- Paperback: 704 pages
- Publisher: Gollancz; paperback / softback edition (16 Jun 2005)
- Language English
- ISBN-10: 0575072628
- ISBN-13: 978-0575072626
- Product Dimensions: 23 x 15 x 5 cm
- Average Customer Review: 3.3 out of 5 stars See all reviews (29 customer reviews)
- Amazon Bestsellers Rank: 665,934 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
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Review
"The most authentically Homeric portrayal of the Gods that I have read in a modern work of fiction. The violence and terror are convincingly epic." (Tom Holland SUNDAY TELEGRAPH )
"...a mind-blasting look at the nature of humanity, and what it truly means to be a hero. Complex and multi-stranded, this free-wheeling and beautifully bonkers epic [is] more than worth the effort. " (Saxon Bullock SFX )
"A deeply satisfying and dark twist on the old comics idea of fictional heroes existing in parallel universes. The action is non-stop and it has an ending that's satisfying. Heavy but rewarding stuff." (Anthony Brown STARBURST )
"This is powerful stuff, rich in both high-tech sense of wonder and literary allusions, but Simmons is in complete control of his material as half a dozen baroque plot lines smoothly converge on a rousing and highly satisfying conclusion." (PUBLISHER'S WEEKLY )
" Like so many epics and space operas, Olympos measures individual lives against a cosmic scale... combines the historical and literary Trojan war with biotechnology, nano-engineering, quantum physics, geology, astronomy, sex, politics, and religion." (The Guardian )
"...a mind-blasting look at the nature of humanity, and what it truly means to be a hero. Complex and multi-stranded, this free-wheeling and beautifully bonkers epic [is] more than worth the effort. " (Saxon Bullock SFX )
"A deeply satisfying and dark twist on the old comics idea of fictional heroes existing in parallel universes. The action is non-stop and it has an ending that's satisfying. Heavy but rewarding stuff." (Anthony Brown STARBURST )
"This is powerful stuff, rich in both high-tech sense of wonder and literary allusions, but Simmons is in complete control of his material as half a dozen baroque plot lines smoothly converge on a rousing and highly satisfying conclusion." (PUBLISHER'S WEEKLY )
" Like so many epics and space operas, Olympos measures individual lives against a cosmic scale... combines the historical and literary Trojan war with biotechnology, nano-engineering, quantum physics, geology, astronomy, sex, politics, and religion." (The Guardian )
Saxon Bullock, SFX
"...a mind-blasting look at the nature of humanity, and what it truly means to be a hero. Complex and multi-stranded, this free-wheeling and beautifully bonkers epic [is] more than worth the effort. "
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews
15 of 15 people found the following review helpful:
3.0 out of 5 stars
what happened??,
By
This review is from: Olympos (Hardcover)
I own most books by Dan simmons and loved all of them - except this one.the first part, Ilium conveys a wonderful adaptation to sci fi of troy with its heroes and gods. in Olympos it seems the narrative escapes the author, with too many threads running amok, leaving too little time for each individual thread.. too many things are left unexplained or just glossed over, leaving a jumble that , to me, just got boring. Also, while in a novel full of gods you expect some deus-ex he overdoes it. gods, overgods, and "evenmorepowerfulgodsyouneverseebutsolvetheplotline" ruin the story, as all the plotting and the plans of ALL characters in the book are ultimately made irrelevant. Dont get me wrong, its not a bad book, but not up to the standards one has come to expect from Dan Simmons.
7 of 7 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Very good, yet strangely dissapointing,
By
This review is from: Olympos (Gollancz S.F.) (Paperback)
Having read the Hyperion cantos and being hugely impressed by Illium i couldnt wait to read this Illium sequel. When the book finally arrived (after a 1 month pre-order) i pretty much read it in one go.One can only admire the scope of the story told through Illium and Olympos. However, Olympos as a book is simply not as good as Illium. Some storylines in Olympos either do not add (enough) to the story as a whole, or simply are a bit of a drag to read through, to the point where i even caught myself flipping through a few pages here and there. Another issue i have with Olympos is the last 50-70 pages. I couldnt get around the fact that the ending felt a bit rushed and cramped. Where Illium's ending was obviously a setup for a sequel the ending we're presented with in Olympos feels too much like Simmons is done with the world of Illium. He fails to answer some big questions (properly) or discuss some important characters more extensively, but he doesnt leave enough open ends to justify a sequel. Also, the references to judaism and islam felt a bit forced, as if it reflected personal views of the author. Olympos is not to Illium what the Fall of Hyperion was to Hyperion, but do not let that keep you from reading this excellent book. Apart from anything else, it is an great read, hugely engaging, and i would recommend this book to anyone with even a vague interest in SF. When i flipped the final page, i felt dissapointed. A bit because of the aforementioned problems, but mostly because i reached the end of it. Olympos, together with Illium, is one of the best SF stories ever printed on paper, or at least the best i read so far. These books deserve a place next to, if not above the Hyperion books. So in the end i cannot get rid of the "it could've been better" feeling, as Olympos is not the perfect sequal to Illium. But it's close, very close...
29 of 31 people found the following review helpful:
2.0 out of 5 stars
So what was all that about?,
By
This review is from: Olympos (Gollancz S.F.) (Paperback)
By the time I'd finished reading Ilium (the first book of this pair) I was enthused with anticipation. How on earth, I wondered, can the author tie up all the plot threads, characters and storylines into a satisfying, coherent and meaningful conclusion. I couldn't wait to find out.If you're wondering the same thing, I can answer you: he isn't going to. Ilium was a fast moving, exciting Sci-fi blockbuster with a lot of good ideas. With Olympos, Simmons piles on even more plot threads and ideas until the whole thing just collapses into incoherence. With the Greek Gods, teleportation, nanotechnology, magic, alternate universes, Shakespeare, Proust, artificial intelligences, quantum effects of consciousness, shaceships, islamic fundamentalists, black-hole bombs, little green men, Mars and more, the author throws in everything you can think of - by the end I was expecting Hitler to wander into the narrative, possibly carrying the kitchen sink because they were the only things which hadn't thrown into the mix. Long flagged plot threads are wrapped up in a couple of lines, the villain of the book just ups and leaves about a hundred pages from the end with no satisfying resolution, major characters appear and then disappear with no indication of where they have gone, and other characters have resolutions which - to put it politely - make no sense whatsoever. Terry Pratchett can get away with using the excuse of "it's all Quantum, innit?" when excusing plot hoes in his books because he writes comedy. An author of Simmons' calibre cannot get away with it and having read Olympos from start to finish my over-riding feeling is that not only did I not understand how the book ends, I don't think the author does either. What is worse, is that there isn't much evidence of the author caring. The last hundred pages feel rushed, as if the author is as sick as you are of the whole thing and just wants to get it finished so he could go and watch Lost instead. Which is what I advise you do. It's more satisfying and it makes more sense.
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