Calculating God [Paperback]

Robert J Sawyer (Author)

Product Details

• Paperback
• Publisher: TOR BOOKS ST MARTINS MASS (1995)
• ASIN: B000SF7XLQ
• Average Customer Review: 3.8 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (186 customer reviews)

More About the Author

Robert J. Sawyer -- called "the dean of Canadian science fiction" by the OTTAWA CITIZEN and "just about the best science-fiction writer out there" by the Denver ROCKY MOUNTAIN NEWS -- is one of eight authors in history to win all three of the science-fiction field's highest honors for best novel of the year: the Hugo Award (which he won for HOMINIDS), the Nebula Award (which he won for THE TERMINAL EXPERIMENT); and the John W. Campbell Memorial Award (which he won for MINDSCAN).

Rob has won Japan's Seiun Award for best foreign novel three times (for END OF AN ERA, FRAMESHIFT, and ILLEGAL ALIEN), and he's also won the world's largest cash-prize for SF writing -- the Polytechnic University of Catalonia's 6,000-euro Premio UPC de Ciencia Ficcion -- an unprecedented three times.

In 2007, he received China's Galaxy Award for most favorite foreign author. He's also won twelve Canadian Science Fiction and Fantasy Awards ("Auroras"), an Arthur Ellis Award from the Crime Writers of Canada, ANALOG magazine's Analytical Laboratory Award for Best Short Story of the Year, and the SCIENCE FICTION CHRONICLE Reader Award for Best Short Story of the Year.

Rob's novels have been top-ten national mainstream bestsellers in Canada, appearing on the GLOBE AND MAIL and MACLEAN'S bestsellers' lists, and they've hit number one on the bestsellers' list published by LOCUS, the U.S. trade journal of the SF field.

Rob is a frequent keynote speaker at conferences, teaches SF writing occasionally, and edits his own line of Canadian science-fiction novels for Red Deer Press.

His novel FLASHFORWARD (Tor Books) was the basis for the ABC TV series of the same name. He enjoyed spending time on the set and wrote the script for episode 19 "Course Correction."

His WWW trilogy, WAKE, WATCH, and WONDER (Ace Books), is all about the World Wide Web gaining consciousness.

Next up is TRIGGERS, April 2012. Set in Washington D.C., TRIGGERS is a science fiction political thriller about the nature of memory.

For more information about Rob and his award-winning books, check out his web page: http://sfwriter.com

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

47 of 53 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Fascinating speculations, very sympathetic main character, June 28, 2000

By 

B Singh - See all my reviews

This review is from: Calculating God (Hardcover)

CALCULATING GOD is a terrific book. Sawyer's research is wonderful and far reaching. He has clearly gone beyond just popular science sources. The main character's struggle with cancer is the perfect subplot, for one does wonder how such injustice can exist. All Sawyer's characters come off well, alien or otherwise. I thought at first that the two fundamentalists were going to be given an unfair treatment, but they were seen being very competent at what they set out to do. And, as a Sikh, I must applaud Sawyer's use of a Sikh character in a nonstereotypical role. Very well done! I enjoyed the aliens very much, from the affable Hollus to the almost incomprehensible Wreeds. I do not know the Royal Ontario Museum, where Sawyer sets his book, but I do know the politics of other museums and what he writes has the ring of real truth about it. A fresh and welcome contrast to the ridiculous portrayal of how a museum really works in for instance THE RELIC by Preston Child. CALCULATING GOD should be enjoyed by science fiction readers (I loved it) and by those who don't read sf (my wife loved it as well).

36 of 42 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars A fine book by a fine SF writer, August 27, 2002

By 

John S. Ryan "Scott Ryan" (Cuyahoga Falls, OH) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Calculating God (Mass Market Paperback)

Those of us who have been reading science fiction for more than a couple of decades are notorious for complaining that so few modern writers in the genre live up to the old masters. Well, I'm happy to report an exception. Robert J. Sawyer writes excellent stuff, and this book seems to be as good a place as any to start (both reading and reviewing).

I tend to evaluate SF writers/books along two dimensions -- one for the techie stuff, as measured against James P. Hogan (one of my two favorite living SF writers), and one for the humaneness of the characterization and plot, as measured against Spider Robinson (my other favorite). It's hard to find anybody who does well at both; Charles Sheffield, for example, rates pretty high on the first axis but not too high on the second, and Connie Willis is approximately the reverse.

Well, Sawyer measures up well along both dimensions. His plots include both plausible extrapolations from current science and his characters are always interesting and engaging. And he writes very well; it's hard to put one of his books down once you've started it.

This one is no exception, and it's one of his more ambitious efforts to date. The plot: a non-Terran spacecraft sets down outside the Royal Ontario Museum, and an eight-legged alien (named, as it later emerges, Hollus) walks into the museum and asks to see a paleontologist.

The paleontologist on call happens to be Tom Jericho, who happens to have cancer. And when he learns that on Hollus's planet, scientists think it's just _obvious_ that the universe was designed by an intelligent God, he finds that he has to deal with his own reasons for not believing in God. ("If there were a God, cancer wouldn't exist." The Oncological Argument?)

Most of the plot is devoted to scientific and philosophical discussions between Jericho and Hollus. These are well done; Sawyer is right on the money in his characterizations both of the shortcomings of Darwinian theory and of the "fine-tuned" nature of the universe. (Check out Michael Denton's _Evolution: A Theory in Crisis_ and _Nature's Destiny_ for good discussions of all this stuff.)

Sawyer's own speculative resolution of these issues probably won't please too many traditional theists and I think it's questionable on other grounds as well. But hey, that's what speculative fiction is about, and Sawyer's speculations are veeeeeery interesting even when they're not altogether convincing. (I won't spoil things by giving away any details, but I think I can mention that the Oncological Argument does receive an answer in the end. Not a Pollyanna-ish one, either, but still a hopeful one.)

So why did I deduct a star? Partly because Sawyer's two "fundamentalist/evangelical" characters are such stereotypical caricatures, and partly because I think he rushes his ending a little.

But he's a fine writer and very much in the same class as the old masters of the genre. SF has _always_ (a) dealt with tough theological issues and (b) proposed speculative solutions that depart from both the religious and the scientific mainstream. Sawyer continues this tradition and adds lots of new twists of his own.

9 of 9 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Excellent book tackles tough themes, May 25, 2000

By 

Dory Mackenzie - See all my reviews

This review is from: Calculating God (Hardcover)

I am always leery when I see the word "God" in the title of a science fiction book .... but I like Sawyer, so I bought this .... and like it too! The theme of evolution vs. creationism is a very touchy one .... but Sawyer handles it very very well. I liked the characters a lot too. The alien Hallus, the human being Jericho .... both were very believable and very sympathetic. And Sawyer knows his evolutionary science and palaeontology .... any book with the Burgess Shale fossils in it is fine by me! You won't be disappointed by this one.