- Paperback: 350 pages
- Publisher: Voyager; New Ed edition (15 Mar 1999)
- Language English
- ISBN-10: 0006482562
- ISBN-13: 978-0006482567
- Product Dimensions: 17.2 x 11 x 2.8 cm
- Average Customer Review: 2.8 out of 5 stars See all reviews (4 customer reviews)
- Amazon Bestsellers Rank: 981,854 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
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More About the Author
Product Description
Amazon.co.uk Review
Though now best known for his massive 1990s Mars trilogy, Kim Stanley Robinson has been publishing fine, intelligent SF novels since 1984. The Memory of Whiteness (1985) describes a grand musical tour of the 33rd-century solar system, beginning on Pluto at the bleak outer edge, visiting various moons, asteroids and planets, and climaxing in the blinding light and heat of a futuristic power station orbiting close to the Sun's solar-flare zone. All these places are habitable thanks to technologies spawned by the Unified Field Theory of physicist Holywelkin, whose other gift to posterity was his mysterious Orchestra--a fantastic amalgam of over 150 instruments controllable by a single player. Past Orchestra Masters simply played classical music, but the new master is a visionary who thinks he sees Holywelkin's original purpose: to explore his revolutionary Ten Forms of Change equations through music, and reach a devastating insight about the universe. The interplay of music and mathematics (as in Douglas Hofstadter's Godel, Escher, Bach) is persuasive and resonant. Meanwhile, plots, deceptions, conspirators, cultists, and sabotage attempts dog the Grand Tour as it spirals inward through the system.... Gripping thriller elements alternate with elegant philosophical speculation and slightly cutesy asides to the "dear Reader". Strange and fascinating. --David Langford
Review
‘An elegance that manages to contain a what-happens-next vigour… It makes astonishing connections’
THE TIMES
‘A masterpiece’
ANALOGUE
‘A symphony of ideas’
GREG BEAR
‘Rich and compelling’
INTERZONE
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Customer Reviews
Most Helpful Customer Reviews
2 of 2 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
I bought this book having been a fan of KSR since reading the Mars novels and working my way throu his previus books as and when I come across them.
I was rather off put by the 1st couple of chapters that I did feel required a musical knowledge to fully understand or enjoy. After this it settles down into a well written sci fi novel with some intresting history bits (not enough) some political / socio thriller elemements and other strange and weird bits with more musical stuff (but nothing that I found as heavy going as the 1st chapter or 2).
If you are a fan of Kims work then I would recomened getting a copy of this as it is a worthwhile read, if you aren't a fan then I would recomened trying something like Escape to Katmandu as a good starting point in his works.
Format:Paperback
To say I was dissapointed after reading this is not even close. I had read good reviews about other KSR books and thought I would give this a go.
I found his use of tenses, and constant flitting between them, hard to follow, infact they flitted so much after 30 minutes I had a headache and could not remember who was where and doing what. His characters to me seemed as though they had no flesh to them, the main character seemed as distant to me as him home planet - Pluto (sorry mini planet now) maybe that was the intention but it took away so much for me.
Although I really really liked the concept behind the book I did not enjoy the execution of that concept. Maybe because I only have a basic grasp of physics and music parts of the plot were lost on me, but I fear that is not really the case. My overwhelming feeling on the last page was relief that I had finally finished it and it had not defeated me.
The beauty of books is that someones despair will be someone elses love so I hope you get as much out of this book as I did not. I also hope his writing has improved and matured over time because I got his latest book as a present.
I found his use of tenses, and constant flitting between them, hard to follow, infact they flitted so much after 30 minutes I had a headache and could not remember who was where and doing what. His characters to me seemed as though they had no flesh to them, the main character seemed as distant to me as him home planet - Pluto (sorry mini planet now) maybe that was the intention but it took away so much for me.
Although I really really liked the concept behind the book I did not enjoy the execution of that concept. Maybe because I only have a basic grasp of physics and music parts of the plot were lost on me, but I fear that is not really the case. My overwhelming feeling on the last page was relief that I had finally finished it and it had not defeated me.
The beauty of books is that someones despair will be someone elses love so I hope you get as much out of this book as I did not. I also hope his writing has improved and matured over time because I got his latest book as a present.
2 of 3 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
A wonderfull book. I have been re-reading it on a yearly basis since it first came out (I'm on my third copy). A mixture of philosophy and quantum physics, a tour guide of the solar system, a murder mystery and music, music, music. Excellent characterisation. An unlikely hero, but very likeable.
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