Customer Reviews

The Neutronium Alchemist: Part I - Consolidation

5 star:		(30)
4 star:		(16)
3 star:		(6)
2 star:		(6)
1 star:		(3)

 

 

This book was great, don't get me wrong, but if you're committed to reading the entire series (ie you've read the Reality Dyfunction and want to see how it all ends eventually) do yourself a favor and start reading right after the Reality Dyfunction. I made that mistake and waited a few years in between (hey I do have other things to do) and attempting to dive in, at least in the beginning, can be rough going. Fortunately Hamilton does his best to bring readers up to speed on the run but he can't explain everything without bogging it all down in lengthy backwards exposition and so you've just got to figure it out as you go. On the book itself, it's just as good as the first two books, just in a different way. The Reality Dyfunction was good for the shock of its ideas, both for the complexity and gritty hardness of Hamilton's universe and the central concept of the dead coming back and taking over people (which could have turned into some cliched horror deal, but didn't). This book shows that the last one wasn't a fluke and he can actually develop all those ideas of the last novel into something workable. Thus, there aren't all out firefights and breakneck action here, mostly a retrenching as the characters gear up for the inevitable second conflict. We get to see how the possessed are trying to fortify their positions and how the living are trying to reclaim their worlds. Through it all there's an impressive knot of political and social machinations, as everyone tries to manipulate the crap out of everyone else. The characters are all still well defined and sometimes still surprising, which is good considering how much time you have to spend with some of them. There are lots of plots spinning around but don't fret, none of them are horribly complex and there's little overlap and Hamilton avoids the problems of some authors (ahem . . . Robert Jordan) by not giving his million characters all similar sounding names so you can't tell them apart. It's a quieter book that simmers with closed intensity, which will probably explode in the next book. Don't even think of starting this one without having read the Reality Dyfunction, it won't make any sense at all and you'll just be hurting yourself. But this is the next logical step after that book and a welcome one. And I don't know what everyone else thinks, but I liked the idea of Al Capone showing up, talk about adapting to yourself situation. Great stuff, and I've learned from my mistakes, I'm reading the second part of this as we speak. Review on that to come shortly, not that anyone is out there waiting. Pity.

There are six books in Peter F. Hamilton's "Night's Dawn" series:

- "The Reality Dysfunction - Part 1: Emergence,"
- "The Reality Dysfunction - Part 2: Expansion,"
- "The Neutronium Alchemist - Part 1: Consolidation,"
- "The Neutronium Alchemist - Part 2: Conflict,"
- "The Naked God - Part 1: Flight," and
- "The Naked God - Part 2: Faith."

Be warned: you CANNOT read these books individually. They are, essentially, chapters in one whopping great book. If you like the first book, then you'll have to read the other five books in order. There's no tie-up of any sort between any of the books. The publisher just broke the story up because it totals over 3,000 pages. If you pick up a book before you've read all the previous books (in order), put it down. It won't mean anything to you. Since these books are entirely dependent on each other, I'm writing this review on the series as a whole, not on the individual books.

This is one of the greatest science fiction sagas written. It ranks up there with David Brin's "Uplift Saga." It is literally a story of good vs evil and shows some of the potential (and pitfalls) of the human race. Over the years, I've read the whole series five times, and I still love it. I really only have two gripes with the book. First, and this is unavoidable in what Hamilton is doing, the evil in the series is definitely, graphically evil. This is not a book where the villain twists his mustache and laughs "nyah hah hah" as he forecloses on the orphanage or ties the heroine to the railroad tracks. The writing is fairly graphic in a lot of places. After five readings, this gets a bit wearing. My second gripe is one which somewhat limits the audience of the series (even more so than the evilness presented, and it's why I've given the series four stars instead of five): there's too much sex and the writing about it is too graphic. This is a problem with all of Hamilton's books, but it seems more prevalent in this series. Because of this, I wouldn't recommend the book for your children to read. But, as long as you're aware of that, I highly recommend the series and give it 4 stars out of five.

That's right - I mean it. Not as engaging as the first, but this is through no fault of Hamiltons. This sad fact is true of most sequels. The first book was replete with countless examples of good versus evil and hard, shocking acts of violence and horror. This volume is not as hard hitting - but perhaps it shouldn't be. After all you can't manufacture identical responses from the reader again and again. Thus, this book is the expected progressment of the story of the Confederation doing what they can in preperation against the dead. More 'technical' or 'diplomatic' than the Reality Dysfunction's actiony themes. However, I expect this will change with the next volume titled 'Conflict'. I hope it does because so far I've been fairly bored with this volume compared to the audaciousness of the previous two. However, the 'dead-end' dead vs. living situation has so far proved to be a truely impressive plot situation. If Hamilton can somehow snap this dead-end away and into some sort of satisfying conclusion he'll go down as one of the best writers I've seen... And I mean that in a positive way. He's deliberately written such a bleak situation. Only the next three volumes will reveal if he does cleverly conclude this nightmare or if he will take 'the easy way out' and let the possessed triumph.

I enjoyed this book, but it fell a little shy in comparison with the first installment in this five book 'trilogy.' While still very good, the narrative dragged in places, failing to engage me as thoroughly as the first part. I find this a common problem for 'middle books' in trilogies, and it is understandable in a way - the set-up is done, the initial crises have happened, but the resolution isn't due yet. The immediate sense of dread that the first part created doesn't sustain as well here, especially when it becomes obvious that the bad things will continue to happen. Nonetheless, it is still a great book (in two parts), it offers much to ponder, moves the story along well, and leaves the reader ready for the conclusion.

I love this story, I am almost finished with this novel and am moving on to number two.

However, this is my only gripe:

The quality of the paperbacks a horrible. I made a HUGE effort to not so much as bend the spine on my book and the cover fell off half way through the book.

If you buy these books, the cover WILL come off. It's as if they were manufactured with rubber cement.

Don't expect a lot of resale value on these paperbacks.

It has often been said that the second book in a trilogy establishes nothing and goes nowhere. This is truly the case with this 1200 page indulgent study of irrelevance.

Despite the innane sex and pre-pubescent heroes rife in this series, I enjoyed the 'Reality Dysfunction' enough to suffer this second instalment to the series. Tragically Hamilton's creative insticts seem to have left him in this turgid and irritatingly repetitve novel. The plot is broken into a number of tenuously related stories; Dr Mzu tracking down her planet buster with intelligence agents and our juvenile 20 year old hero, Joshua, in hot pursuit; Quinn zipping off to earth to wreak his vengeance; the Confederation attempting to deal with AL Capone and various enclaves of the possessed; and other more or less significant side stories. In each of them, the one dimensional unoriginal central figures move from one act of stupidity to another. The pursuit of Dr Mzu is tragic. She eacapes the clutches of her pursuers only to run foul of them again and again. They reminded me of a Japanese TV drama where the two predestined lovers are brought tantalisingly close to some kind of resolution or closure only to have it ripped from them by some mindless act of stupidity and misunderstanding. Other strands of the narrative follow a similar pattern. There is so much procrastination!

Probably what I found most ceaslessly irritating was the cast of morons brought together by Hamilton to save the universe. Joshua epitomizes the shallow teen dork we have all come to know and hate from somewhere in our lives. He experiences a bit of late 'teen angst' after his dead mate tells him not to treat his girls so poorly. Wow. It is wonderfully pathetic. But he is not the only stupid one. With the galaxy on the brink of Chaos and humanity's resources stretched to the limit, one wouold think anything that could be done would be done. But no! One of the demon-evil possessed is in scientific 'torture-like' surveillance. She demands to see a lawyer and naturally is 'released' into a courtroom to chat about whether this kind of treatment is really kind of below the belt, or unsportsmanlike, as it were. Predictably, she explodes and kills people for a few minutes before being subdued again. Tragically for humanity, this allows important intelligence to be passed on to the dead and Al Capone to save his entire fleet of possessed starships. Doh!

Al Capone, the silly tart banging him, and the and whole '101 most loved' undead people thing only adds to maelstrom of irritation unleashed in this book.

As others before me have said, this is pulp. And like them I found myself flicking through the storylines I could no longer endure. I have never felt so enervated after a book in all my life.

But what's the use? Some people seem to have enjoyed it. But then again some people ike Nascar and Daytime TV soaps... If you have read the first book in the series you will probably read this. After that, do yourself a favour and read Jack Vance 'Demon Princes' series. Now that is writing!

and he's trying to steal my soul by boring me to death!!

I hardly ever flat out stop reading a book and give up. That's what I did with Neutronium Alchemist. Even more tedious than the first book - Reality Dysfunction. Just as goofy (dead coming back to possess the living?!?). Even more intricate subplots that disappear for what seems like hundreds of pages at a time. Just as much gratuitous sex and gore. And finally Hamilton pushes it over the top by bringing back Al Capone. Gimme a break.<...

Book 2A or 3 (depending on how you want to count the books) begins on the pastoral planet of Norfolk and ends on an asteroid in the Dorados called Ayacucho. I felt this extreme contrast shows how the people of the Confederation's innocence has been stripped away by the discovery of the possessed, life after death in a seemingly endless purgatory - so many ideals stripped down to the bare bones, leaving none of the lovely illusions used to blanket their fears of death.

Several plot lines run through this book: Alkad Mzu finds her way to the Dorados to get the Alchemist ready for her revenge on Omuta. Louise and Genevieve Kavanaugh - with the help of a possessed by the name of Christian Fletcher (yes, THAT Christian Fletcher of the infamous Mutiny on the Bounty) - escape from Norfolk and travel to Mars. Joseph succeeds in bringing Elwes, the children and Kelly Tirrell back to Tranquility and receives a heroes welcome - and more responsibility. Rubra (a habitat personality now - he used to be human but transferred his memories into the matrix and took over when he died) fights against the possessed taking over his habitat, who are using his descendant Dariat to try to gain control of the habitat. Kiera, possessing Marie Skibbow, is the leader in the habitat and decides that they need more people in the habitat, so designs an advertisement, which they send all over the galaxy - it becomes a big hit with the teens, becoming a fad called Deadnight. Al Capone takes over the whole New California system. And more . . .

It is never easy to keep track of all that is going on in a Hamilton book, as he tends to populate them with a lot of people (all with amazing back stories which he manages to work in without overly much exposition) and a lot of intersecting plot lines. This series is further complicated by its overall length. However, the more I read it the more I am engaged by it - the depth of the notion is quite fascinating and I am interested to see where he takes this idea of life after death, death and where the dead go - is there only one level of the beyond? Etc. I would definitely recommend this to anyone who enjoys a very detailed, intricately plotted sci-fi/space opera with a thought-provoking plot. Just be sure to read it all in order!

Peter F. Hamilton's hard science fiction trilogy has taken a turn towards the fantastic. Don't get me wrong, there is still plenty of interstellar travel, amazing scientific advancement that has permitted technology that a 21st Century reader might very well consider magic, but so much is based on science and genetics and technology. Except for one little thing that has come to dominate the series: Possession. On the planet of Lalonde we were first introduced to the concept that some men and women were being "possessed" by some other intelligence, some other human intelligence. Now that we are beginning The Nuetronium Alchemist we have learned who exactly the Possessors are and some of what they want. The entities doing the possessing were human once upon a time. These are the souls of the dead. All of the souls of every human who has lived and died are in some sort of a void, as it has been explained so far, and something has happened that they can take over the bodies of living humans and there are far more dead than there are living people...even in a vastly expanded universe of trillions (or more). The Possessed have taken over two planets, have footholds on several more, and there is currently no known way to stop a group of them.

This is what we know when we begin The Neutronium Alchemist: Consolidation. Consolidation is the paperback first half of The Neutronium Alchemist with Conflict being the second half of the original hardcover publication. The primary focus of this novel (or half-novel as it truly is) is on the Possessed as they consolidate their hold on several planets and the danger they pose to the Universe. Of special note is a Possessed leader taking control on the planet of New California: Al Capone. That's right, the 1920's Crime Lord is one of the returned souls and he wastes no time in setting up a new Empire. His is a special charisma and leadership that is rare and powerful. We also are given perspectives on Louise Kavanagh, the young woman whom Joshua Calvert had a liason with on Norfolk and we see her planet being lost to the Possessed. We also see the responses of the Living and how they hope to combat the Possessed and how they can understand just what is truly happening. In a thick novel with an ever expanding scope of story we are given references back to events that happened a thousand pages ago and some things begin to make more sense. Reasons behind events and behind the scenes events come clear.

A negative to bring up is that the story is so large that some characters and viewpoints do not show up for hundreds of pages at a time. So, readers expecting Joshua Calvert or some of the voidhawks from the first book to jump off the page will have to wait several hundred pages before they show up here. Now, I fully expect they will have more to do in Conflict but it is worth noting. A major plus is that Hamilton has set up a story that is very broad and very interesting. I have no idea where Hamilton is taking this story, but I have fully signed up to go on the ride. He does heavily lace the novel with the "hard" science fiction technologies and terminology, but it does not overwhelm the story. Consolidation is still not as exciting and eye opening as The Reality Dysfunction: Emergence, but this is a story I want to read.

-Joe Sherry

I have the benefit, or the detriment, of reading this book without having access to the first two in the series. It was a benefit because I was right in the action and knew roughly what was going on from tidbits I picked up about the previous two books. So I was anxious to know what happened with Mzu and was curious about what the title meant.

This book is complex, even with my experience at untangling plot lines, this was a broad and deep galaxy to read about. The number of viewpoints are astounding. Every person has their own little short story that connects and then diverges. It brings to mind that of a fractal image. The one weakness I must point out is that it jumps view points so quickly and numerously, that sometimes you will become annoyed that it isn't more continuous. If you get can get over that hump, then the rest of the story should suit you fine.

The Neutronium Alchemist begins with Consolidation. The newly possessed argue among themselves about what they should do and how they should do it. While the Confederation strives to contain the "infection" and learn more about it. The two main protagonist and antagonist are the Confederation and Al Capone's "organization". Amidst this backdrop of conflict, there are numerous neutral and not so neutral characters and sub entities. The struggle for Valisk, the escape from Norfolk, and other viewpoints which seek to enlighten you about the every day life of the citizens of the Confederation.

The next part culminates in the use of the Alchemist as you might have guessed.