Eon (S.F. MASTERWORKS)
and over one million other books are available for Amazon Kindle .
Learn more
| ||||||||||||||||||||||||
Did you know you can trade in your old books for an Amazon.co.uk Gift Card to spend on the things you want? Visit the Amazon.co.uk Trade-In Store for more details. |
Frequently Bought Together
Product details
|
More About the Author
Product Description
Review
"Sharing aspects of Calrke's "Rendevouz with Rama", its uniqueness arises from bear's bold imagination. Bear is a writer of passionate vision. "Eon "is his grandest work yet."--"Locus"
""Eon" may be the best constructed hard SF epic yet."--"The Washington Post"
--This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
""Eon" may be the best constructed hard SF epic yet."--"The Washington Post"
--This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
Book Description
'A triumph of soaring imagination and huge detail. The science fiction novel of the year' DAILY MAIL
Inside This Book
(Learn More)
Browse and search another edition of this book.
Browse and search another edition of this book.
First Sentence
"It's going into a wide elliptical Earth orbit," Judith Hoffman said. Read the first page
Front Cover | Copyright | Excerpt | Back Cover
"It's going into a wide elliptical Earth orbit," Judith Hoffman said. Read the first page
Explore More
Concordance
Browse Sample PagesConcordance
Front Cover | Copyright | Excerpt | Back Cover
Tags Customers Associate with This Product(What's this?)Click on a tag to find related items, discussions, and people.
|
What Other Items Do Customers Buy After Viewing This Item?
Customer Reviews
Most Helpful Customer Reviews
8 of 8 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
This is a five star book, no question... The book itself deals with the human reaction to the discovery of something so incomprehensible as to shake the soul to the core. The plot centres on a typical group of Sci-Fi characters, the scientist, the soldiers, the administrator...... It is in the development of these characters which enriches this complex physics based novel. Speaking of physics, yes the plot does involve spatial geodesical warps, but hey, Bear would have been slagged off if he had have just dropped an infinate trans dimensional tube into the middle of space without at least explaining how it came to be. So, if you like your Science Fiction to give you a head ache and severe insomnia, this is the book for you. However, if you don't want your girlfriend to start sleeping with someone else as she's fed up with being ignored in preferanc of a book, stick to... Asimov.
4 of 4 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
I first read this when I was 16 year old and it was the first book I ever bought with my own money. And having just reread it a little over 20 years later and my feelings for it have changed slightly. As a 16 year old I was blown away by the ideas, scope and possible future direction of humanity its only on my recent rereading that its flaws come into focus.
First off its a fantastic mystery that really works if you don't read the back of the book. There are some great pay-offs early on that are worth not knowing anything about the story, just to experience fresh. There is also a palpable sense that the world is on the edge of a nuclear holocaust which is exploited very well but the book really comes into its own in the first third when revealing the secrets of the Stone/Potato. The second third starts to let you into the secrets of the grater story and this is also where the flaws in the books structure come to the fore.
Firstly there are so many characters, seemingly one for every plot purpose. Meaning that characters turn up, do something and then vanish again only to be mentioned fleetingly later on. Also the political stereotypes of the Americans (who are all super liberal) as opposed to the ignorant peasant like Soviet brutes (who are all narrow minded outdoorsy types) is so obvious as to sometimes make it slightly humorous. Never more so when one of the Russians very obviously starts to think for himself and begins having trouble with his much more 'loyal' fellow Soviets.
There are some characters you want to know more about, namely Judith Hoffman and Pavel Mirsky, as they seems to be going places and then suddenly nothing happens with them. Pity.
That said the story goes along at a fairly brisk pace and doesn't seem to slow down to much despite all this. Greg Bear is adept at building a truly MASSIVE playground to allow his characters run around in and its a pity that Eon is not published along with Eternity; as its very obvious that this is the first part of the story he wanted to tell.
Its worth a look but do Bear in mind it was written right before the Mikhail Gorbachev came to power, meaning that the Soviets are very obviously the bad guys.
First off its a fantastic mystery that really works if you don't read the back of the book. There are some great pay-offs early on that are worth not knowing anything about the story, just to experience fresh. There is also a palpable sense that the world is on the edge of a nuclear holocaust which is exploited very well but the book really comes into its own in the first third when revealing the secrets of the Stone/Potato. The second third starts to let you into the secrets of the grater story and this is also where the flaws in the books structure come to the fore.
Firstly there are so many characters, seemingly one for every plot purpose. Meaning that characters turn up, do something and then vanish again only to be mentioned fleetingly later on. Also the political stereotypes of the Americans (who are all super liberal) as opposed to the ignorant peasant like Soviet brutes (who are all narrow minded outdoorsy types) is so obvious as to sometimes make it slightly humorous. Never more so when one of the Russians very obviously starts to think for himself and begins having trouble with his much more 'loyal' fellow Soviets.
There are some characters you want to know more about, namely Judith Hoffman and Pavel Mirsky, as they seems to be going places and then suddenly nothing happens with them. Pity.
That said the story goes along at a fairly brisk pace and doesn't seem to slow down to much despite all this. Greg Bear is adept at building a truly MASSIVE playground to allow his characters run around in and its a pity that Eon is not published along with Eternity; as its very obvious that this is the first part of the story he wanted to tell.
Its worth a look but do Bear in mind it was written right before the Mikhail Gorbachev came to power, meaning that the Soviets are very obviously the bad guys.
18 of 20 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
Although 'Blood Music' received more attention from the SF community , this is probably the book in which Bear set the standard for his subsequent work.
It's Hard SF/Big Science at its hardest, and in one sense can be seen as a 'Rendezvous with Rama' for the Nineteen Eighties.
Bear should also be applauded for his portrayal of female characters as in this and subsequent novels he places strong female characters centre-stage, in this case, Patricia Luis Vasquez, a young gifted physics student who is drafted in to solve the mysteries of the Stone and becomes important to the plans of all the factions involved.
The plot involves some complex physics and the concept of parallel universes.
It is always interesting to look at authors' views of the future once that future is past and gone. Written in 1985, Bear's future world has become a kind of 'alternate future' since perhaps no-one could have predicted that the abrupt fall of the USSR and the smashing down of the Berlin wall. Here, the USSR is still a superpower, and the Cold War very much alive.
Bear cleverly sets up the East/West ideological divides while Nuclear War destroys the Earth in the background, before bringing in the people of Earth's future. They live in Axis City, a vast mobile habitat which roams 'The Way' (the corridor which stretches along the infinity of parallel Universes) and which is itself divided along ideological lines between radical Geshels and orthodox Naderites.
It's a compelling and scientifically convincing novel, and one of Bear's best.
It's Hard SF/Big Science at its hardest, and in one sense can be seen as a 'Rendezvous with Rama' for the Nineteen Eighties.
Bear should also be applauded for his portrayal of female characters as in this and subsequent novels he places strong female characters centre-stage, in this case, Patricia Luis Vasquez, a young gifted physics student who is drafted in to solve the mysteries of the Stone and becomes important to the plans of all the factions involved.
The plot involves some complex physics and the concept of parallel universes.
It is always interesting to look at authors' views of the future once that future is past and gone. Written in 1985, Bear's future world has become a kind of 'alternate future' since perhaps no-one could have predicted that the abrupt fall of the USSR and the smashing down of the Berlin wall. Here, the USSR is still a superpower, and the Cold War very much alive.
Bear cleverly sets up the East/West ideological divides while Nuclear War destroys the Earth in the background, before bringing in the people of Earth's future. They live in Axis City, a vast mobile habitat which roams 'The Way' (the corridor which stretches along the infinity of parallel Universes) and which is itself divided along ideological lines between radical Geshels and orthodox Naderites.
It's a compelling and scientifically convincing novel, and one of Bear's best.
Would you like to see more reviews about this item?
Were these reviews helpful?
Let us know
Most Recent Customer Reviews
Excellent sci-fi
Really gets you thinking but is mostly pure escapism. Probably something for the more hard-core sci-fan I would suspect. Read more
Published 3 months ago by JH
EON: Simply brillant
This story is simply brilliant, one of his best works. This story starts simply enough and you'll find yourself engrossed very quickly. Read more
Published 4 months ago by Halo Reader
A work of great vision and scale
I first read this book 10 years ago and was blown away by the vision and imagination demonstrated by Greg Bear. It is both fantastic yet believeable. Read more
Published 7 months ago by Mark
Epic in scope but hard to understand and difficult to visualize
This hard science fiction novel tells the story of a large asteroid that suddenly appears in orbit around the earth, leading scientists to go and study it. Read more
Published 18 months ago by Irikefe Okonedo
Dare I say derivative?
Imagine a tunnel through time like the one in Isaac Asimov's "The End of Eternity". Then, give it a sort of "gravity drive" that allows you to make it into a something between a... Read more
Published 21 months ago by Behan
Eon lasted an aeon
This is not only the worst sci-fi 'novel' I have ever read but also the worst novel ! It IS PURE UNADULTERAED American tripe of the highest order. Read more
Published on 3 Nov 2009 by Ivor Winters
Too slow.
I have read Bears work before but this one takes the biscuit, he may be one of the great uncles of sf, but in this the characters at the begining lack personality, and this makes... Read more
Published on 8 Oct 2009 by Tommy Lawlor
Definitely a masterpiece
This is another of Gollancz's classic reissues and whilst it perhaps doesn't get the attention of a lot of his other work its definitely one that has set the standards for others... Read more
Published on 24 May 2009 by Gareth Wilson - Falcata Times Blog
An incredibly imaginative novel
I wasn't exactly sure what to expect from Eon when i began reading it, so i was pleasantly suprised to find myself really enjoying it after i got into it. Read more
Published on 3 May 2009 by N. Durand
Enjoyable, but dated
When the Stone arrives in a elongated orbit around Earth the first thought is of alien visitors. However, when NATO is the group to arrive and enter the asteroid they discover... Read more
Published on 22 April 2009 by Mark Chitty
Customer Discussions
|
This product's forum
Active discussions in related forums
Search Customer Discussions
|
Related forums
|
Listmania!
Look for similar items by category
Look for similar items by subject
Feedback
- Would you like to update product info or give feedback on images?
- I am the Author, and I want to comment on my book.
- I am the Publisher, and I want to comment on this book.
|
