Xeelee: An Omnibus: Raft, Timelike Infinity, Flux, Ring
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
Product Description
Stephen Baxter's epic sequence of Xeelee novels was introduced to a new generation of readers with his highly successful quartet, Destiny's Children, published by Gollancz between 2003 and 2006. But the sequence of novels began with RAFT in 1991. From there it built into perhaps the most ambitious fictitious universe ever created. Beginning with the rise and fall of sub-quantum civilisations in the first nano-seconds after the Big Bang and ending with the heat death of the universe billions of years from now the series charts the story of mankinds epic war against the ancient and unknowable alien race the Xeelee. Along the way it examines questions of physics, the nature of reality, the evolution of mankind and its possible future. It looks not just at the morality of war but at the morality of survival and our place in the universe. This is a landmark in SF.
About the Author
Stephen Baxter is the pre-eminent SF writer of his generation. Published around the world he has also won major awards in the UK, US, Germany, and Japan. Born in 1957 he has degrees from Cambridge and Southampton. He lives in Northumberland with his wife.
Inside This Book
(Learn More)
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
33 of 35 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
This omnibus of some of Stephen Baxter's earlier novels: Raft, Timelike Infinity, Flux and Ring is great value. If you are a fan of hard SF and/or Stephen Baxter, it's well worth it.
All four are standalone novels which are loosely bound as the Xeelee sequence.
The first novel, Raft, is also Baxter's debut. As such, it is a little rough in some areas. Mainly (and in fairness, he won't be the first SF writer to suffer from this) in that the characterisation is a little weak. In this, I think it's mainly that the hero looks too perfect next to the almost uniformly gormless people he encounters (not quite, but you get my drift). The story itself is pacy and fun. The ideas it has are clever and believable (Baxter is a scientist). The people in the story are trapped in a universe where gravitational force is much higher than it is here. This is handled in an interesting way. Great stuff.
Timelike Infinity follows on, but is, as I said, standalone. This one is concerned with cause and effect and considers the future of the human race and its subjugation and how these things happening. Potentially head mangling, but handled well. Characterisation slightly better in this!
Flux is my favourite for the ideas in it. It features a group of artificially engineered nano-scale humans that live below the surface of a neutron star. They are part of the fight the humans are engaged with against the mysterious Xeelee. This is in the background, though, given the smaller scale it's not necessary to know the rest of the story. This is, ironically, the one I found most convincing in its characterisation, given that the people aren't old-style humans! The story starts off looking like it's about saving the main character's family, but moves on to encompass their world and beyond. Great stuff.
Ring is the final book in this sequence. It seeks to wrap things up. It's even more ambitious than the other 3, great stuff. There are two plots, running parallel in this novel - following an AI left in the sun to examine it, and that of a "generation ship" with a number of different factions. Through these the novel seeks to wrap up the story of the Xeelee - the other novels have hinted at there being a wider conflict between the Xeelee and humans; in this we find what it is that the Xeelee have been up to all the time and learn some unfortunate truths (for the humans!) about what they have been involved with and what it means for the human race (and indeed, all life). There are more scientific musings on quantum physics and the nature of observable reality.
Apart from the sometimes weak characterisation, the one other criticism of this group of novels is that there is (much in the tradition of hard SF) a lot of info-dumping. I didn't mind, but watch out if you find this objectionable.
As I say, it's good value, and in spite of the criticisms (weak characters and info-dumping) it's worth its 5 stars. The stories are interesting and rollicking good fun.
Recommended!
Incidentally, if you like these novels, Vacuum Diagrams is an anthology of short stories set in the same universe.
All four are standalone novels which are loosely bound as the Xeelee sequence.
The first novel, Raft, is also Baxter's debut. As such, it is a little rough in some areas. Mainly (and in fairness, he won't be the first SF writer to suffer from this) in that the characterisation is a little weak. In this, I think it's mainly that the hero looks too perfect next to the almost uniformly gormless people he encounters (not quite, but you get my drift). The story itself is pacy and fun. The ideas it has are clever and believable (Baxter is a scientist). The people in the story are trapped in a universe where gravitational force is much higher than it is here. This is handled in an interesting way. Great stuff.
Timelike Infinity follows on, but is, as I said, standalone. This one is concerned with cause and effect and considers the future of the human race and its subjugation and how these things happening. Potentially head mangling, but handled well. Characterisation slightly better in this!
Flux is my favourite for the ideas in it. It features a group of artificially engineered nano-scale humans that live below the surface of a neutron star. They are part of the fight the humans are engaged with against the mysterious Xeelee. This is in the background, though, given the smaller scale it's not necessary to know the rest of the story. This is, ironically, the one I found most convincing in its characterisation, given that the people aren't old-style humans! The story starts off looking like it's about saving the main character's family, but moves on to encompass their world and beyond. Great stuff.
Ring is the final book in this sequence. It seeks to wrap things up. It's even more ambitious than the other 3, great stuff. There are two plots, running parallel in this novel - following an AI left in the sun to examine it, and that of a "generation ship" with a number of different factions. Through these the novel seeks to wrap up the story of the Xeelee - the other novels have hinted at there being a wider conflict between the Xeelee and humans; in this we find what it is that the Xeelee have been up to all the time and learn some unfortunate truths (for the humans!) about what they have been involved with and what it means for the human race (and indeed, all life). There are more scientific musings on quantum physics and the nature of observable reality.
Apart from the sometimes weak characterisation, the one other criticism of this group of novels is that there is (much in the tradition of hard SF) a lot of info-dumping. I didn't mind, but watch out if you find this objectionable.
As I say, it's good value, and in spite of the criticisms (weak characters and info-dumping) it's worth its 5 stars. The stories are interesting and rollicking good fun.
Recommended!
Incidentally, if you like these novels, Vacuum Diagrams is an anthology of short stories set in the same universe.
3 of 3 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
I've always loved Stephen Baxter, who indeed reminds me a lot of the great Arthur C. Clarke, only with more energy than that great man had towards the end of his phenomenal career. I stumbled upon FLUX years ago when it first came out and loved the relentless merge of hard science and brilliant speculation with ferociously clear imagination. Only not until more recently did I note how it fits into the grand sequence of Baxter's extraordinary future histories. I'd also obtained VACUUM DIAGRAMS and not read it all--that had given me a foretaste of this magnificent volume... and a recent re-look at VACUUM DIAGRAMS led to further research on today's Internet.
So: I decided to methodically explore. RAFT reminded me initially of Niven's THE INTEGRAL TREES in that it takes place in atmospheric conditions without what we consider a planetary body... however, much as I adore the Smoke Ring and all, this is another sort of bid. At any rate, Baxter's superb story-telling, clarity, and remorseless sense of plot, irony, dare I say stardust destiny (?) is delightful.
Among the greatest appeals of this entire arc of stories and books is that Baxter takes us into his plausible version of our Universe + perhaps a fe others, that teems with Life. Just as the Earth itself teems, from high atmosphere to deep in the rocky crust, pol-to-pole, the baxter cosmos of the Xeelee and humans from "Big Bang" to Eternity brims with living things of endless variety.
Bravo and kudos to Mr. Baxter!
So: I decided to methodically explore. RAFT reminded me initially of Niven's THE INTEGRAL TREES in that it takes place in atmospheric conditions without what we consider a planetary body... however, much as I adore the Smoke Ring and all, this is another sort of bid. At any rate, Baxter's superb story-telling, clarity, and remorseless sense of plot, irony, dare I say stardust destiny (?) is delightful.
Among the greatest appeals of this entire arc of stories and books is that Baxter takes us into his plausible version of our Universe + perhaps a fe others, that teems with Life. Just as the Earth itself teems, from high atmosphere to deep in the rocky crust, pol-to-pole, the baxter cosmos of the Xeelee and humans from "Big Bang" to Eternity brims with living things of endless variety.
Bravo and kudos to Mr. Baxter!
Format:Kindle Edition
A set of stories covering millions of years, Baxter's ingenuity and use of hard science stretched to its limits of possibility have resulted in a magnificent set of works.
This book was my first purchase from Amazon and almost certainly my last thanks to their continued refusal to release their kindle app for my Blackberry Playbook. Kobo are getting my money now. Who's losing out there Amazon?
This book was my first purchase from Amazon and almost certainly my last thanks to their continued refusal to release their kindle app for my Blackberry Playbook. Kobo are getting my money now. Who's losing out there Amazon?
Would you like to see more reviews about this item?
Were these reviews helpful?
Let us know
Most Recent Customer Reviews
Something for a rainy day
This book is actually a series of novels set in a coherent future.
It is, unfortunately, inhabited by a series of very similar and rather boring heroes and... Read more
It is, unfortunately, inhabited by a series of very similar and rather boring heroes and... Read more
Published 7 months ago by W. Black
Awesome old school sci-fi
Reminds me of why I started reading sci-fi long long ago. Enjoyable though difficult and depressing at times. Also, switches topics and places a lot without much continuity.
Published 7 months ago by Dust
Good, but gets repetative
I don't think there's a need for me to describe the plots of Stephen Baxters books included in this Omnibus, suffice it to say that he is a superbly immaginative Sci-fi writer with... Read more
Published 8 months ago by Peter
Good ideas, deep concept, not an easy read
This has some good ideas, far from hum-drum SF, starting with the life time of the universe as the base for the story arc, the individual story's are on the human scale, but only... Read more
Published 9 months ago by A. Smith
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.
|
