Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #967505 in Books
• Published on: 2003-04
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 448 pages

Amazon.co.uk Review
All the best thrillers contain the solution to a mystery, and the mystery in this intellectually sparkling scientific thriller is more crucial and more strange than most. Why are people turning on their neighbours and their new children? And what is causing an epidemic of still-births? A disgraced palaeontologist and a genetic engineer both come across evidence of cover-ups, and the government is clearly not up to any good. But no-one knows what is really going on, and the government is covering up because that is what, in thrillers as in life, governments do. And what has any of this to do with the find of a Neanderthal family whose mummified faces show signs of a strange peeling? Greg Bear has spent much of his recent career evoking awe in the deep reaches of space, but he made his name with Blood Music, a novel of nanotechnology that crackled with intelligence. His new book is a workout for the mind and a stunning read; human malignancy has its role in his thriller plot, but its real villain, as well as its last best hope, is the endless ingenious cruelty of the natural world and evolution. --Roz Kaveney

Customer Reviews

Darwin's radio
A great book about our next evolutionary step and how the public and government react to it. There is a lot of science in the book, but not prohibitively so, and it is interesting to see how government departments react to mass illnesses and fight for control of how it should be dealt with. An original premise, well told and perfect commuting and lunchtime reading. I agree with other reviewers that the short chapters make it easy to fly through this book, which only seems to add to the pace of the story.

Science Fiction with actual science
I first read this book when a friend leant it to me after telling me that there was too much science for her liking and that I'd probably enjoy it. She was right.

After the inital shock of just how much science there was in the book I settled into it surprisingly quickly. The characters were well developed, the story fast paced enough to keep me interested. And the chapters were short enough to keep me happy - I knew that I had time to read them practically anywhere.

All in all this was a great book and the sequel was just as good. I'd recommed this to anyone who enjoys science fiction - but be warned, sometimes this book is more science than fiction.

good stuff, but a cop out i think
a superb premise. well thought out. far too much science in it, despite doing some molecular biology at university a decade ago, i found the science tricky to follow in places.
not enough characterisation though. and not enough about what is going on in the general public. far too much about the politic s in the academic and political world.
good read if you are commuting.