Customer Reviews

The Phoenix Exultant: The Golden Age, Volume 2 (Golden Age (Tor Paperback))

5 star:		(14)
4 star:		(7)
3 star:		(4)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

I abstained from writing reviews on any volumes of this trilogy until and unless I finished them all. I just recently completed the final volume of The Golden Age Trilogy, and am happy to report that each book is a wonderful read in its own right.

For me, the first was a mind-bending introduction into a world so strange, so fascinating, it took an entire volume to get me comfortable with the basic attributes of the environment. This book, the second volume in the trilogy was a real treat to read. I was already comfortable with the "user interface" of GA, and the plot unfolded with less strain. The third book, Golden Transcendence is the most remarkable of them all.

But back to Phoenix Exultant. I won't spoil any of the developments this book offers (warning: some reviews below do), and it's difficult (having read all 3) to parse out what is now a blended understanding, but some general impressions:

This was a much more exciting read than the first book. Phaethons transition from immortal to mortal, his struggle for survival, and the effects such turmoil had on his basic belief system was at times mindblowing. The effects environment has in changing or reinforcing a mans basic virtue is always interesting, but when that man is thousands of years old, well, infinitely more so.

It was also intriguing to explore the basic history, tendencies, and roles each major character (and neuroform) play in this colorful and highly detailed future. In particular, the relationship between Daphne (Phaethons wife), their present, and VERY interesting past.

If you're like me, you'll sail through this book and enjoy every minute of it. Trust that as good as the first two volumes are, John Wright saved the best for last.

Enjoy

Christian Hunter
Santa Barbara, California

John C. Wright has done it again with a fantastic follow-up to "The Golden Age", which set the stage for a sweeping space opera pitting an adventerous soul against a complacent and stagnating society.

"The Phoenix Exultant" begins with our hero, Phaethon, in exile. He finds relative safety in a Seussian town peopled by the dregs and outcasts of the Golden Oecumene. Phaethon is trying to reclaim his ship, from which the book takes its title, but to do so he must first overcome the vice and lethargy of those around him, skirt the terms of his exile, and battle agents of his unknown enemy.

One of Mr. Wright's strengths is his ability to craft an amazing array of fascinating characters, and he certainly delivers again in this book. We learn quite a bit more about Phaethon's wife, Daphne. Or rather, it is a close copy of Daphne, which sets the stage for interesting complications in the love story. Some reviewers found the Daphne subplot too corny, but I felt it charming. Other interesting characters include, but are not limited to, Old-Woman-Of-The-Sea, the Bellipotent Composition, and the soldier Atkins, who sees a little action. There are many more characters, and Mr. Wright helpfully includes a lengthy list of "dramatis personae" at the beginning of the tale to help readers keep track.

The book also continues the philosophic and moral themes begun in the first volume. Phaethon, a man of ability, intelligence and ambition opposed in the first book by society's elite for threatening the peaceful order of civilization, is challenged in this story by the lowest rung of humanity, people who prefer to lose themselves to drugs or computer stimulation rather than to engage in productive and satisfying work. Phaethon also grapples with fundamental questions when he realizes whom he is fighting and comes to understand that they stand for everything anathema to his understanding of a rational and sane universe. Those looking for something meaty in their space opera will find plenty to gnaw on here.

As in the first book, there is plenty of imaginative technology kicking about Mr. Wright's future. He avoids the temptation to flaunt fundamental physics like the Second Law of Thermodynamics and the Special Theory of Relativity, but delights in speculating about the far-out possibilities offered by quantum weirdness and computing on a planetary scale. Practically each page has something weird and wonderful that would be worthy of a short story in its own right.

Finally, the writing is simply great. These novels have more in common with classic literature and plays than with the gritty, journalistic/pulp style that marks much science fiction today. It has been a long time since I've had the pleasure of simply savoring dialogue and turns of phrase in a science fiction book.

If there's anything negative to say about "The Phoenix Exultant" it is that it is wedged between two stronger tales (the sequel is "The Golden Trascendence", which I read before writing this review). The first book concluded by saying Phaethon's tale would be wrapped up in "The Phoenix Exultant", so it appears Mr. Wright may have had too much material for one sequel. This proved to be a good thing since the trilogy definitely stands as is, but the second volume perhaps suffered slightly by being made into a bridge between the firmer shores of the first and third books.

Nonetheless, I wholeheartedly recommend this book for those who liked the first one.

Having read all three volumes in this trilogy now, I can say that this is truly a masterpiece. John C. Wright manages to update Jack Vance into the nanotech/deity-computer age. His future universe is remarkably well-imagined, an all the more difficult feat since it takes place thousands of years in the future. But rather than create a "Dying Earth" going-forward-means-backwards milieu, as did Jack Vance and Gene Wolfe, Wright aggressively imagines a high tech (and, unlike Gene Wolfe, explicit rather than implicit) future. Godlike AIs, mass-minds, augmented humans, and many other creations populate this remarkable universe.

In these volumes, Wright shows himself a master of dialogue (here is where he most often resembles Vance), although he is occasionally somewhat too twee (the conversations between Daphne and Phaethon). He shows himself a master of plot, with a number of unexpected plot twists. And, as alluded to above, he shows himself a master of invention.

Strangely, the three volumes resemble the three Matrix movies in their nature. The first volume, The Golden Age, is by far the best, for the simple reason that the reader is immersed for the first time in this wonderfully realized world (just as in the Matrix). The Matrix Reloaded did not have the newness of the first movie, but compensated for it by dangling mysteries in front of the viewer and by dazzling pyrotechnics and action. This is largely the case for the second volume of Wright's trilogy, The Phoenix Exultant. We are familiar with Phaethon's world, so it is comfortable rather than new and exciting, but the plot itself drives us along. The third volume, the recently released The Golden Transcendence, is the least satisfying of the three, just as the third Matrix movie is the least satisfying, as what mysteries are revealed are not quite as interesting as we might have hoped. But it nonetheless is still a winner by any standards. Together, they represent a remarkable achievement.

So, get this if you love good science fiction, but also especially if you like:

1) Jack Vance
2) Gene Wolfe
3) Iain M. Banks
4) Walter Jon Williams' Aristoi
5) literate high tech space opera
6) far far future romance

These are, truly, very good books (and deserved to have better proofreading by Tor).

Phaeton, who is a character from Greek mythology. From wikipedia:
Perhaps the most famous version of the myth is given us through Ovid in his Metamorphoses (Book II). Phaeton seeks assurance that his mother, Clymene, is telling the truth that his father is the sun god Helios. When Phaeton obtains his father's promise to drive the sun chariot as proof, he fails to control it and is killed to prevent further disaster.

In The Golden Age, Phaeton (whose father actually controls a great solar array that powers civilization) agrees to have his recent memory erased to prevent censure/banishment for building a great starship to explore the universe, against the wishes of his society, even though his activities are legal. They fear he will birth an extra solar civilization that will eventually war with the home civilization. At the same time he loses his wife, who due to the stresses of his conflict, escapes reality by permanently immersing herself in a dream state. However, with Phaeton's recent memories erased, he is unaware of his recent past, but becomes curious when he encounters hints that something is amiss. He comes across his memories, which are metaphorically placed in a box, upon which is written:

"Sorrow, great sorrow, and deeds of renown without peer, within me sleep, for truth is here. Truth destroys the worst in man; pleasure destroys the best. If you love truth more than happiness, then open; otherwise, let rest."

Pretty cool! It waxes a little philosophical, and I think the books will probably devolve into way too much heavy philosophy, but it started off good.

First off, if you haven't read Wright's The Golden Age, just buy it. You could read Phoenix Exultant without having read it, but you would just be cutting yourself short on one of the most creative, visionary, and exciting science fiction trilogies.

Phoenix starts out right exactly where Golden Age stops. And pretty much just keeps plowing ahead. That may have sounded a little monotonous, but let me assure you Wright's epic is anything but. The most amazing aspect of Wright's writing, in my mind, is how he can cultivate a conflict and conspiracy, an enemy and allies that continue to evolve throughout this book and into the next one.

This book, to me, was one adventure right after the next with hardly any downtime in between. It's pretty much nonstop from start to finish. Mixing the movement of the plot with the action, you also have the zany but strangely familiar world Wright has created.What is so beautiful about this book, about the entire trilogy, is that the true conflict of the story lies in the impact of the technology of this future on mankind. That is the essential nature of science fiction.

So do I recommend it? Absolutely, especially if you like science fiction - but I highly recommend reading Golden Age first, and I'd even recommend trying to have Golden Transcendence on hand as well. That way you don't have to wait at all to continue the story.

You just know going into it that nothing much is going to happen in this second volume of The Golden Age trilogy, that author John C Wright is simply setting the stage for the last chapter. You know this not only because that's the way most trilogies are structured, but also because you've read that the publisher broke off this section of what was planned as a two-part work to make a financially rewarding third installment.

The Phoenix Exultant opens with our hero Phaethon beginning his exile on the Sri Lankan island of Talaimannar, a community of temporary and permanent exiles, a motley collection of the degenerate, the slothful and the drug and simulation addicted. True to his character, Phaethon upsets the established order by usurping what passes for the community's work boss and drug/sim supplier and launching small work projects to help his fellow exiles gain some degree of financial independence, projects from which Phaethon skims his share in order to buy communication time with the Neptunians, with whom he seals a contract to pilot his ship, the Phoenix Exultant. While amongst the lost, Phaethon meets up with another incarnation of Daphne, sent to help him escape his exile but who in the end seems to play no more significant role than comedic sidekick. Also on hand is Atkins, Earth's last soldier, an immortal military cliché who because of his existence outside the main computer net is able to help clarify bits of the plot.

By the time you open the first chapter of The Golden Transcendence, the concluding volume of this trilogy, which begins like the first, with Phaeton having lost his memory, you realize you were right, that you could have perhaps read the last chapter or two of The Phoenix Exultant and not really missed anything of any great significance to the overall story. You would have also sparred yourself a pious exposition on poverty, "strength-of-the-will" bromides that when alluded to amongst Phaethon's social and economic peers were unremarkable, but when doled out barefaced to the dispossessed tend to stick in the craw.

Even so, Wright has done such a spectacular job imagining his world and his characters that it's easy to overlook these flaws and simply enjoy spending a few hours in The Golden Age.

Rating System:
1 star = abysmal; some books deserve to be forgotten
2 star = poor; a total waste of time
3 star = good; worth the effort
4 star = very good; what writing should be
5 star = fantastic; must own it and share it with others


THE STORY:
Continuing right where Book1: The Golden Age left off, we find Phaethon exiled from society as he knows it. This story is of his attempt to rise to power in a society where it is a crime to associate with Phaethon, as he works to regain control of his ship, The Phoenix Exultant, and still live out his dream of reaching the stars.

THE BOOK:
In this second of a trilogy the author looses much of the ethical debates of the first book for one more physical in action. There still exists debates to boot, but the majority of the book is our protagonist and his allies working their way through the murk of deception and technology in order to identify who Phaethon's true enemy is and how a broke exile could leverage the system to gain him control of his ship again.

The setting, though away from the Peers and the rest of the Transcendence, remains vivid and colorful. Even in the areas of exiles and rejects, technology still is an overpowering force that governs the actions of men and Phaethon utilizes this to his advantage wherever possible.

The allies that emerge leave the reader glad for Phaethon and cheering...expectant of what is to come. Phaethon continues to show his intelligence as a protagonist which allows him to overcome obstacles that most of us would have shyed away from.

The story ends where one must again keep reading into the next book, but that isn't a bad thing. That just means a great story continues.

OVERALL:
If you've read the first book and enjoyed it you must keep reading. Once you read this book you'll feel compelled to keep reading more, as I am. So off I go to start the finale to this epic space saga. Don't miss out, get it and read it!

How would you survive in a society where people, computers, and even the equivalent of Automated Teller Machines (ATMs) refuse to acknowledge your existence? That's essentially the dilemma faced by Phaeton in "The Phoenix Exultant," which isn't quite as strong as its predecessor "The Golden Age" (2002). The story isn't so much about Phaeton's starship (which the book is titled after), as it is about his continued efforts to recapture it (and the recurring hurdles which get in his way). There are some twists and turns involving a clone of Phaeton's wife Daphne, who is convinced she's "the real deal."

"The Phoenix Exultant" is strong until two-thirds of the way through, when it takes a sudden left turn into a romance, followed by a comedy, but finally regains its footing to finish up just in time for the final book in the trilogy, "The Golden Transcendence" (2003). Those "odd" sections lend a different flavor to the narrative, but are a bit jarring, too.

Volumes two and three in this series are noted as being edited by David G. Hartwell, who also brings us "The Year's Best SF" series. Despite that, some spelling errors slip through. "Noumenal" (which denotes the technology for recording human personalities electronically) becomes "numenal" on two occasions, and a character is described as wearing a "back kimono." However, the web that Wright's storytelling weaves captivated me enough that I had to find out what happened next!

In all, slightly weaker, but still worth the effort... so you can move on to Volume 3!

I consider Wright's first book in the trilogy, "The Golden Age," to be one of the best reads one is likely to encounter in science fiction. This book, however, does not live up to the high standards set by its older brother--but nonetheless it is a good read in its own right.

"The Golden Age" is hard sci-fi crossed with deep philosophy and dropped into the middle of a labyrinth; "The Phoenix Exultant" is a Shakespearean comedy or romance, with heroic adventures, damsels in distress, pirates (yes, pirates!), spies, and soldiers. Without a doubt, Wright pulls off his elaborate plot and juggles his wide-ranging characters with skill. However, because a great chunk of it is told through the eyes of the novel's heroine, Daphne, the middle book just doesn't have the same "feel"--for lack of a better word--as the bookends.

Don't get me wrong, as this is still an excellent novel, one which does little to detract from the greatness of the trilogy. Like its brothers, this one was polished off over the course of a couple of days as it is so captivating. It rates 4 stars only because it is not quite as good as the other two.

Excluding where it seems the author delves a little too closely
into trivia related to the main characters romance this is probably
a continuation of one of the finest new works I've ever seen.

John Wright brings us to a world where machine intelligences co-exist with merely augmented human intelligences, where immortality has long since been achieved and poses the question, "what's next?" for humanity and intelligent life.