The Sky Road (Fall Revolutions Series) [Paperback]

Ken McLeod (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: May 4, 2000 | Series: Fall Revolutions Series

Centuries after its catastrophic Deliverance, humanity is again reaching into space. And one young scholar working in the space ship yard, Clovis colha Gree, could make the difference between success and failure. For his mysterious lover, Merrial, has seduced him into the idea of extrapolating the ship's future from the dark archives of the past. A past in which, centuries before, Myra Godwin faced the end of a different space age - her rockets redundant, her people rebellious, and her borders defenceless against the Sino-Soviet Union. As Myra appealed to the falling empires of the West for help, she found history turning on her own dubious past - and on her present decisions. Decisions which, centuries later, will determine the future of the new space age. Merrial's people, the itinerant computer engineers, know this. And they know that the truth they seek lies within the secret files left by Myra Godwin.

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

In the series that started with The Star Fraction, Ken MacLeod has created a future history whose genesis was an argument about anarchism between a group of left-wing students in the '70s. The destruction and renaissance of civilization, here and elsewhere in the human galaxy, turns on this argument. In the fourth book, MacLeod productively fills in some of the gaps. This is the story of Myra, Trot-turned-entrepreneur, whose nuclear deterrence-for-hire is central to the event known by some as the Fall and others as the Deliverance. It is also the story of young Clovis, part-time worker in the yard where the first space-ship in centuries is being built, part-time scholar trying to find out what Myra the Deliverer was really like.

MacLeod's readers are used to his quirky and intelligent take on the world of power politics and his charmingly cynical gift for engaging and engaged protagonists. What this book also has is a profound sense of the beauty of a simpler and stiller world; MacLeod's real gift is his capacity to see all sides of a question, even when he is sure of the answer. --Roz Kaveney, Amazon.co.uk --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

From Publishers Weekly

Unlike most American SF writers, MacLeod (The Stone Canal), a Scot, has little good to say about the U.S., democracy or capitalism. Indeed, the future history within which he sets his complex but compelling novels pretty much assumes the collapse of Western-style democracy in the near future and its replacement by a crazy-quilt of various socialist, libertarian and anarchist states. MacLeod's current tale follows two separate plot lines. In the near future, Myra Godwin-Davidova, an American expatriate, former Trotskyist and current leader of a small, high-tech socialist workers' state surrounded by Kazakhstan, struggles to keep her nation afloat against the onslaught of the Sheenisov, an aggressive nation bent on world conquest. As her political alliances crumble, Myra's only trump card is a cache of outdated nuclear weapons planted decades ago in Earth orbit, but if she uses them she could destroy the world. Hundred of years later, Clovis colha Gree lives in a bucolic near-utopia almost totally lacking in violence. Although his people treat virtually all electronics and computers with superstitious dread, the scientists of his day, called tinkers, are attempting to build the first spaceship since Myra's distant era. Clovis, a young scholar working on the spaceship, plunges into intrigue when a secret cabal of tinkers uses him to recover forbidden computer data. The intellectual difficulty of MacLeod's work may prevent him from acquiring a mass readership, but his complex plotting, crisply delineated military action, well-drawn characters and trademark byzantine radical politics are sure to endear him to a growing number of aficionados. (Sept.)
Copyright 2000 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 304 pages
• Publisher: Orbit; New Ed edition (May 4, 2000)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1857239679
• ISBN-13: 978-1857239676
• Product Dimensions: 5 x 0.9 x 7.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 7.8 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 3.2 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (15 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #2,698,271 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Ken MacLeod's SF novels have won the Prometheus Award and the BSFA award, and been shortlisted for the Hugo and Nebula Awards. He lives near Edinburgh, Scotland.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

8 of 8 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Excellent, Engaging Novel of Politics and AI, August 7, 2000

By 

Richard R. Horton (Webster Groves, MO United States) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: The Sky Road (Hardcover)

This is another excellent, engaging, novel from a fairly new Scottish writer, just now making his mark in the United States. This probably does not quite jar my favorite of his novels, The Stone Canal (1996), from its position at the top of my personal MacLeod heap, but it's very fine, with yet another differently organized somewhat anarchic semi-utopia on display, as well as yet another look at the turbulent 21st century, and the menace of Artificial Intelligence.

Ken MacLeod's new book is an intriguing offshoot from his previous three novels. (It is not necessary to have read those books to appreciate The Sky Road.) In this future, the world has fractured into numerous smaller states by the early 21st Century, essentially in a continuation of the process begun in the ex-communist states in the 1980s. In addition, Artificial Intelligences begin to emerge, not always planned, and not always benevolent. The three books, in addition to the persistent worry about AI's, portray a variety of political organizations, and forms of organization, most notably perhaps the anarcho-socialist society of the Solar System and the anarcho-capitalist society of New Mars, in the time of The Cassini Division.

The Sky Road is kind of an "alternate history" of MacLeod's future. The earlier parts, chronologically, of The Stone Canal, and all of The Star Fraction, are set in a common past to both The Sky Road and to The Cassini Division, but one of the events in The Stone Canal goes a different way in The Sky Road. Like The Stone Canal (and, to a lesser extent, The Cassini Division), this book is told in two threads, one in the past, in 2059, and the other some centuries in the future. The pastward thread follows Myra Godwin-Davidova, a minor character in The Stone Canal. Myra, 105 years old, is the head of the government of a mini-state near Kazakhstan, called the International Scientific and Technical Worker's Republic. At the opening of the action, the Sino-Soviet Alliance, or the Sheenisov, is advancing on Kazakhstan. Both the reformed UN and Dave Reid's Mutual Protection Society are trying to take control of the world, partly from space, and to stop the Sheenisov. Myra goes on a whirlwind tour of Kazakhstan, Turkey, the US and the UK, looking for military assistance. What she has to offer are the world's remaining supply of nuclear weapons. But her problem is, it's not at all clear who the real enemy is, or for that matter how many enemies there are. She also deals with her personal problems: her age, her guilt over such betrayals of her past ideals as the use of slave labour, and the selling of nuclear protection, and her loss of yet another loved one in suspicious circumstances.

The other thread features Clovis colha Gree, a young student in an odd, somewhat Utopian, Scotland. He is working on a project building a spaceship: the first spaceship to be built since the mysterious "Deliverance". It seems that since this "Deliverance" the world has reorganized itself on a rather pastoral model. Clovis' field of study is history, particularly the life of the "Deliverer". (The reader figures out right quick that the "Deliverer" is Myra Godwin-Davidova.) Clovis meets a beautiful woman called Merrial, and they fall tumultuously in love. But Merrial is a tinker, and the tinkers are regarded with suspicion by the rest of society, as they are the only people who deal with the somewhat restricted computer technology available in this future. Clovis is drawn by his love for Merrial and his thirst for knowledge about the Deliverer to a questionable search for secret files of the Deliverer's: ostensibly to help protect the spaceship project. But this search leads them not only to some anti-hagiographic knowledge about the Deliverer (her use of nuclear weapons, for example), but also to some potential use of the "black logic", the "path of power".

The two threads converge to reveal to the reader some, at least, of what's going on: what the Deliverance really was, and what "black logic" might be, and part of the nature of this future society. It's intriguing, and clever, and by the end quite moving. The only weakness is that I found Merrial and Clovis' affair just a bit convenient: not all that easy to believe. (To explain exactly why would involve spoilers.) I also found the political machinations of Myra's time hard to follow, but that weakness is in me, partly, and partly, I think, its a feature: MacLeod 21st century really is a chaotic time. I also was impressed again by MacLeod's clever way with a phrase. His prose is sound, but only some of the time does it sing. (The first chapter is quite impressive in this way, but he doesn't really maintain that peak level.) However, throughout there are dry asides, and clever plays on words, and mordant observations that hit home.

Ken MacLeod continues to be one of the most exciting new SF writers. His books are politically intriguing, and honest, also full of nice SFnal speculation about future technology, nicely written, and fast moving. The characters are well-drawn, and almost always ambiguous. Each of his books is worth reading, and The Sky Road is one of his best.

5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Reading Fiction, Lesson One: Start at the begging of the series., November 29, 2005

By 

Terra Nova "Scifi_Socialist" (London, UK) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Sky Road (Paperback)

I couldn't help but to leave this small piece of advice for those complaining about obscure references and an overwhelmed feeling due to plot points they failed to grasp (or indeed, viewed as inconsequential rambling on Mr Mcleods part).

If the fourth book in a series is the first you read, then OF COURSE you're not going to have a clue with regards to obscure references and knowing-winks-and-nods to past events and characters.

For the love of god, read the series and put the book into some form of context before slapping a 2 star rating on it. You're putting off more patient prospective-readers who may well take the time and effort to become properly versed in the back story before leaping in for the final lap and then moaning that they don't know what's going on...

An excellent book and a wonderful series, the more positive elements of the other reviews here are all spot on... Not to be missed if you are a fan of Hamilton or Reynolds... Or like myself, have strong leftist/socialist tendencies and a love of sci-fi.

11 of 14 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Im a Believer, October 4, 2000

By 

Sheldon S. Kohn - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Sky Road (Hardcover)

Before reading MacLeod's "The Sky Road," I read his "The Cassini Division." My review of "The Cassini Division" reflected the confusion I had while trying to work my way through the often-obscure text. My initial impression was that, for the most part, the glowing reviews I had read of MacLeod's work had been much too generous.

Fortunately, I did not let my initial disappointment with "The Cassini Division" sour me completely on MacLeod. "The Sky Road" is one of the finest science fiction novels I have read in quite some time. MacLeod is worthy of the accolades and praise he has been receiving. However, I echo other reviewers' advice that readers should tackle "The Sky Road" before turning their attention to "The Cassini Division."

In alternate chapters, "The Sky Road" jumps back and forth between the story of Myra Gowin-Davidova, who faced a worldwide crisis in her time, and that of Clovis colha Gree, who lives in Scotland far in the future when mankind is preparing to venture back into space for the first time since "The Deliverance." Clovis, a would-be scholar, wants to write a biography of The Deliverer, who is none other than Myra. One of the interesting and successful aspects of the novel is MacLeod's juxtaposition of a character acting in times of crisis with a far-removed biographer attempting to understand what happened in a time for which he has no context. MacLeod seems to argue that History is a matter of context, as much as it is a matter of anything. Many would agree.

The novel is a lot of fun for those who are a bit left-leaning, or at least left-inclined. In MacLeod's alternative future, the fall of the Soviet Union turns out to have been a mere counter-revolutionary moment. Myra herself, who is ultimately a bit of a 21st century Joan of Arc, is Head of State for a small soviet-style republic known as the ISTWR (International Scientists and Technical Workers Republic). In the crisis of her times, she is the only one who can save the world from itself in the act known as "The Deliverance." Another interesting aspect of the novel is MacLeod's exploration of how spontaneous actions taken in the heat of the moment become mythic to all who seek to understand and explain the way that powerful personalities shape their times.

In "The Sky Road," MacLeod demonstrates why such praise has been lavished upon his small canon. "The Cassini Division" is much too vague and referential to an unknown alternative history. In contrast, "The Sky Road" stands on its own as an entertaining tale. It reminds me of what I liked about science fiction in the first place.