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Darwin's Radio (Hardcover)

by Greg Bear (Author) "The flat afternoon sky spread over the black and gray mountains like a stage backdrop, the color of a dog's pale crazy eye ..." (more)
3.9 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (31 customer reviews)

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Product details

  • Hardcover: 439 pages
  • Publisher: HarperCollins Publishers Ltd; First Edition (Second Impression) edition (4 May 1999)
  • Language English
  • ISBN-10: 0002257319
  • ISBN-13: 978-0002257312
  • Average Customer Review: 3.9 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (31 customer reviews)
  • Amazon.co.uk Sales Rank: 459,767 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

    Popular in this category:

    #25 in  Books > Science Fiction & Fantasy > Authors, A-Z > B > Bear, Greg

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Product Description

Amazon.co.uk Review

All the best thrillers contain the solution to a mystery, and the mystery in this intellectually sparkling scientific thriller is more crucial and more strange than most. Why are people turning on their neighbours and their new children? And what is causing an epidemic of still-births? A disgraced palaeontologist and a genetic engineer both come across evidence of cover-ups, and the government is clearly not up to any good. But no-one knows what is really going on, and the government is covering up because that is what, in thrillers as in life, governments do. And what has any of this to do with the find of a Neanderthal family whose mummified faces show signs of a strange peeling? Greg Bear has spent much of his recent career evoking awe in the deep reaches of space, but he made his name with Blood Music, a novel of nanotechnology that crackled with intelligence. His new book is a workout for the mind and a stunning read; human malignancy has its role in his thriller plot, but its real villain, as well as its last best hope, is the endless ingenious cruelty of the natural world and evolution. --Roz Kaveney


Synopsis

The human race is about to give birth to a new species ...World War III will be the war against our extinction. Christopher Dicken, 'virus hunter' of the Epidemic Intelligence Service, joins an emergency Taskforce on the order of the President. Around the world, what were thought to be ancient junk genes in human DNA have been stimulated to assemble encoded proteins and RNA into an infectious virus which attacks only women -- and it kills unborn children. It's called SHEVA, an apt name for a killer. Dicken needs Kaye Lang on his team. She's the scientist who predicted the emergence of SHEVA. She knows more about SHEVA than anyone...Except for one other scientist, a paleontologist, who has intuited even more. But, Mitch Rafelson has no credibility whatsoever. The sin of overwhelming curiosity has left him an unemployed outcast -- and revealed to him something nobody else knows, not even Kaye Lang. Our place on the ladder of evolution is not where we thought. All other wars in history have been in some way between the forces of good and evil. Not this war. Like a signal on Darwin's radio SHEVA is broadcasting an extraordinary truth about the origin of species.

SHEVA confirms Darwin's view of 'blundering, low and horribly cruel works of nature'. There are those who will want to control human destiny, and others who will fight them. The Descent of Man is at hand. At once a gripping thriller on the grandest scale and a tender love story, this is a uniquely controversial and thought-provoking page-turner.

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Customer Reviews

31 Reviews
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Average Customer Review
3.9 out of 5 stars (31 customer reviews)
 
 
 
 
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7 of 7 people found the following review helpful:
3.0 out of 5 stars Entertaining and solid, but he missed the best story, 4 April 2004
By Dr. Rod S. Taylor "rstaylor" (Ely, UK) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   
This review is from: Darwin's Radio (Mass Market Paperback)
Darwin's Radio is my first Greg Bear novel, after my hearing many good things about him over the years - and I wasn't disappointed with it. It's a well-written novel, crammed with scientific ideas, questionable politics and real people - more than enough to hold the attention of any sci-fi reader. Sadly, I never really felt any great emotional connection to the main characters until the very end of the book, when the answer to the big question of the book - is what's happening a disease or the next step of human evolution - was coming clear. I wish Darwin's Radio had continued for another few hundred pages, to see where Bear's speculations would have eventually led us. Maybe I can wait for a sequel.....
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10 of 11 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars Speculative science, not science fiction., 4 Jan 2003
By Mary Whipple (New England) - See all my reviews
(TOP 10 REVIEWER)   
This review is from: Darwin's Radio (Paperback)
Darwin's Radio is a real eye-opener about molecular biology, evolution, and the condition of the human race, not just the human race of the present or the early humans who were the immediate descendants of the hominids, but the human race as it may soon become in the future. Bear himself, after researching the book, "came away with an unshakable sense that evolutionary biology is about to undergo a major upheaval--not in the next few decades, but in the next few years"!

In a powerful and exciting narrative, Bear explores just this sort of evolutionary upheaval, as SHEVA, a retrovirus, begins to attack women, causing them to miscarry at three months, while, at the same time, causing them to begin spontaneously a new, ostensibly fatherless, pregnancy within a month. Kaye Lang, a highly respected molecular biologist, and Mitch Rafelson, a disgraced anthropologist, are involved in research to contain SHEVA, studying DNA and its coding, various immune responses to bacteria and viruses, genetic mutations, and the possibility that SHEVA is not a new phenomenon at all. As the virus starts to spread and thousands of women find themselves infected, public safety is endangered, riots occur, shootings result in deaths, and the government starts to panic, requiring SHEVA-infected women to register their pregnancies, and their second stage babies, if delivered alive, to be turned over to the government.

Bear does a masterful job of depicting both the personal traumas and the petty jealousies which surface when people in power recognize that a genuine emergency can also provide opportunities for personal advancement. Conflicts on both the personal and professional level are astutely presented and heighten the tension and immediacy of the SHEVA crisis. Remarkably, Bear never reduces issues or individual behavior to the level of black and white, carefully preserving the grays which are involved in all ethical and moral inquiry. The science here is dense and challenging to someone (like me) who is not a scientist, but the human story and its implications for the future are so clearly presented and intriguing, that I became thoroughly engrossed in the possibilities of new directions in evolution. Mary Whipple

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7 of 8 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars Science Fiction with actual science, 2 April 2006
This review is from: Darwin's Radio (Paperback)
I first read this book when a friend leant it to me after telling me that there was too much science for her liking and that I'd probably enjoy it. She was right.

After the inital shock of just how much science there was in the book I settled into it surprisingly quickly. The characters were well developed, the story fast paced enough to keep me interested. And the chapters were short enough to keep me happy - I knew that I had time to read them practically anywhere.

All in all this was a great book and the sequel was just as good. I'd recommed this to anyone who enjoys science fiction - but be warned, sometimes this book is more science than fiction.

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Most Recent Customer Reviews

2.0 out of 5 stars Another disappointing SF award winner
As anyone who's read Eon will know, Greg Bear does Sense of Wonder almost by default. But he also does it at the expense of structure, characterisation and plausibility. Read more
Published 1 month ago by nutella the hun

4.0 out of 5 stars Very unusual book
A great tale

unfortunately the book ends just where the real questions are asked -so I have to get the second volume now.
Published 13 months ago by CjW

5.0 out of 5 stars Darwin's radio
A great book about our next evolutionary step and how the public and government react to it. There is a lot of science in the book, but not prohibitively so, and it is... Read more
Published on 23 Jul 2006 by Spider Monkey

3.0 out of 5 stars good stuff, but a cop out i think
a superb premise. well thought out. far too much science in it, despite doing some molecular biology at university a decade ago, i found the science tricky to follow in... Read more
Published on 5 Jan 2006

3.0 out of 5 stars OK
this book is ok...had no idea what all the science words meant, but there's a glossary at the back which at least gives you a vague idea of what all of them are talking about... Read more
Published on 4 Sep 2004

5.0 out of 5 stars A superb book (not one for elf-lovers)
There is too little good science fiction been written these days - the shelves are full of sub-standard Tolkein knock-offs with sword-wielding wizards on the cover. Read more
Published on 24 Mar 2004 by M. J. Farncombe

5.0 out of 5 stars Forget the one star review by the intellectually challenged.
This is a good read, full of accurate scientific detail. Not for the Buck Rogers / Space Ranger fans. Read more
Published on 24 Dec 2003

4.0 out of 5 stars Believable and terrifying
Darwin’s Radio is a pleasure for someone who loves hard science fiction, as I do. Here’s the premise: SHEVA, a retrovirus long-buried in our genes, suddenly awakens... Read more
Published on 15 Dec 2003 by D. Ronco

4.0 out of 5 stars Evolution by jerks?
For those unfamiliar with evolutionary theories, there are two contesting ideas about the process. One is Charles Darwin's thesis of gradualism - successive generations change... Read more
Published on 15 Oct 2003 by Stephen A. Haines

4.0 out of 5 stars Gripping opening, heavy middle, good conclusion
I did find the first chapters completely engrossing, but all that biology slowed me down considerably. The ending was good enough though. Read more
Published on 25 April 2003 by Neal C. Reynolds

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