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Downbelow Station: The Company Wars (Daw Books Collectors) [Paperback]

C. J. Cherryh
3.8 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (57 customer reviews)

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Book Description

December 2, 2008 Daw Books Collectors (Book 420)
The Hugo Award-winning classic, now available in a trade edition for the first time.

Pell?s Station, orbiting the alien world simply called Downbelow, had always managed to remain neutral in the ever escalating conflict between ?The Company,? whose fleets from Earth had colonized space, and its increasingly independent and rebellious colony worlds. But Pell?s location?on the outer edge of Earth?s defensive perimeter? makes her the focal point in the titanic battle of colony worlds fighting for independence?


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Downbelow Station: The Company Wars (Daw Books Collectors) + Cyteen + Regenesis
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Editorial Reviews

Review

"Cherryh tantalizes our minds...captures our hearts and involves us completely...a consistently thoughtful and entertaining writer."Publisher's Weekly

"Satisfying and rewarding."Analog
--This text refers to the Mass Market Paperback edition.

Product Details

  • Paperback: 352 pages
  • Publisher: DAW Trade; Reprint edition (December 2, 2008)
  • Language: English
  • ISBN-10: 0756405505
  • ISBN-13: 978-0756405502
  • Product Dimensions: 5.9 x 0.9 x 9 inches
  • Shipping Weight: 1 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
  • Average Customer Review: 3.8 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (57 customer reviews)
  • Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #499,754 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

I've written sf and fantasy for publication since 1975...but I've written a lot longer than that. I have a background in Mediterranean archaeology, Latin, Greek, that sort of thing; my hobbies are travel, photography, planetary geology, physics, pond-building for koi...I run a marine tank, can plumb most anything, and I figure-skate.

I believe in the future: I'm an optimist for good reason---I've studied a lot of history, in which, yes, there is climate change, and our species has been through it. We've never faced it fully armed with what we now know, and if we play our cards right, we'll use it as a technological springboard and carry on in very interesting ways.

I also believe a writer owes a reader a book that has more than general despair to spread about: I write about clever, determined people who don't put up with situations, not for long, anyway: people who find solutions inspire me.

My personal websites and blog: http://www.cherryh.com
http://www.cherryh.com/WaveWithoutAShore
http://www.closed-circle.net

Customer Reviews

The characters are interesting and their interactions are the spice of the story. J. K. Kelley  |  12 reviewers made a similar statement
This is what science fiction is all about. Clay Hunt (lexington@lycosmail.com)  |  9 reviewers made a similar statement
I read the first 200 pages (almost half the book). Ben Wand  |  2 reviewers made a similar statement
Most Helpful Customer Reviews
54 of 60 people found the following review helpful
5.0 out of 5 stars One of Cherryh's best . . . March 11, 2003
Format:Mass Market Paperback
I first met Carolyn Cherry(h) at AggieCon in the late '70s, when she was still teaching school in Oklahoma and had just completed her first novel, _Brothers of Earth_. She had written that book in a sort of social vacuum, with no notion of the existence of the fannish world and was amazed at the warm reception she received from a bunch of enthusiastic strangers. That book and its sequels, plus the "Morgaine" trilogy, made me a fan and I enjoyed her work for years, including this first installment in the "Merchanter" series when it first appeared. Unfortunately, success seems to have made her lazy in recent years and she has recently been churning out interminable formulaic series, often sharing the credit with younger writers, and I find most of those efforts to be unreadable. Anyway. Downbelow Station showcases Cherry's inarguable talent for complex but understandable geopolitical plots, many-layered characterization, and truly alien cultures that humans are never really going to fully understand. There are several sides to the conflict here: The Company, now in charge of an isolationist Earth; the Fleet, once the enforcement arm of the Company but now pretty much independent; Union, formed out of the farther worlds of the Beyond and possessed of a new psychological style completely foreign to Earth; Pell, a station circling a planet which circles Tau Ceti, and which only wants to left alone; and the free Merchanters, making a living hauling goods between the worlds and the stations. Pell is a civilized republic in the best tradition, but they're about to lose all that. Mazian's Fleet has been on its own devices for far too long to have a regard for any other culture and is quite willing to destroy a station and all its thousands of inhabitants in order to keep it out of Union's hands. And Union is a chilling example of nascent fascism based on state-controlled cloning. The Merchanters, who are the focus of most of the later books in this universe, must find a way to work together if they are to survive at all. Peopling this tumultuous plot are the Konstantin family, the sort-of Medicis of Pell, willing to believe the best of others and appalled at what power-seekers are doing to their station, especially the Lukas family. And there's Capt. Mallory of Fleet carrier NORWAY, a bloody-minded commander who nevertheless hews to her own kind of morality. And the hisa, the indigines of Downbelow, whose nonviolent assistance to Pell becomes crucial as the story progresses. And Jessad, the Union agent who has his own agenda on Pell. And Josh Talley, ex-Union agent who wants to find a new home there -- or maybe he's not so "ex." And there's a large supporting cast, all of them also exceptionally well developed. This is a fat book, more than 500 pages, but it never slows down and you'll never lose interest. Definitely one of Cherryh's best.
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33 of 36 people found the following review helpful
5.0 out of 5 stars Lengthy but satisfying July 23, 1997
By A Customer
Format:Mass Market Paperback
I had read about C.J. Cherryh's massive Alliance-Union series in a science-fiction encyclopedia and wanted to find a good place to start. The encyclopedia suggested what it considered her two best books, Downbelow Station and Cyteen. As it turned out I could find neither of them immediately, but I kept the two in the back of my mind over the months as I shopped. And, one day, while searching through a bookstore, I found to my pleasant surprise that the publisher had released a new edition of the novel, which I quickly snapped up and read.


Now, to the actual novel. Since I had no prior knowledge of any other Cherryh book, I just held my breath and dove right in. Fortunately, Cherryh does not bog you down in continuity, giving you all the pertinent information right in the first chapter, thus absolving the reader of any feeling that they are missing something that happened previously. The story is an excellent thriller, highlighting a wondrous cast of characters, and giving them a genuine disaster to overcome, allowing the reader to see exactly what makes each character tick as things fall further and further apart. Throw in an interstellar war and numerous subplots and you have probably the finest science-fiction novel on the subject, though its length may daunt less dedicated readers. Still, it remains one of Cherryh's finest works, even today, almost twenty years later

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28 of 32 people found the following review helpful
5.0 out of 5 stars Still impressive after all these years August 19, 1997
By A Customer
Format:Mass Market Paperback
It's been quite a few years since I first read "Downbelow Station", having found a dog-eared copy in a used-book store in Silver Spring, Maryland, and since then just about every book Cherryh ever wrote has come to grace my bookshelf. But still, I come back to this novel, which won the Hugo award in the early 80s (1981, I believe).

It's evident from the style that this is one of Cherryh's earlier books; it's not as smooth or sophisticated as "Tripoint" or "Cyteen", both of which are set in the same universe. It does, however, represent a sweeping vision of humanity's possible future, showing not only how we may colonize the stars, but how living among the stars may change us as humans.

For it is one of the most impressive things about this book that the characters are human. Over a year after my last re-reading, I still recall Angelo Konstantin, Elene Quen, Jon Lukas, Signy Mallory, Vassily Kressich, Satin and the rest as if they were old friends. "Downbelow Station" is not only a splendid introduction to Cherryh's thoroughly explored and well-populated Alliance-Union universe, it's an excellent introduction to science fiction in general, as a novel that addresses the tough questions of humanity's future

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Most Recent Customer Reviews
1.0 out of 5 stars How do I despise this book? Let me count the ways...
Ugh! Ten reasons I hated this book:

10. Mindnumbingly boring +
9. Way too long +
8. Nothing happens = kill me now!
7. Read more
Published 10 days ago by BGH
4.0 out of 5 stars One of a long line of "God reads" from CJ Cherryh
This Author, like a very few out there, delivers! Easy to read, well thought out story that ties in quite well with several other stories from this "universe," both before... Read more
Published 27 days ago by Keith Bates
4.0 out of 5 stars A Good Science Fiction Read
I read this book as part of a book club and I have found another author to go check out her other books.
Published 1 month ago by Terry A Winters
5.0 out of 5 stars This is a best ten list topper
I think this is a brilliant book written by someone with a genius intellect. It required mastery of realpolitik political science and a deep awareness of human nature and perhaps... Read more
Published 1 month ago by April
2.0 out of 5 stars Below Average Science Fiction
I selected this piece of science fiction by virtue of its having won the Hugo Award in 1982. The first of a series of books by C. J. Read more
Published 3 months ago by Steven M. Anthony
5.0 out of 5 stars Powerfully good, powerfully depressing.
I read this book as part of an effort to read all the science fiction books that have won major awards. Read more
Published 7 months ago by Leighland Feinman
5.0 out of 5 stars HMMM... so far so good.
I am a bog sci-fi fan like my father who gave me this book, and many others like it.
The plot seems a little loose at the beginning, but yet held together somehow. Read more
Published 7 months ago by KrazYkat
5.0 out of 5 stars best in class
C J. Cherry is the best science fiction writer alive at this time. There is no comparison. All of her books for the last 15 years are outstanding, and I usually read them in one... Read more
Published 8 months ago by L. Michael Gundy
5.0 out of 5 stars Perfect
This book came in a very short period of time and was exactly as described. I have to fill in a few more words. There.
Published 10 months ago by Joseph
5.0 out of 5 stars Resolving differences
Pell Station is one in a series of stations built as stepping stones to space because of lack of planets suitable for colonization. Read more
Published 13 months ago by RAR
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