Product Description

Across Realtime brings together two classic linked novels that present a vivid vision of time travel and future war. They show one of the masters of modern SF at the top of his game and provide a fascinating companion to his epic recent novels.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #69511 in Books
• Published on: 1995-10-02
• Original language: English
• Binding: Paperback
• 592 pages

Amazon.co.uk Review
In this Hugo-winning 1991 SF novel, Vernor Vinge gives us a wild new cosmology, a galaxy-spanning "Net of a Million Lies", some finely imagined aliens, and much nail-biting suspense.

Faster-than-light travel remains impossible near Earth, deep in the galaxy's Slow Zone--but physical laws relax in the surrounding Beyond. Outside that again is the Transcend, full of unpredictable, godlike "Powers". When human meddling wakes an old Power, the Blight, this spreads like a wildfire mind virus that turns whole civilisations into its unthinking tools. And the half-mythical Countermeasure, if it exists, is lost with two human children on primitive Tines World.

Serious complications follow. One paranoid alien alliance blames humanity for the Blight and launches a genocidal strike. Pham Nuwen, the man who knows about Countermeasure, escapes this ruin in the spacecraft Out of Band--heading for more violence and treachery, with 500 warships soon in hot pursuit. On his destination world, the fascinating Tines are intelligent only in combination: named "individuals" are small packs of the dog-like aliens. Primitive doesn't mean stupid, and opposed Tine leaders wheedle the young castaways for information about guns and radios. Low-tech war looms, with elaborately nested betrayals and schemes to seize Out of Band if it ever arrives. The tension becomes extreme... while half the Beyond debates the issues on galactic Usenet.

Vinge's climax is suitably mind-boggling. This epic combines the flash and dazzle of old-style space opera with modern, polished thoughtfulness. Pham Nuwen also appears in the nifty prequel set 30,000 years earlier, A Deepness in the Sky. Both recommended. --David Langford

About the Author
SALES POINTS * The Peace War and Marooned in Realtime brought together in one volume * SF of the same epic scope and quality as Peter F. Hamilton and Iain M. Banks * Highly recommended' Kirkus 'A high point in hard SF creativity' SF Review Hugo Award winning author Reissued is series style with A FIRE UPON THE DEEP and A DEEPNESS IN THE SKY

Customer Reviews

turgid, terrible, total claptrap
Vinge may well have some wonderful ideas up his sleeve and I suppose one can see how ahead of its time this book was when it was first written. The depiction of the alien races was potentially incredibly interesting and thought provoking while the fight against the blight could have been epically exciting. However, I must confess that I absolutely hated this book. It took an age to get going - at least 200 pages and Vinge has the most opaque, verbose and frankly stupefying writing style of just about any author I have ever read. I think it shows that Vinge is an academic and not a writer first and foremost. I found the book rather dull and earnest, certainly very worthy but on the whole, rather drab like a university lecture. I found myself longing for the witty, self-deprecating style of Iain M Banks. I imagine that his version of the same story would be half as long, far more easy to read and accessible to the ordinary reader. I feel sorry for those posters who say that this is the best book that they have ever read as they have obviously denied themselves the work of so many wonderful authors. This book gets a big thumbs down from me which makes me sad because it came so highly recommended.

In the best tradition of SF
A very satisfying book, combining grand themes, a strong narrative, and excellent and thoroughly well thought-out ideas for alien races, societies and technologies. I particularly liked the approach to the predicament of a starship's captain, forced to make unaided decisions which will change the course of history - this was in the tradition of the best naval historical fiction, as it should be, with a good dose of espionage and treachery thrown in. The closest comparable book, for me, is Iain Banks' The Algebraist - high praise.

Vinge Fan
Dr Vinge is, in my opinion, one of the best sci fi authors alive. This is the first book I read of his, and I was hooked. The worlds Dr Vinge creates stay with you - a rare achievement. Highly recommended.