challenge of rebuilding meaning after discontinuity all give the novel unusual depth.
The murder mystery at the center works especially well because it unfolds inside such an extraordinary setting. Instead of feeling grafted onto the science fiction framework, the investigation is strengthened by it. Questions of motive, opportunity, identity, and hidden history become more interesting when time travel of a sort—through bobbling and deferred existence—reshapes ordinary assumptions.
Wil Brierson is an effective protagonist for this story. His combination of competence, skepticism, and persistence makes him a solid guide through both the puzzle and the larger existential questions around it. Vinge often writes intelligent characters without making them insufferable, and that balance helps here.
The worldbuilding is another major strength. Empty landscapes, remnants of past civilizations, advanced survivors with different agendas, and the sheer scale of time all create a sense of wonder tinged with melancholy. Few novels make the future feel so expansive while also feeling so deserted.
There is also something quietly moving in the book’s treatment of continuity. What does civilization mean when generations no longer flow naturally into one another? What remains of culture when people skip across eras instead of living through them? These questions sit beneath the plot and give it weight.
If there is any drawback, it is that some emotional relationships can feel secondary to the conceptual machinery. But the concepts are so strong, and the mystery so well handled, that the novel remains compelling throughout.
What makes Marooned in Realtime memorable is how fully it earns its sense of scale. It is a detective story, an end-of-humanity meditation, and a showcase of speculative imagination all at once—smart, strange, and deeply satisfying.
Survivors are scattered through time, waking into a future where humanity may have vanished. That idea carries an immediate emotional charge. The loneliness of enormous empty centuries, the uncertainty of what happened, and the practical challenge of rebuilding meaning after discontinuity all give the novel unusual depth.
The murder mystery at the center works especially well because it unfolds inside such an extraordinary setting. Instead of feeling grafted onto the science fiction framework, the investigation is strengthened by it. Questions of motive, opportunity, identity, and hidden history become more interesting when time travel of a sort—through bobbling and deferred existence—reshapes ordinary assumptions.
Wil Brierson is an effective protagonist for this story. His combination of competence, skepticism, and persistence makes him a solid guide through both the puzzle and the larger existential questions around it. Vinge often writes intelligent characters without making them insufferable, and that balance helps here.
The worldbuilding is another major strength. Empty landscapes, remnants of past civilizations, advanced survivors with different agendas, and the sheer scale of time all create a sense of wonder tinged with melancholy. Few novels make the future feel so expansive while also feeling so deserted.
There is also something quietly moving in the book’s treatment of continuity. What does civilization mean when generations no longer flow naturally into one another? What remains of culture when people skip across eras instead of living through them? These questions sit beneath the plot and give it weight.
If there is any drawback, it is that some emotional relationships can feel secondary to the conceptual machinery. But the concepts are so strong, and the mystery so well handled, that the novel remains compelling throughout.
What makes Marooned in Realtime memorable is how fully it earns its sense of scale. It is a detective story, an end-of-humanity meditation, and a showcase of speculative imagination all at once—smart, strange, and deeply satisfying.
December 21, 2011
Only three hundred humans left on earth. A murder mystery across fifty million years. A meditation on deep time and evolution, on civilization and intelligence.
What more could you want?
A very good book.
What more could you want?
A very good book.
October 19, 2017
Storyline: 3/5
Characters: 2/5
Writing Style: 3/5
World: 3/5
This is a book that starts with surprises. Surprise one was that it didn't do what sequels normally do: follow up on the foreshadowed crises of the last book. What it did instead was rather fun. Vinge gave consideration to the repercussions of the technological introductions he made in the first book. One can generally criticize authors for plotholes and overlooking details when they introduce technology; it is difficult to see the unexpected and unforeseen consequences when presenting novel ideas. Vinge obviously gave his technology a lot of thought, and the resulting world we get is full of novel ramifications and possibilities that weren't even under consideration as of the last book.
Surprise two was that Vinge abandoned the political action-adventure in lieu of a murder mystery. I liked the direction of the first book better, though the background ideas and world in this one were so intriguing that any plot laid atop would have been sufficient. Everything else about the book was just that: sufficient. The characters mostly performed their necessary roles, the action gave us the needed adrenaline rush, the world building gave the barest suggestions of wonder, and the resolution of it satisfactorily answered all the requisite questions. Besides the technological repercussions following from the first book, there was little here that suggested passion, scrutiny, or delight on the part of the author. It was an enjoyable sequel remarkable for only a very few things, not offensive or inane enough to engender any real ill-will.
Characters: 2/5
Writing Style: 3/5
World: 3/5
This is a book that starts with surprises. Surprise one was that it didn't do what sequels normally do: follow up on the foreshadowed crises of the last book. What it did instead was rather fun. Vinge gave consideration to the repercussions of the technological introductions he made in the first book. One can generally criticize authors for plotholes and overlooking details when they introduce technology; it is difficult to see the unexpected and unforeseen consequences when presenting novel ideas. Vinge obviously gave his technology a lot of thought, and the resulting world we get is full of novel ramifications and possibilities that weren't even under consideration as of the last book.
Surprise two was that Vinge abandoned the political action-adventure in lieu of a murder mystery. I liked the direction of the first book better, though the background ideas and world in this one were so intriguing that any plot laid atop would have been sufficient. Everything else about the book was just that: sufficient. The characters mostly performed their necessary roles, the action gave us the needed adrenaline rush, the world building gave the barest suggestions of wonder, and the resolution of it satisfactorily answered all the requisite questions. Besides the technological repercussions following from the first book, there was little here that suggested passion, scrutiny, or delight on the part of the author. It was an enjoyable sequel remarkable for only a very few things, not offensive or inane enough to engender any real ill-will.
March 30, 2018
Full review on my podcast, SFBRP episode #364.
May 25, 2009
Why I Reread This Book: I enjoyed rereading
The Peace War
for the SFDG.
Wow. An amazing work indeed.
The Bobble series (for want of a better label) consists of The Peace War, a novella titled "The Ungoverned", and the present book. I reread "The Ungoverned" just before this, and I'm glad I did; it introduces the protagonist, Wil Brierson.
When I first read this book, which I believe I did shortly after it first was first published, I loved it for the ideas but didn't see it as strongly connected to The Peace War. That's not a bad thing, necessarily; I liked the fact that this book, and Orson Scott Card's Speaker for the Dead and Michael P. Kube-McDowell's Enigma , all of which came out about the same time, didn't slavishly follow the shape of their predecessors.
This time, though, I could see the connections with The Peace War more strongly. Indeed, it even carries over a couple of characters, though that isn't clear at first.
The Peace War was something of a conventional near-future post-holocaust story, though it was told with some vigor. Marooned In Realtime isn't the conventional sort of sequel; despite the connections, it takes place millions of years after the first book. It's a murder mystery set in a future when no traces of human civilization remain, among a tiny community of people who missed the vanishing of human civilization. The best thing about the book is the ideas; Vinge spelled out what we now call the Singularity, and presented its implications very convincingly. It also deals with significant ideas about humanity, intelligence, Fermi's paradox, and what immortality would do to human beings.
(Finished rereading 2009-05-24 21:08 EDT)
Wow. An amazing work indeed.
The Bobble series (for want of a better label) consists of The Peace War, a novella titled "The Ungoverned", and the present book. I reread "The Ungoverned" just before this, and I'm glad I did; it introduces the protagonist, Wil Brierson.
When I first read this book, which I believe I did shortly after it first was first published, I loved it for the ideas but didn't see it as strongly connected to The Peace War. That's not a bad thing, necessarily; I liked the fact that this book, and Orson Scott Card's Speaker for the Dead and Michael P. Kube-McDowell's Enigma , all of which came out about the same time, didn't slavishly follow the shape of their predecessors.
This time, though, I could see the connections with The Peace War more strongly. Indeed, it even carries over a couple of characters, though that isn't clear at first.
The Peace War was something of a conventional near-future post-holocaust story, though it was told with some vigor. Marooned In Realtime isn't the conventional sort of sequel; despite the connections, it takes place millions of years after the first book. It's a murder mystery set in a future when no traces of human civilization remain, among a tiny community of people who missed the vanishing of human civilization. The best thing about the book is the ideas; Vinge spelled out what we now call the Singularity, and presented its implications very convincingly. It also deals with significant ideas about humanity, intelligence, Fermi's paradox, and what immortality would do to human beings.
(Finished rereading 2009-05-24 21:08 EDT)
March 12, 2025
I read this book as part of my quest to read older Hugo winners I missed when I was younger.
This book is actually 3 different tales melded into one excellent book. It is only loosely connected to the previous novel called Peace war, in that some characters and technology were used, as it is the future of the universe of that book.
The main tale surrounds the "Bobble" technology. A method of creating a sphere that everything within is held in status until it pops or opens. A number of people, whether by choice or not, have traveled forward through time in these bobbles. While this happened, human civilization disappeared from the world. Now, one small group plans to accumulate all those remaining in an attempt to resurrect humanity.
One story is a short piece that follows the life on one person, Marta, who was left behind, on purpose, but not to her purpose. (This was the "Marooned in real time " aspect of this book.) The aspect is that of a "famous" detective who was Bobbled forward by a criminal he was investigating. Now part of the newly created society he is asked to investigate what happened to Marta and discover who had done this to her. (doing this to her is considered murder). But the investigation takes place 50 million years after she had died. Finally, this is a story of high tech intrigue, power grabbing, and people of various level of technology attempting to live together peacefully.
The ending is quick, fast paced, and has a number of surprises. Even though we discover some of the bad guys, some mysteries are never really answered. It is a wonderful story. It was hard to stop reading at times and impossible to stop reading toward the end!! No wonder it was an award winner.
I highly recommend it. There is no need to read the first book, Pease Wars to understand this book.
This book is actually 3 different tales melded into one excellent book. It is only loosely connected to the previous novel called Peace war, in that some characters and technology were used, as it is the future of the universe of that book.
The main tale surrounds the "Bobble" technology. A method of creating a sphere that everything within is held in status until it pops or opens. A number of people, whether by choice or not, have traveled forward through time in these bobbles. While this happened, human civilization disappeared from the world. Now, one small group plans to accumulate all those remaining in an attempt to resurrect humanity.
One story is a short piece that follows the life on one person, Marta, who was left behind, on purpose, but not to her purpose. (This was the "Marooned in real time " aspect of this book.) The aspect is that of a "famous" detective who was Bobbled forward by a criminal he was investigating. Now part of the newly created society he is asked to investigate what happened to Marta and discover who had done this to her. (doing this to her is considered murder). But the investigation takes place 50 million years after she had died. Finally, this is a story of high tech intrigue, power grabbing, and people of various level of technology attempting to live together peacefully.
The ending is quick, fast paced, and has a number of surprises. Even though we discover some of the bad guys, some mysteries are never really answered. It is a wonderful story. It was hard to stop reading at times and impossible to stop reading toward the end!! No wonder it was an award winner.
I highly recommend it. There is no need to read the first book, Pease Wars to understand this book.
February 22, 2010
I clicked on 3 stars for the rating, but it deserves a bit more than that.
The book has interesting portrayals of how different groups of people might perceive and choose to exist in a far future.
I had a number of reservations about it. First, I read it as part of Across Realtime (an omnibus of The Peace War, The Ungoverned and Marooned In Realtime). Each of the works in omnibus had some threads connecting them to the other, but I didn't think they made a cohesive unit. Rightly or wrongly, I was expecting more than an anthology of works placed in a common conceptual universe, and it didn't really work out as expected.
Marooned in Realtime is an SF mystery, and I like SF mysteries. But for my tastes, this was overly complex. The mystery itself is confused by various factional disputes among humans, various fanatics (a self-declared prophet of the third coming of Jesus, a guy warning of aliens planning to wipe out humans, etc.), questions about how most of the human race disappeared in the 23rd century... There's so much more going on than a number of people with grudges against the victim, and more to the resolution than finding the killer.
And because there's so much more, the book goes a bit beyond the naming of the murderer - and yet leaves so many other things unfinished.
So, SF mystery readers may prefer to read Marooned In Realtime by itself rather than part of Across Realtime. And it may appeal more to those who like greater complexity. And it will help if you don't mind not having everything wrapped up and put away at the end.
The book has interesting portrayals of how different groups of people might perceive and choose to exist in a far future.
I had a number of reservations about it. First, I read it as part of Across Realtime (an omnibus of The Peace War, The Ungoverned and Marooned In Realtime). Each of the works in omnibus had some threads connecting them to the other, but I didn't think they made a cohesive unit. Rightly or wrongly, I was expecting more than an anthology of works placed in a common conceptual universe, and it didn't really work out as expected.
Marooned in Realtime is an SF mystery, and I like SF mysteries. But for my tastes, this was overly complex. The mystery itself is confused by various factional disputes among humans, various fanatics (a self-declared prophet of the third coming of Jesus, a guy warning of aliens planning to wipe out humans, etc.), questions about how most of the human race disappeared in the 23rd century... There's so much more going on than a number of people with grudges against the victim, and more to the resolution than finding the killer.
And because there's so much more, the book goes a bit beyond the naming of the murderer - and yet leaves so many other things unfinished.
So, SF mystery readers may prefer to read Marooned In Realtime by itself rather than part of Across Realtime. And it may appeal more to those who like greater complexity. And it will help if you don't mind not having everything wrapped up and put away at the end.
February 21, 2013
I really enjoyed Marooned in Realtime. The premise is that time travel is possible, but only in one direction - forward. The mechanism is called bobbling and it puts a whole area and everything inside it in statis . The statis area is protected by a non-permeable bubble that has a mirror finish. The technology in this world has been around since the early 2050s. It has been used by various people to escape their present fates, make money or to get rid of people. At the present is this book, the world is empty except for about about 300 survivors from before 2300, when humanity seems to have disappeared. There are various theories for this but no one knows for sure. The population is split into two groups - high tech and low tech. The high tech have all sorts of weapons and machines and access to data banks but they can't run them forever. Then added to the science fiction, there is a murder mystery when one of the most important high techs, Marta is marooned in the real time while the rest of the settlement is bobbled forward. The system was set to check every 3 months to make sure that everything was ok. But instead that was changed to never, so Marta had to survive on her own till she was found. This did happen so she died and she left a diary of her life. Marta's partner Yelen asks W.W. Bierson a policeman in his former life to find out who arranged for Marta to be left behind. I loved the mystery and also the class divisions as well as the political wrangling to restart civilization.
June 29, 2019
Vinge, Vernor. Marooned in Realtime. Across Realtime No. 2. 1986, Tor, 2004.
I am told that Marooned is the novel that introduced the concept of technological singularity to the science fiction world. Well, OK. But do not expect a huge infodump about it. There are bobbles—the ultimate stasis devices—that have moved a bunch of humans millions of years into the future to a time when human beings have disappeared from the planet. One of their number is abandoned there when a hacker makes everyone else bobble even farther into the future. A cop who was bobbled into this far future by a criminal he was chasing is put on the case. It is a well-made mystery. I wish there was a sequel, because there are many interesting characters who I wish I knew better.
I am told that Marooned is the novel that introduced the concept of technological singularity to the science fiction world. Well, OK. But do not expect a huge infodump about it. There are bobbles—the ultimate stasis devices—that have moved a bunch of humans millions of years into the future to a time when human beings have disappeared from the planet. One of their number is abandoned there when a hacker makes everyone else bobble even farther into the future. A cop who was bobbled into this far future by a criminal he was chasing is put on the case. It is a well-made mystery. I wish there was a sequel, because there are many interesting characters who I wish I knew better.
November 14, 2019
Other reviewers on this site have done a fine job describing the plot of this seminal book. I will instead provide links to a short essay I recently wrote about the intellectual path that took author Vernor Vinge to his discovery of the "Singularity," a concept he first popularized in this novel: http://ramshacklevampire.blogspot.com...
I've also composed a timeline of the events in MAROONED IN REALTIME, THE PEACE WAR, and "The Ungoverned," which appears here: http://ramshacklevampire.blogspot.com...
Comments, here or at the links, are welcome.
I've also composed a timeline of the events in MAROONED IN REALTIME, THE PEACE WAR, and "The Ungoverned," which appears here: http://ramshacklevampire.blogspot.com...
Comments, here or at the links, are welcome.
April 27, 2008
Fantastic book, loved all the far-future implications of bobbles. The plot is a high-tech mystery/adventure set fifty million years in the future and Vinge keeps you on your toes.
April 21, 2022
If you like very good Sci Fi and a detective story, this is the one for you.It kept my interest and ended well too.
March 27, 2024
2024-03-27 I remember reading this book about 25 years ago and really loving it.
Fascinating SF scenarios about possible futures.
Vinge is a really good writer.
I remember the book & author were recommended to me and others in the audience by David Friedman at a talk or two he gave in Silicon Valley in the late 1990s at either Santa Clara University for the Civil Society Inst. or Ming's Restaurant, for the Jefferson Society or both. When I mentioned it to a colleague at work (Verisign) he mentioned the little book by Vinge called Real Names, which is also VERY cool, preceded the internet but predicted some of its power.
Fascinating SF scenarios about possible futures.
Vinge is a really good writer.
I remember the book & author were recommended to me and others in the audience by David Friedman at a talk or two he gave in Silicon Valley in the late 1990s at either Santa Clara University for the Civil Society Inst. or Ming's Restaurant, for the Jefferson Society or both. When I mentioned it to a colleague at work (Verisign) he mentioned the little book by Vinge called Real Names, which is also VERY cool, preceded the internet but predicted some of its power.
April 5, 2016
Wil Brierson is a detective, maybe the last one. Sometime in the twenty-second century, every human on Earth disappeared. The only ones left are those who were, at the time, encased in "bobbles", spheres of absolute stasis that many used to jump ahead through the years... and there are only a few hundred people left, trying to build what society they can by jumping further and further ahead to collect more stragglers. Nobody knows what happened to the rest. But that's not Wil's case. Nor is it his case to find the person who bobbled him for over a hundred years without his consent and separated him from his family forever... although he'd really like to do that, too. No, his case is to solve a murder of one of the few survivors left, who was murdered by being left outside of the bobbles, marooned in realtime, when everyone else jumped a century into the future. Murder by old age. But since the victim is one of the key people trying to keep the human race viable, it's a crime that everyone's got a stake in.
This is technically a sequel the The Peace War, but I feel like it stands alone. So much so that for this reread, I didn't bother to read the first book, which does introduce the bobbling technology, certain elements of the backstory, and one main character (who is changed almost to unrecognizeability by a long time gap), but is a completely different type of book, and, in my opinion, a far less interesting and lower quality one. Vernor Vinge is one of the greats of SF, and the line between where he was worthy of that title and where he was an okay author with a some really cool ideas is right between the The Peace War and Marooned in Realtime. Even to completeists I'd hesitate to recommend the other book, just because they might not think it's worth moving on to the second... and it is, it's a great book that deserves to be read, even standalone. Of course, it should be noted that the book DOES spoil the Peace War, so if you do think you might read both, you probably should do it in order, but if you read only one, read this one. It's not one of Vinge's best, perhaps, but it's still damn good, and it has its own story to tell that doesn't require reading The Peace War, which is good but may appeal more to dedicated SF readers.
There's so much to love in this book... there is of course, the three mysteries being balanced, and they're all handled quite well. There are some twists that are cool, but the story doesn't depend on them, it's built on the characters and, to a degree, the worldbuilding. Worldbuilding is a big factor here, but the world in question is Earth... one of the best things about this book is the view of the types of plants and animals that could exist on Earth millions of years from now. It was vivid, believable, and compelling. And more, the long diary of the victim, telling as she tries to survive and reach help while everyone she knows is bobbled up and completely unaware of her plight, is riveting. Reading about a person reading someone else's story should not be this good.
The book does have flaws, and there were times as they were approaching the climax that I felt it started to lose stream in trying to get across a lot of complicated action and motivations, but what it does well, it does so well that I'm happy to forgive it.
This was my first reread of the book, and I already know I want to reread it again somewhere down the line.
This is technically a sequel the The Peace War, but I feel like it stands alone. So much so that for this reread, I didn't bother to read the first book, which does introduce the bobbling technology, certain elements of the backstory, and one main character (who is changed almost to unrecognizeability by a long time gap), but is a completely different type of book, and, in my opinion, a far less interesting and lower quality one. Vernor Vinge is one of the greats of SF, and the line between where he was worthy of that title and where he was an okay author with a some really cool ideas is right between the The Peace War and Marooned in Realtime. Even to completeists I'd hesitate to recommend the other book, just because they might not think it's worth moving on to the second... and it is, it's a great book that deserves to be read, even standalone. Of course, it should be noted that the book DOES spoil the Peace War, so if you do think you might read both, you probably should do it in order, but if you read only one, read this one. It's not one of Vinge's best, perhaps, but it's still damn good, and it has its own story to tell that doesn't require reading The Peace War, which is good but may appeal more to dedicated SF readers.
There's so much to love in this book... there is of course, the three mysteries being balanced, and they're all handled quite well. There are some twists that are cool, but the story doesn't depend on them, it's built on the characters and, to a degree, the worldbuilding. Worldbuilding is a big factor here, but the world in question is Earth... one of the best things about this book is the view of the types of plants and animals that could exist on Earth millions of years from now. It was vivid, believable, and compelling. And more, the long diary of the victim, telling as she tries to survive and reach help while everyone she knows is bobbled up and completely unaware of her plight, is riveting. Reading about a person reading someone else's story should not be this good.
The book does have flaws, and there were times as they were approaching the climax that I felt it started to lose stream in trying to get across a lot of complicated action and motivations, but what it does well, it does so well that I'm happy to forgive it.
This was my first reread of the book, and I already know I want to reread it again somewhere down the line.
October 1, 2011
Vernor Vinge's MAROONED IN REALTIME is a murder mystery set in a strange far-future earth. Not long after our time, scientists had discovered a way to create "bobbles", indestructible stasis fields in which time doesn't pass. (For science-fiction aficionados, these are similar to the Slaver stasis fields in Larry Niven's Known Space books.) Bobbles were used to send a variety of people into the future: investors who wanted to "instantly" get rich by taking advantage of centuries of economic growth, criminals who were punished by the ultimate exile from everything dear to them, and even terrorists who thought they could win in the future even if defeated in the present. All of them leave the bobbles centuries or millennia from now to find Earth completely deserted, with no sign of the human race except other bobble survivors. As they try to rebuild civilization, one of them is murdered in an exotic fashion, and it falls to Wil Brierson, once a detective in the late 21st century, to find the criminal.
The survivors disagree on what exactly happened to the human race, apparently in the mid-23rd century. Some believe that Man destroyed himself, his warlike tendencies leading to extinction. Others suspect alien invasion and mass extermination. But it is the possibility of a technological singularity, progress so fast and extreme that we in the present time cannot foresee the outcome, that Vinge especially explores in MAROONED IN REALTIME. Human beings perhaps evolved to some other plane, and no longer needed to maintain a residence on Earth.
In an afterword, Vinge says that his novel sets a possible singularity as far off as the mid-23rd century for the sake of storytelling, but he believes that many of the initial readers of MAROONED IN REALTIME will witness the singularity. That might have been a tad optimistic. Still, his view of the future and human-computer interaction is perhaps more fresh than the cyberpunk genre with its now-dated focus on people hanging out in some 3D virtual reality. Indeed, it was a shock to me, after finishing the novel, to see again the era in which he wrote: 1983-85.
Vinge's prose isn't very good and a great many of the characters aren't believable people, being either cardboard cutouts or taking turns that don't make any sense. MAROONED IN REALTIME therefore isn't one of the great science-fiction literary classics, the sort that merit attention outside of genre fans. However, people who read a great deal of hard science fiction will probably enjoy MAROONED IN REALTIME, as there's enough thought-provoking ideas in spite of the clunky writing.
The survivors disagree on what exactly happened to the human race, apparently in the mid-23rd century. Some believe that Man destroyed himself, his warlike tendencies leading to extinction. Others suspect alien invasion and mass extermination. But it is the possibility of a technological singularity, progress so fast and extreme that we in the present time cannot foresee the outcome, that Vinge especially explores in MAROONED IN REALTIME. Human beings perhaps evolved to some other plane, and no longer needed to maintain a residence on Earth.
In an afterword, Vinge says that his novel sets a possible singularity as far off as the mid-23rd century for the sake of storytelling, but he believes that many of the initial readers of MAROONED IN REALTIME will witness the singularity. That might have been a tad optimistic. Still, his view of the future and human-computer interaction is perhaps more fresh than the cyberpunk genre with its now-dated focus on people hanging out in some 3D virtual reality. Indeed, it was a shock to me, after finishing the novel, to see again the era in which he wrote: 1983-85.
Vinge's prose isn't very good and a great many of the characters aren't believable people, being either cardboard cutouts or taking turns that don't make any sense. MAROONED IN REALTIME therefore isn't one of the great science-fiction literary classics, the sort that merit attention outside of genre fans. However, people who read a great deal of hard science fiction will probably enjoy MAROONED IN REALTIME, as there's enough thought-provoking ideas in spite of the clunky writing.
June 3, 2018
I first have to say, this book is going straight to the poolroom Best Books I Every Read Ever Ever list, because I love it. The premise is brilliant and the prose is so smooth, it just poured off the page. A book like this is far too rare these days.
It's a sequel to The Peace War only in so far as it's set in the same world, so same tech, same history etc. But it is otherwise completely at right angles to the first book, which is an "Orphan Child is the TechnoJesus" adventure with observant but also prescient commentary on the world we are currently witnessing the end of (haha! How the fuck is that man President?) and of course the obligatory SFnal "Physics As Magic " device.
In this book, we get the same magic device, but in a murder mystery, set billions of years into the future, and now everything's WEIRD!
My past encounters with "What will we become" have been dominated by Robert Reed, who puts out 4 stories and a novel every four days, much of it exploring the super-future, and I find it a bit boring when the characters spend 90% of a story aiming weapons systems that are so powerful you Wouldn't! Even! Understandit!!!! and describing their augmentations and body mods, but are otherwise just normal shitty people with cultural habits reflecting the authors nationality, or America, whichever get's me a publishing deal. (I'm specifically thinking of Reeds Marrow but even The Great Ship stories had a lot of this sort of bleh.
This Vinge book does it nice and fast. This novel length story reads like a novella, it's so quick it flashes by. The circumstances of the story are really clever. You get a real sense of what a human remnant, sampled through time, suddenly dumped together in the far far distant might actually look like, and most importantly, it's recognisable as a DEVELOPMENT of our species, not a transplant with fancy gadgets.
The only other writer I think who used this theme as well is Alastair Reynolds in House of Suns which you should also read. That book is spectacular. This book is better.
It's a sequel to The Peace War only in so far as it's set in the same world, so same tech, same history etc. But it is otherwise completely at right angles to the first book, which is an "Orphan Child is the TechnoJesus" adventure with observant but also prescient commentary on the world we are currently witnessing the end of (haha! How the fuck is that man President?) and of course the obligatory SFnal "Physics As Magic " device.
In this book, we get the same magic device, but in a murder mystery, set billions of years into the future, and now everything's WEIRD!
My past encounters with "What will we become" have been dominated by Robert Reed, who puts out 4 stories and a novel every four days, much of it exploring the super-future, and I find it a bit boring when the characters spend 90% of a story aiming weapons systems that are so powerful you Wouldn't! Even! Understandit!!!! and describing their augmentations and body mods, but are otherwise just normal shitty people with cultural habits reflecting the authors nationality, or America, whichever get's me a publishing deal. (I'm specifically thinking of Reeds Marrow but even The Great Ship stories had a lot of this sort of bleh.
This Vinge book does it nice and fast. This novel length story reads like a novella, it's so quick it flashes by. The circumstances of the story are really clever. You get a real sense of what a human remnant, sampled through time, suddenly dumped together in the far far distant might actually look like, and most importantly, it's recognisable as a DEVELOPMENT of our species, not a transplant with fancy gadgets.
The only other writer I think who used this theme as well is Alastair Reynolds in House of Suns which you should also read. That book is spectacular. This book is better.
August 14, 2011
The sequel to the peace war, this is very definately a different book to it.
In the Peace War Vinge introduced us to the bobble and showed how it completely transformed / destroyed society. In Marooned, that entire episode in human history has gone, and we are now travelling with a bunch of survivors from and Earth that was destroyed in some mysterious fashion (none of the survivors know how), towards an unknown future using the same technology as a lifeboat.
In the midst of this, as people bobble in and out for thousands of years at a time, we have a murder to solve and a detective to figure out who did it and why. We come across all sorts of suspects, including one monster dictator in disguise, and an assorted host of weirdness.
This is a good story, though as a detective novel it falls short since the clues given could never allow the reader to guess the killer since you simply don't have that information about things like P and P available to you. And though it uses science fiction as its back drop and the explanation for the truly weird society of refugees fleeing the end of the human race, its not really a science fiction novel either. Its more a simple mystery made possible by weird science, and an exodus novel rolled together.
For all that its a good read.
In the Peace War Vinge introduced us to the bobble and showed how it completely transformed / destroyed society. In Marooned, that entire episode in human history has gone, and we are now travelling with a bunch of survivors from and Earth that was destroyed in some mysterious fashion (none of the survivors know how), towards an unknown future using the same technology as a lifeboat.
In the midst of this, as people bobble in and out for thousands of years at a time, we have a murder to solve and a detective to figure out who did it and why. We come across all sorts of suspects, including one monster dictator in disguise, and an assorted host of weirdness.
This is a good story, though as a detective novel it falls short since the clues given could never allow the reader to guess the killer since you simply don't have that information about things like P and P available to you. And though it uses science fiction as its back drop and the explanation for the truly weird society of refugees fleeing the end of the human race, its not really a science fiction novel either. Its more a simple mystery made possible by weird science, and an exodus novel rolled together.
For all that its a good read.
March 27, 2011
This novel is published both as a singleton and in the omnibus edition Across Realtime together with its prequel The Peace War.
The sequel to “The Peace War” jumps 50 million years into the future. The 300 remaining humans travel forward through the eons with Bobbles, the invulnerable stasis fields introduced in “The Peace War”. One of them is left behind. The only remaining cop in the world must solve the mystery of why she had to die marooned in “realtime” while the rest jumped ahead in time. This book is absolutely fantastic. The factional disputes, the feeling of disconnection, the sheer human suffering of losing everything you ever knew, is portrayed masterfully. It delves deeply into the question of what should we, as humans, really do with our lives and our race. Some wish to recreate the human race now that enough people are simultanously “in realtime” (not in stasis). Some with to travel forward through the eons and see what awaits at the end of the universe. Some, it would seem, want to continue the nationalist struggles of a long-lost past. What a ride!
http://www.books.rosboch.net/?p=321
The sequel to “The Peace War” jumps 50 million years into the future. The 300 remaining humans travel forward through the eons with Bobbles, the invulnerable stasis fields introduced in “The Peace War”. One of them is left behind. The only remaining cop in the world must solve the mystery of why she had to die marooned in “realtime” while the rest jumped ahead in time. This book is absolutely fantastic. The factional disputes, the feeling of disconnection, the sheer human suffering of losing everything you ever knew, is portrayed masterfully. It delves deeply into the question of what should we, as humans, really do with our lives and our race. Some wish to recreate the human race now that enough people are simultanously “in realtime” (not in stasis). Some with to travel forward through the eons and see what awaits at the end of the universe. Some, it would seem, want to continue the nationalist struggles of a long-lost past. What a ride!
http://www.books.rosboch.net/?p=321
December 8, 2018
Marooned in Realtime takes the premise, ideas and some of the characters established in The Peace War and expands on them to create a fascinating novel which is much better than its predecessor in terms of pacing and character development. And of course, what makes Marooned so effective is the fact it revolves around a murder mystery which is the linchpin that ties it all together. Wil Brierson is a "low-tech" (basically an ordinary citizen like you and me) who served as a cop in a previous life, 50 million years ago (!), and is tasked with solving the murder of a "high-tech", (a member of society with above-average technological capabilities and resources) who was left stranded in realtime through sabotage, eventually to die. Realtime, as opposed to Bobbletime, the stasis fields used by the last remnants of humanity in order to gallop through the ages, unaffected by time. At stake is nothing short than the survival of the human race. Vinge's biggest stroke of genius here is to bring back Della Lu from the previous novel, where she was an ancillary, mostly antagonistic character, and turn her into... well, you'll have to read to find out.
October 22, 2013
The plot of this book is imaginative and thrilling. Humans have invented a way to advance themselves forward in time for however long they wish, bringing with them as much or as little as they want. This leads to murder mystery #1: the victim is 99.9% of the human race. When a group of long-term "bobblers" come out of stasis, they find that at some point in the 23rd century, most of humanity disappeared without a trace. As they work to gather up the remaining bobbled survivors - in the process, advancing millions of years into the future, to a barely recognizable earth - one of their number is stranded outside stasis through technical trickery and eventually dies. So, the remaining humans must figure out why humans disappeared while they track a killer in their midst.
What's beyond remarkable about this book is how clearly Vinge imagines a future given to technology and its consumption - each human becomes an army, a government, and a supercomputer, controlling via implants a vast array of machines, whether it's a personal guard bot or a giant fleet of robot spaceships.
What's beyond remarkable about this book is how clearly Vinge imagines a future given to technology and its consumption - each human becomes an army, a government, and a supercomputer, controlling via implants a vast array of machines, whether it's a personal guard bot or a giant fleet of robot spaceships.
January 3, 2008
I read this one pretty much straight through. I like hard sci-fi and I found the premise intriguing. Basically, this is the story of a group of people who have "bobbled" forward in time for various reasons and have all found themselves on the wrong side of the Singularity. They are trying to restart "civilization" with a mere 300 people.
There is a murder mystery central to the plot, but I really enjoyed the speculation about what technology would be like. The characters are all able to take the long view because death has ceased to be a problem and they can move forward in time at will to avoid problems. Of course, being humans they bring war and violence with them.
I highly recommend this book. I like Vernor Vinge's work and his writing about the Singularity, and I thought this was an interesting take on those who may be left behind.
There is a murder mystery central to the plot, but I really enjoyed the speculation about what technology would be like. The characters are all able to take the long view because death has ceased to be a problem and they can move forward in time at will to avoid problems. Of course, being humans they bring war and violence with them.
I highly recommend this book. I like Vernor Vinge's work and his writing about the Singularity, and I thought this was an interesting take on those who may be left behind.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
March 13, 2026
Real popcorn scifi.
Lots of fun, but pretty seriously flawed by his standards. Seems like a 300 page novel from someone who was always meant to have a good 500 or 600 pages to work with.
Still loads of fun, and the concept is very cool.
Lots of fun, but pretty seriously flawed by his standards. Seems like a 300 page novel from someone who was always meant to have a good 500 or 600 pages to work with.
Still loads of fun, and the concept is very cool.
April 4, 2008
I'd neglected to read any Vinge, and after reading Marooned In Realtime, I realized that was a mistake. His characters live and breath in extraordinary circumstances. The narrative never loses sight of the science fiction underpinnings of a world far beyond our own, and yet Vinge still knows how to drill down to the characters underneath it all to create one hell of a satisfying story.
May 7, 2008
What an improvement over the previous book, and I really liked that one. In this one, Vinge is thinking Big. This book spans more eons than I could keep track of, but he manages this time to flesh out the characters quite a bit better.
Part murder mystery, part what if the human race succumbed to a mysterious *something* that wiped out everyone but those who happened to be "bobbled" (suspended in time) this is quite a page turner.
Part murder mystery, part what if the human race succumbed to a mysterious *something* that wiped out everyone but those who happened to be "bobbled" (suspended in time) this is quite a page turner.
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