Customer Reviews

Moonseed

5 star:		(16)
4 star:		(14)
3 star:		(11)
2 star:		(7)
1 star:		(5)

 

 

I am an avid fan of "hard" science fiction - stories where accurate, highly detailed science is so integral to the plot that the book would not function without it. Moonseed places well in this category. Baxter is very adept at creating a boogeyman out of cutting-edge scientific theory, and his characters use science and modern technology in a complex, intellectual manner to solve the problem. His choice of a geologist as protagonist was interesting, and it worked; this is the first hard-SF novel I have read where an intimate knowledge of geology provided the key to resolving the plot's main conflicts. Baxter's handling of science reminds me of decorated hard-SF veteran Gregory Benford - and that is high praise.

An even better point was Baxter's description of Earth-Moon travel. This is a must-read for anyone who has ever daydreamed of a successor to the Apollo program or of going back in time to plant a moon-boot in the regolith next to Neil Armstrong. I would venture to say that this book is really *about* returning to the moon, and that the Moonseed is merely there to provide an excuse to do so. Regardless, it is a fun vicarious journey.

With all the above traits to recommend it, this book should have qualified for five stars. But it didn't. Baxter clearly loves and knows his science, but whenever he strays from it - say, into character development, or the more mundane details of life - his writing suffers. Characters sometimes do things that don't seem consistent with their personalities. Details are dropped or glossed over. For example, a man with badly cracked ribs can barely move in one scene, but only hours later is walking around with little hinderance. Astronauts forget some fairly basic elements of mission planning in a manner that is too obviously a plot device to set up a later scene. And too many characters decide to give up their lives in various suicidal endeavors, with no real development of _why_ the person no longer wishes to live.

I don't advise you to avoid this book, because it has some unique good qualities. But limit your expectations.

For some reason I've always enjoyed reading "end of the world" scenarios. Novels such as "Lucifer's Hammer" (Niven & Pournelle), "Mother of Storms" (John Barnes), and "The Forge of God" (Greg Bear) come to mind. In "Moonseed" (which I think is a somewhat cheesy title, perhaps befitting an old episode of Star Trek), Stephen Baxter envisions a "10-dimensional superstring nanovirus" gradually reducing Earth to molten rock before taking the planet apart completely. The first year or so of this 40-year process is told in exquisite, realistic and often horrifying detail ... and in this respect I was very satisfied with the book. Characters that you genuinely care about are well-developed, but there are some rather annoying lapses in the storyline (such as "Whatever became of that oil rig guy?" and "What about that volcano in Japan?" and "How exactly DID Jane get from Scotland to the U.S.?"). As for the remarkable exodus to the Moon, I guess when the chips are down and the future of the global economy is pretty much moot, you can accomplish anything. The very end of the book, in which the attitudes of the new Lunar generation toward the demolished Earth are considered, is provocative and a bit depressing. But overall I'm quite glad to have stumbled across "Moonseed."

Moonseed is a SF drama documenting the release on Earth of a planet-devouring nanovirus. The "Moonseed" infection starts in Scotland and induces an extremely ancient volcano to erupt again. Then the Moonseed continues spreading, apparently unstoppable as it heads down through the Earth's crust and towards the mantle where it would wreak complete havoc. So begins the desperate race to save humanity.

The geology and space travel aspects of this novel are thoroughly grounded in research, allowing Baxter to achieve tenability on top of the entertainment, unlike other sci-fi authors who are merely entertaining. Or even worse, unbelievable AND unentertaining (*cough* The Millennial Project *cough)! It's a hefty novel at over 650 pages, but it seemed much shorter to me due to the quick and continuous plot development. Being an engineer and amateur astronomer, my attention didn't wander during the more technical passages. In fact, I was captivated during Baxter's description of the voyage to the Moon and the sojourn there. If you're not technically inclined, perhaps 5-10% of the book may be heavy going. Fortunately, the other 90-95% is easily understood and enjoyed by the layman.

Thanks to the novel's level of science, I somewhat believe now that we could return to the Moon for under $2 billion if need be. I have a much better grasp now of the power of "Act of God" disasters like volcanoes and earthquakes. Areas that did not seem convincing to me: politics (funding without adequate explanations), speed of infrastructure failure (far too rapid), harenodynamics (wacky alternate method of landing on the Moon), Henry's solution (I won't spoil it here), and a few others. Also the Moonseed itself is not satisfactorily researched during the course of the book, although the ending implies that humanity is on its way to discovering its secrets.

The overall tone of the novel is somewhat pessimistic. I think the gloominess adds to the prose and makes it more believable; previous reviewers have construed it as evidence of Baxter's nihilism. Whether you appreciate the dark mood or not, there certainly are quite a few morbid scenes in the novel that are more for dramatic effect than enriching the plot. Characterization of the main players is decent (I really got to like Henry!) but there seems to be a bit of unnecessary quarreling. Geena seems to be in perpetual PMS. Minor characters are generally flat and underdeveloped.

Overall, recommended for sci-fi buffs and readers with an interest in end-of-the-world scenarios.

Just to explain, 1 star=poor, 2=fair, 3=good, 4=very good, 5=excellent

I thought this book was fair. Baxter certainly writes about science convincingly and with a thorough knowledge of subject. The concept in the story was intriguing, but that's not enough in this case. I found none of the characters to be sympathetic enough to really care about any of them. I think this is really indicative of Baxters biggest failing; he doesn't write about people well. Sure, the science and exposition work well enough to convey a grand concept, but ultimately, people have to pull me into a story.

There are some good sections in the book, but much of the story is page upon page of basically mundane things like a space launch to the moon, or about how many craters there are on the moon. I get it already, Stephen, the moon has A LOT of craters!

A serious criticism I have is that all the science that Baxter is praised for seems to go to fantasy once the characters get to the moon. I find it hard to believe that anyone could survive a thousand mile an hour wind-storm, let alone scraping along the surface of the moon in a lunar orbiter at thousands of miles an hour and surviving for several minutes. I was very disappointed with this book, mainly because for the first 400 pages or so, things are set up carefully and in excrutiating detail at times; then the last 250 pages we suddenly get huge leaps in time of one year, ten years, etc. To me, when things finally started to get interesting, the author glossed over them. It would have been fascinating if we'd had much more about how the two main characters survived on the moon for weeks or months, instead of getting a "One year later" cop out. Sorry Baxter, this book was not good.

Once in a while an sf book comes along that explores a completely unique - but terrifyingly plausible - concept. In the classic tradition of `what if' Baxter takes the reader on a slowly building, but inevitably terrifying ride that questions our definition of life, our origins and our future. The backdrop is a very plausible earth, just a few years down the track. And the moon, visited in one short burst during the Apollo years, but abandoned in the face of political realities. The story is not inhabited by larger than life heroes, but real people with real lives - warts and all - and yet we are led to understand how acts of heroism and self sacrifice arise. Baxter has researched his geological facts well. From first hand experiences, I can testify his volcanic events are portrayed realistically. You can feel the heat, live the horror of the very earth upon which we sit betraying us in the most fundamental way, shrugging off mere, fragile mankind as easily as we shrug off dust motes. And as a space nut, I was fascinated by his thorough, gutsy window into the Apollo missions and the less than glamorous astronaut training procedures. This is not a `one sitting' quick read, but an unfolding drama to immerse oneself in over days.

I hate it when I have to skip pages to enjoy a book. Page after page after page after page after page after page of needless details that don't further the plot.

Baxter got so bogged down in details about spaceflight and PREPARATION for spaceflight that he forgot he was telling a story. Hey, we're smarter than that. We get it.

This is my fourth foray into Baxterland (previous reads Voyage, Titan, Manifold: Time, in descending order). For the first 120-odd pages, I was extremely hopeful Baxter had conquered his biggest bugaboo-- creating characters we can really CARE about. His main man, geologist Henry Meacher, showed dangerous signs of HUMANITY early on. True to form, however, by mid-book, he had reverted to form as an emotionless scientific wonk viewing the destruction of the world and everything in it with clinical detachment (indeed, with a kind of perverse glee). Other annoying Baxterisms include his tendancy to essentially plaigerize his research materials, lifting long passages of books like "Diary of a Cosmonaut" (yes, I'm one of the eight or so other folks who read the English language version) and "To A Rocky Moon" almost verbatim (as he did in the otherwise excellent "Voyage" with the "Angle of Attack"). Other reviewers have noted his fundamental nihilsim: It becomes evident fairly early on that Baxter hates humanity and thinks it deserves destruction, a theme that also runs strongly through "Titan" and the awful "Manifold: Time." This might be a valid view to hold, but it's certainly not my cup of tea. Another infuriating trademark is his tendency to set up a situation in painstaking detail, then seemingly get bored with the whole idea (or suddenly realize, "cripes--I've wasted 140,000 words on what should be the first third of the book--got to end it NOW!")and launch into "and ten years later... and another ten years..." mode. Finally, for a guy who seems to understand the basic mechanics of spaceflight so well, he takes some incredibly wild leaps into "Abbot And Costello Go To Mars" land. You mean to tell me Henry Meacher has not been briefed on the basic flight profile of the moon mission HE CREATED before he's blasted into space? How can a lunar geologist who's spent his entire career with NASA be so CLUELESS about space flight 101?

Why do I keep reading Baxter? I keep thinking he'll surprise me by turning out another space epic like "Voyage," something that mixes nuts-and-bolts-and-turbopump mechanics with real HUMAN characters, something with a basically upbeat vision of mankind's future. So far, no good.

I'm giving MOONSEED three stars because there's no "two and a half stars" rating. It's a ... sight better than his more recent "Manifold: Time" (indeed, Baxter's books seem to get worse as time goes on), but maybe a tad behind "Titan" and nowhere near as good as "Voyage."

Twenty five or so years ago, you never saw books like this. Moonseed is a traditional science fiction disaster novel, but it's been written in a mainstream style, presumably for marketing reasons. What we have here is "The Poseidon Adventure", except that it's the earth that's sinking.

The lead character, Henry Meacher, is a geologist. When a nano-threat from the Moon starts collapsing the Earth's crust and causing increasing vulcanism he is on the scene and soon becomes part of the race for a solution. His ex-wife, colleagues and acquaintances form more of the cast. There are dozens of viewpoint characters; each followed till they die horribly or reach safety (safety being something that changes its definition as the book progresses). The plot suffers a little from data-hiding--Baxter can't tell you what Henry's great plan is, because then the last couple of hundred pages are little more than the playing out of the idea. And in fact that happens anyway--the last thirty pages are subtitled every dozen paragraphs: "A year later", "Ten years later" and so on, as Baxter traces down the results of Henry's mission. Not a terrible ending, but not a very satisfying climax either.

The science is neat, and as another reviewer said here one wishes he'd done more of it. Baxter is clearly very knowledgeable about the space program, and we get page after page of detail about technology that exists now--when a character goes up to the Space Station it takes forty pages to get from launch to where they're going. I'm not saying it's boring, but that section is going to be a hit only if you're a real space buff.

Apart from problems like that with the pacing, though, the book is a good hard science techno-thriller. Baxter does a more than competent job with the characters, and the gradual breakdown of the earth's geological stability is lovingly detailed and very convincing, and rises on occasion to the sense of wonder found in books like Greg Bear's The Forge of God. Not an unconditional recommendation, but worth a try if you like sf disaster novels.

I picked this book up when the local Crown Books was going bankrupt and closing their doors. It took me a little while to get into the book, but once the seed started to grow in Scotland, I was hooked. The ending seemed a little abrupt and I'm not sure I can believe that with what happens to the Earth, the Moon would be unaffected.

Overall, though, a fun read.

By page fifty I was considering putting this book down out of frustration at waiting for something to happen. But I decided to skim for a bit, give it another 25 pages, and I am very glad I did. The first portion of the book builds slowly, emphasizing character development, and starting around page 74, the whole thing takes off (ahem) like a rocket: the next 580 pages or so flew by.

I was surprised into laughter when I saw that some recent reviews here complain about the book's "fantasy," unsympathetic characters, and "hard science nihilism." None of those accusations have any connection with this novel. The science is detailed and constant without being tedious, the characters are sympathetic without being sappy, and in retrospect the overall tone of the book is remarkably hopeful.

Read this book. If you like hard, human science fiction, you'll enjoy it.