Diaspora [Import] [Hardcover]

Greg Egan (Author)

Product Details

• Hardcover: 300 pages
• Publisher: Millennium Books; 1St Edition edition (1997)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1857984382
• ISBN-13: 978-1857984385
• Shipping Weight: 1.3 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 4.2 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (67 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #6,522,465 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

I am a science fiction writer and computer programmer. You can find information, illustrations and interactive applets that supplement my books at www.gregegan.net

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

28 of 30 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Full of Fascinating Ideas, but Flawed, April 1, 1998

By 

Jim Mann (Pittsburgh, PA USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Diaspora (Hardcover)

I'm sometimes not sure exactly how to react to the works of Greg Egan. Diaspora, while a good book, generated the same react as other Egan I've read. Sometimes his works seem brilliant. At other times, Egan seems too clever for his good, intent on showing off lots of details about new ideas. Sometimes the work moves right along. At others, it stops with the old hack of "tell me again professor exactly how wormholes work." (This one really happens in Diaspora.) Sometimes the novels seems driven by an interesting story. At other times, it seems like a loose collection of events, a travelogue, the plot of which is only there to allow Egan to explore wonder after wonder. Parts of Diaspora had me saying, as I read, "this is brilliant and belongs on the Hugo ballot." Other parts had me saying "OK, so he wants to show off with more future physics/math" or "OK, he dreamed up yet another universe, so our characters have to go there so he can write about it."

In the end, I still think that Diaspora was a good book, with flashes of brilliance and ideas that in and of themselves are exciting and interesting. But overall, it's impact is lessened by its rambling nature and by Egan's tendency to go into information-dump mode.

14 of 15 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Ingenious but..., December 20, 2000

By 

Dr. Zoidberg (New York, NY) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Diaspora (Mass Market Paperback)

First, let me tell you this: Greg Egan is a genius. His ideas are unparalleled by any other science fiction writer I know of. I have read several of his books, and his novels/short stories are the most unique stories I have ever read. Having said that, I have to say he has a bit of a problem with writing long novels and tends to lose focus and drift away. He shines with short stories, though. This book has the same problems. It actually seems like 2 books, really, the first and the second part are so different. The first half of the books tells the story of Yatima, an artificial intelligence being who lives inside a "polis", which is the equivalent of a city of AIs. The story details how Yatima was "born", how did he evolve, and elaborates on his experiences. The background of the story is complex and detailed - yet still remains believable: most of what is left of humanity chose to turn themselves to digital beings, others turned themselves to Gleisners (Robots). But a few chose to remain human, albeit genetically modified humans. This part is *awesome*, *amazing* - it is very, very good! Then, roughly in the middle of the book the story takes a turn: after an unexplained phenomena which occured and wiped the remaining human population, one of the polises decides to go on a "Diaspora", clone itself and explore the galaxy. This part elaborates on the journey. The thing is, there is very very little story, most of it is complicated scientific theories. I'm sure Greg Egan knows his science, from what I understood (I couldn't follow everything), he got it right to the point. But it gets way too complicated. Seriously, I had university courses easier than this part of the book! And it is not really necessary, most of the time, a theory is introduced, and then the story moves on to the next theory. In the meanwhile, there isn't much left of the original story - the scientific background seems to be much more important than the plot! I would give 5 (or more!) stars to the first half of the book, and 2 to the second part. But overall, the second part really ruined a lot of the book for me. Nonetheless, I'd still recommend it - just be prepared for a very high level of physics! And check out "Axiomatic", this is truly one of the best short science fiction stories of all time - Greg Egan at his best.

13 of 14 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Excellent Speculative Fiction, February 10, 2006

By 

Jeremy P. Hamilton "- J>-/ -" (Dallas TX) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Diaspora (Mass Market Paperback)

I've been looking for a book like this for a long time. Anthropomorphism has always been a pretty pervasive feature of sf-- it makes for better drama, but really bad speculation. For once, the ideas described here aren't restrained by what people find familiar- the aliens aren't simply alternate earth biology, the human societies are actually more then just variances of what you'd read in a history book, the underlying science is as essential to the story as the events of the novel, and the storyline is about intellectual discovery, almost exclusively.

Despite what some reviewers have written, the society the author describes clearly wasn't intended as a dystopia. Whether you see it as such depends on how you define human identity (the author, a programmer, seems to believe that the core of human identity is some sort of mathematically perfect function, and the rest is extraneous extrapolation-- I couldn't disagree more, but my own motivations have nothing to do with tissues and neurons (except as a means to an end), so I personally found the incorporeal society pretty cool). In any case, the idea is both plausible and interesting-- good speculation.

If you read sci-fi for escapism, I wouldn't recommend this book-- it offers little in the way of relatable characters or drama, and the only fantasy it fulfills is that of a physicist or programmer. If, on the other hand, you read sci-fi for interesting ideas and speculation, then this book is a godsend, a breath of fresh air in a stale room.