This item is not eligible for Amazon Prime, but millions of other items are. Join Amazon Prime today. Already a member? Sign in.

12 used & new from £3.92
See All Buying Options

Have one to sell? Sell yours here
 
   
Tell a Friend
River of Gods
 
 
River of Gods (Paperback)
by Ian McDonald (Author)
4.3 out of 5 stars 13 customer reviews (13 customer reviews)

Availability: Available from these sellers.

12 used & new available from £3.92
Other Editions: RRP: Our Price: Other Offers:
Hardcover 6 used & new from £12.61
Paperback (New Ed) £8.99 £6.99 33 used & new from £1.23
 
   

Customers Who Bought This Item Also Bought

The Dreaming Void (Void Trilogy 1)

The Dreaming Void (Void Trilogy 1) by Peter F. Hamilton

3.9 out of 5 stars (29) 
Hilldiggers

Hilldiggers by Neal Asher

4.1 out of 5 stars (9)  £5.59
Polity Agent

Polity Agent by Neal Asher

4.1 out of 5 stars (10)  £5.99
Spook Country

Spook Country by William Gibson

3.6 out of 5 stars (18)  £11.99
The Line War (Agent Cormac 5)

The Line War (Agent Cormac 5) by Neal Asher

5.0 out of 5 stars (4)  £10.79
Explore similar items : Books (19)

Product details

Product Description
Christopher Priest, Guardian
'A staggering achievement, brilliantly imagined and endlessly surprising...a brave, brilliant and wonderful novel'

Nick Gevers, Locus
'Hugely adventurous and entertaining, sumptuously inventive and full of heart...it is likely to rank as Ian McDonald's finest creative achievement'

See all Product Description

Inside This Book (Learn More)
Browse Sample Pages
Front Cover | Copyright | Table of Contents | Excerpt | Back Cover
Search inside this book:

Customers Who Viewed This Item Also Viewed

The Broken Land

The Broken Land by Ian McDonald

5.0 out of 5 stars (1)  £9.47
Ares Express (Earthlight)

Ares Express (Earthlight) by Ian McDonald

3.4 out of 5 stars (5)  £5.99
Chaga

Chaga by Ian Mcdonald

4.0 out of 5 stars (3) 
Cyberabad Days

Cyberabad Days by Ian Mcdonald

£9.09
The Light Ages

The Light Ages by Ian R. MacLeod

4.3 out of 5 stars (7)  £5.49
Explore similar items : Books (22)

 
Customer Reviews
13 Reviews
5 star: 61%  (8)
4 star: 23%  (3)
3 star: 7%  (1)
2 star:    (0)
1 star: 7%  (1)
 
 
 
 
 
Average Customer Review
 
 
 
Share your thoughts with other customers:
Write an online review
Most Helpful Customer Reviews

 
8 of 8 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars woo hoo, woo hoo hoo, 20 Aug 2004
Three years after the so-so Ares Express, but it's been worth the wait. This is a big steam-roller of a book --you don't so much read it as experience it; it's a shock to the system in almost every way. There's so much going on it it's almost impossible to adequately describe --Mysterious Artefacts in space, artificial intelligences, a completely computer generated soap opera (it's only a question of time really)weater wars, political intrigue, third-sex 'nutes', genetically engineered 'Brahmins': this is wide-screen SF. More than that, it has the feel of John Brunner's classics: Stand on Zanzibar, The Sheep Look Up, --it's a lived in future, not just a wam-bam story. And it's India! This is a world as alien as any you'll read in a wide-angle space-opera...
Great characters, who generate the story, rather than get pushed around by it, and a cosmic-scale denoument that is perfectly set up, but I for one didn't see coming.
Not the easiest book I ever read, but you come out of it with your head reeling and our world seems dull and pale by comparison.
Oh, and there's cricket too!
Comment Comment | Permalink | Was this review helpful to you? YesNo (Report this)



 
2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars River of Gods, 19 Jul 2005
This review is from: River of Gods (Paperback)
River of Gods marks a return to form for Ian McDonald, after the dissapointing Ares Express. It's set in a near-future India, splintered into smaller states. The book takes awhile to get going as there are several protagonists and we are introduced to each in turn, as the plot starts up. This takes time, but is rewarding as we see a multi-faceted view of the society that Indida has become in the near future, and the changes to the human condition that have come with biotechnology and climate change.

The plot is layered and keeps us guessing to the very end. I can't discuss it much here whithout giving too much away, but it's as satisfying and twisty-turny with the same mythic ties as the original Desolation Road, only the mythos here is Indian, not African, and a great deal more interesting. There are occasional passages where he holds up a latter-day mirror to the current-day West, but it's done stubly and doesn't interfere with a read as tightly plotted as a thriller.

In short, a very rewarding read.

Comment Comment | Permalink | Was this review helpful to you? YesNo (Report this)



 
2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars Excellent and expansive, dissapointing ending though...., 3 Nov 2004
A roller coaster ride with superlative character development and prose that really paints a picture of the difference in culture between east/west and the rigid societal and religious issues in India. Also greatresearch went into this book as it is authentic in its intepretation of Indian culture. Great SF elements to the story, although feel some of the ideas have been copied from other books (but thats inevitable....I liked this book alot and after spending most of the year reading mediocre old hash, this was refreshing. Good material for a film, maybe Bollywood can come up with something....BUT and its a rather large BUT.....after all the great writing, ideas and the pictures in your head he paints, the ending is something of a damp squib....should have been a bit more grandiose i feel to match the earlier parts of the book. Altogether though worth every penny and ill read it again....
Comment Comment | Permalink | Was this review helpful to you? YesNo (Report this)


Write an online review
 
 
Most Recent Customer Reviews

1.0 out of 5 stars Ughh!
It's more than 30 years that i read sf and I rarely write reviews but this i had to do!
Basic Idea is just enough for a short story. Read more
Published 1 month ago by Antonio Donini

4.0 out of 5 stars Flawed But Worth Reading
Once or twice a year I like to try out a recent science-fiction title people are buzzing about, just to get a sense of developments in the genre. Read more
Published 4 months ago by A. Ross

4.0 out of 5 stars Good book - too short though
Ok. After over a decade of reading I.M. books I've been completely amazed by this mans imagination, way with words (those adjectives, still can't believe it) and the staggering... Read more
Published 22 months ago by da ding

5.0 out of 5 stars An instant SF Classic!
Ian Mcdonald has quite simply written the first great SF novel of the 20th century!

First, when I mean SF, it does not mean that I am not reading this novel as closely as I... Read more

Published on 16 Jan 2006 by cmmahon

5.0 out of 5 stars A SF Masterpiece!
Ian Mcdonald has quite simply written the first great SF novel of the 20th century!

First, when I mean SF I do not mean 'Weird' or 'Fantasy' fictions... Read more

Published on 14 Jan 2006 by cmmahon

5.0 out of 5 stars Ian Mcdonald's Masterpiece
Ian Mcdonald as of this book, is a great writer in the sense of having something to say about the world. Read more
Published on 13 Jan 2006 by cmmahon

5.0 out of 5 stars River of Gods
River of Gods takes you into an alien (at least alien to my western mind) world of India 50 years hence, with a mix of hi-tech gadgets and third-world slums, Hindu mythology and... Read more
Published on 13 May 2005 by Bob simms

5.0 out of 5 stars As Staggering as India Itself
Scared the bejeezus out of my wife after reading page 382, closing the book, and banging my palms against the window frame in our hotel room high over this city in Northern China... Read more
Published on 29 Dec 2004 by socrates17

5.0 out of 5 stars Epic!
Ian McDonald has long promised to deliver a book like 'R