Customer Reviews

Rocheworld

5 star:		(5)
4 star:		(3)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(2)

 

 

Like most of Robert Forward's books, this one is for those who love Science at least as much as fiction. Though the life forms in Rocheworld were not as interesting as those he created in Dragon's Egg, I appreciate the fact that he continued to challenge the idea that all life should be (even remotely) like that on Earth. The idea of a culture far beyond ours intellectually, without the least bit of industry or technology also questions assumptions about what is an "advanced" civilization. But I think my favorite parts of this book were the ideas for long-distance space travel (Forward pioneered the use of solar sails) and the physics of the double-egg shaped world, including the tides and "snow" under the ammonia ocean.

"Rocheworld" is one of my all-time favorite sc-fi reads. I am glad Robert L. Forward was able to expand on his original manuscript to make this new improved version of "Flight of the Dragonfly", --retitled "Rocheworld". This book is about light-sail travel to a very far away twin world system that has very original aquatic aliens--a really grand adventure with four sequels to read.

This is the only Robert Forward book i've read, but I would like to try some more. The "Fluben" are the most interesting aliens i've read about except maybe the "Moties" from "The mote in god's eye". They are very diffrent anatomically from human beings ,which is logical ,and they are all mathematical geniuses. They're all brain. that is, their whole body ( which is a cloud of a dense fluid hovering in the ocean )is allso the thinking organ. They can become smaller, tighter and harder, form a "rock" and in that state they are even more smart then usual ( and the usual is something like 400 i.q's ). Another thing about this book is that the aliens and the humans don't fight, they get along and like each other. the opponent is nature. Buy the book, it's an interesting read.

This book has SPACE MARINES, capital, used non-ironically. That tells you how seriously this book should be taken right off the bat. The first main character we meet, General Virginia Jones, is not only a SPACE MARINE but the VERY BEST LIGHTSAIL INTERCEPTOR PILOT in the SOLAR SYSTEM. Described as such not by another character, but by the *narrator*. These aren't characters, they're caricatures! In fact that's too generous; the characters' only distinguishing features are their names and occupations; they have no real unique character features, not even stereotypical ones. They're just *insert name and occupation*. It only gets more ridiculous. Drone satellites and probes carried aboard the Prometheus for some reason can speak and have personality, generally ridiculous cartoon character personalities. For example, the seismic probes SLAM and SMASH get dialogue that seems torn straight from Scrappy-doo (paraphrasing, "Where is it? Let me at it! I wanna SMASH it!").

The politics are also laughable. It's fairly understandable that he would assume the continued existence of the Soviet Union, but it was just bad luck it was published just before its fall. But the 'Greater United States?' NASA renamed to GNASA (*Greater* National Aeronautics and Space Administration)? This is all pure cheese.

Of course this is one of the scientists who pioneered the concept of lightsails, so the physics of his space travel is absolutely right on. Unfortunately the same can't be said of his grasp of biology/medicine, or as mentioned above, AI. So that the crew can make the 40-year journey to Rocheworld without being elderly at the end, they are given a drug called, get this, 'No-Die'. Yes, 'No-Die.' The drug slows the aging process by three-quarters, but for some never-explained reason reduces intelligence by the same amount. But the kicker is, this drug had *never before been tested* with a large group over anything like the time frame of the journey. The US government actually spends hundreds of billions of dollars constructing an interstellar spaceship and gives its crew a drug which might reduce them to permanent imbecility, for all they know.

There really is a worthwhile story to be told here, but Forward is not the author to tell it. The science is spot-on, the description of the Barnard's Star system is fascinating, and his aliens are genuinely original and interesting. Unfortunately I can only recommend this to the most hardcore fans of hard sci-fi, who would be willing to overlook its considerable flaws as fiction in favor of the accurate and truly fascinating space flight.

This is my favorite version of the three similar stories, all by Dr Forward. I first read Flight of the DragonFly (4.5 stars). A couple of years later, I read the full version of Rocheworld (Flight + parts of an earlier Rocheworld edition + additional material) and all of its sequels. I liked it even more than Dragon's Egg, my previous Forward Favorite.

Of course, the plane has to crash. Other than that, great story, solid science. What flight of the Dragonfly was meant to be.

I've never read much science fiction in my day, much less books with more hard scifi than fantasy elements, but Forward does a really good job of keeping the novice scifi reader hooked in the book, even when describing the gravitational pulls of binary planets or Newtonian law and how it affects the propulsion of a ship powered by a lightsail. I would definitely recommend this book to anyone who wants to get into the more factual section of scifi and away from the fantasy worlds of Star Wars and Stargate.

RLF is another one of my favorite authors...

Too bad he died...

If you like hard science fiction - you will like this book.

MJL

The author was clearly someone who loved science. However, in his attempt to describe the science in way too much detail, he forgot things such as logic. There are too many plot holes in both science and characters' actions that just shouldn't have been made. Just one, mid-level, example is sending all your pilots down on a single expedition. There are others, such as his lack of understanding of Hodgkins and its cures (I was diagnosed with it while he was writing the novel, I know his stats are off). Then there's a big one that I won't mention because it's key to the story.

What saves the book is the combination of two things. First, his love of science is very clear and enjoyable, and he only mildly overdoes is -- not to Melville standards. Second, while his humans often relate in very stereotypical manners, his aliens are fairly interesting.

It's a nice, average, hard science-fiction read.

This is a really good story which in fact has a high probability to really occur. A sailing spacecraft is in fact possible. The star system that is visited seems to be possible, even if it isn't very likely from a celestial point of view that two planets should exist in such a constellation. I will anyway recommend this book!