© 2011 by John C. Wright
Over the past two decades or so, as I meandered about
the Catholic blogosphere on my journey to traditional Catholicism, I came
across many references to the blog of one John C. Wright. Most, if not all, of the
references were of the awestruck reverence variety. Those times I did come
across those references of awestruck reverence I followed the links back to the
source. And, lo, I too was struck with awe and reverence, and said I need to
read this guy regularly. Oh he’s a Catholic and
a science fiction writer, too? I gotta pick up some of his books.
Then, as always, life intervened.
And, just as always, I could punch myself for putting
off my foray into the science fiction of Mr. Wright.
So back in November I spotted this novel on a used
book shelf and immediately purchased it. After taking care of some other
reading business first, I finally opened it about two weeks ago. Result? Right
from the beginning I realized this novel is unlike any previous SF I’ve read.
How so?
The first thing that struck me was the presence of
higher math. Higher math? In a novel meant for mass consumption? Now, we don’t
go into strict detail, and there’s nary a formula to scare the gentle reader, but
it’s there, and Wright undeniably knows what it is. Higher math is a secondary
character in the novel, lurking always in the background, ready to pipe up at a
moment’s notice. Whether to offer its insight into relativistic travel, the
physics of antimatter energy consumption, artificial intelligence, global
socio-politico-economics, or game theory on planetary levels, offer insight it
does.
That alone intrigued me. Then I got to know the main
character.
Menelaus Montrose, is the odd combination of gun
slinging lawyer and mathematical prodigy in a post-apocalyptic Texas. Now,
lawfare in the 25th century is conducted a bit different than it is today, most
notably in the fact suits are settled Burr-Hamilton duel style. Only now
there’s computerized armor, defensive flak and chaff, intelligent bullets that
change direction, personal missiles that feint and jab. When Menelaus nearly loses
to rival attorney Mike Nails, he realizes that it’s time to hang up the shingle
and join that interstellar voyage to the Diamond Star, to decipher the Monument.
Now we slip into Arthur C. Clarke territory. The
Monument initially reminded me of the Clarkian Monolith from 2001. However, instead of a one-story
sized slab, it’s the size of a small, smooth moon. Writ upon it down to
microscopic levels in alien hieroglyphs are equations to open up the universe.
Can Man decipher them? And how was the Monument initially discovered? Orbiting
the Diamond Star, a star of pure antimatter.
The mission is twofold: decipher the Monument (mapped
off into Greek alphabet segments) and mine the star for its antimatter – the
greatest, purest form of energy. En route, Menelaus decides to try something
risky. Sensing something greater than Man – something Posthuman – would be
required to understand the Monument, he injects himself with a brain altering
drug –
And so the novel, which I could not put down and read
dozens of pages at a sitting, unfolds.
Questions: What – or Who – would leave a Monument to a
lesser species? Something good, or something, perhaps, evil? We always read, in
these tales, of a benevolent alien civilization nudging us up the evolutionary
ladder. But what if that wasn’t the case? And what if they can “see” us mining
the Diamond Star? And what if our partial decipherment of the Monument leads us
to be able to hoist our own selves up that ladder by our own bootstraps? And
should we evolve ourselves into a race of heroes to defend against an invading
force that is to us what we are to insects, or should we evolve into a race of
– more efficient drones lest we be stomped out of existence?
I thoroughly enjoyed Count to a Trillion, which happens to be, thankfully, Book One of a
series of six written to date. The next one, The Hermetic Millennia, is on deck for a mid-Spring reading.
Grade: A+
No comments:
Post a Comment