The Rise of Endymion

The Rise of Endymion is the fourth book in the Hyperion Cantos series by Dan Simmons.

The Hyperion Cantos is essentially two stories. The first one split over the first two books and the second split over books three and four. The two stories are separated by about 300 years, but there are some links and even common characters. Throughout the books the characters and scenarios were consistently interesting, but the books themselves were not always so consistently good to read. The Rise of Endymion is a good example of that. There are some totally excellent sections of the book and some that could just do with being cut completely. There was a section describing the mountain ranges of a planet and I just found myself thinking, “WTF is the author expecting readers to think here? It’s a string of made up names for mountains that don’t exist. What a waste of words…”

Despite the issues, I was extremely interested to see how things turned out. Who lived, who died, did the Pax/Church get exposed and overthrown… In that sense, the book delivered very well.

On reflection, the series reminds me a lot of the Dune series. A combination of exceptional high points and some rather lacklustre sections that test your loyalty. 🙂 Both series are well worth the effort though…

Cheers

Tim…

Endymion

Endymion is the third book in the Hyperion Cantos series by Dan Simmons.

After finding the last book a little patchy at times, this one returned to the same sort of pacing and thrust that made me love the first book. This story picks up nearly 300 years after the last one ends. The daughter of one of the characters from the previous book entered one of the time tombs and appeared in Hyperion 274 years later. Since then things have changed throughout the former web worlds and the church has a vested interest in keeping things the way they are. The last thing they need is a little girl, with the power to topple their stronghold on the galaxy, messing things up for them.

The timeline does jump around a little and there are always a couple of stories happening at the same time, but it is a lot more direct and easier to follow than the last book. I think this was helped by the fact I was able to read is in relatively few sittings. OK, they were spread over the best part of a month, but at least each time I picked it up I got through quite a few pages.

I’m really looking forward to the last book in the series. Fingers crossed it ends strongly…

Cheers

Tim…

Hyperion (Dan Simmons)…

Hyperion is the first in the Hyperion Cantos series by Dan Simmons.

What a great Sci-Fi book! A group of seven travellers are on a pilgrimage to Hyperion. Six of the seven tell the stories of how they came to be there, with the sixth story kind-of linking things together. There is no real conclusion to the story as the next book carries on the story from the point the first one ends. It was definitely written as a series!

The timeline jumps around quite a bit through the book, but in a good way. It’s not done in a confusing way.

Definitely worth a look for any Sci-Fi readers out there.

Cheers

Tim…

PS. I put the authors name in the title, for fear of confusing people into thinking this was about work. 🙂