β Scribed by Greg Egan
No coin nor oath required. For personal study only.
Synopsis:
Twenty thousand years into the future, an experiment in quantum physics has had a catastrophic result, creating an enormous, rapidly expanding vacuum that devours everything it comes in contact with.
Now humans must confront this deadly expansion. Tchicaya, aboard a starship trawling the border of the vacuum, has allied himself with the Yieldersβthose determined to study the vacuum while allowing it to grow unchecked. But when his fiery first love, Mariama, reenters his life on the side of the Preservationistsβthose working to halt and destroy the vacuumβTchicaya finds himself struggling with an inner turmoil he has known since childhood.
However, in the center of the vacuum, something is developing that neither Tchicaya and the Yielders nor Mariama and the Preservationists could ever have imagined possible: life.
Publishers Weekly:
Australian Egan (Teranesia) writes some of the hardest SF around in terms both of difficulty and cutting-edge scientific content, as shown in his latest challenging novel, set some 20,000 years in the future. Though superhuman by our standards, Egan's characters often disembodied intelligences who prefer to live as programs in virtual reality or in still stranger, high-tech media are still capable of making mistakes. At the start, an experiment in quantum physics goes badly astray, creating another universe with physical laws that differ from our own. Its border expanding at half the speed of light, this new universe swallows planetary systems whole. Fortunately, humanity is so highly developed that entire populations can be quickly evacuated with little if any loss of life. Soon the scientific community divides into two groups, those who would destroy the new universe, and those who would study it. The debate becomes even more tense when evidence of life is found behind the rapidly expanding border. Characters invariably speak the language of quantum physics fluently, and the author makes little effort to bring their discussion down to the layman's level. Not until the end, when scientists begin to explore the new universe, does Egan make any real attempt to engage the reader's senses or emotions. The pleasures of this impressive novel, although considerable, are almost entirely intellectual. (May 8) Forecast: Winner of a Hugo and a John W. Campbell award, Egan tried to counteract his reputation for leaving out emotion and sense impressions by developing appealing characters and place in his last novel, Teranesia. But his return to "coolness" may limit his appeal largely to quantum physicists who read SF. Copyright 2002 Cahners Business Information.
Biography:
Greg Egan is the author of the acclaimed SF novels Diaspora, Axiomatic, Quarantine, Permutation City, and Teranesia. A winner of the Hugo Award and the John W. Campbell Memorial Award, Mr. Egan lives in Australia.
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SUMMARY: Twenty thousand years into the future, an experiment in quantum physics has had a catastrophic result, creating an enormous, rapidly expanding vacuum that devours everything it comes in contact with.Now humans must confront this deadly expansion. Tchicaya, aboard a starship trawling the b
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