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10 of 10 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
McCarthy Fails to Disappoint (You Read that Right), May 31, 2005
Wil McCarthy has managed to quickly become the favorite author of many, being mentioned in the same breath as Asimov, Bova, or Heinlein. This is due in no small part to his ability to at once fascinate the reader with the minutae and still deliver a sweepingly epic adventure. But a warning to new McCarthy fans: don't read this book. That is, do not read it unless you have first read "The Wellstone" and "Lost in Transmission". (Neither of those are responsibly read without having first read "The Collapsium".)
In TCTM, McCarthy rounds out the story arc begun with the Children's Revolt. Conrad Mursk and a few of his fellow conspirators return from exile on Barnard as the refugees of a dying civilization only to discover that the scarcity and overpopulation that brought their world to the brink also threatens the Queendom of Sol. Mursk, a grown man of several hundred years now, is soon thrust into an ambitious project by none other than King Bruno de Towaji himself. In order to provide a home to the billions of refugees from failing solar and extra solar settlements, the moon is to be squozen into a super-planette rechristened Lune. Just in time, the project is completed, and then...all hell breaks loose, and the world comes to an end.
Fast foward a thousand years in the future, and the immorbid Conrad, aided by the last of the Queendom's children, sets out on a quest to save the retrograde civilization of Lune from total destruction by a maniacal king who commands an army of robots. To accomplish this, Conrad must retrieve King Bruno for one last swashbuckling adventure to save mankind's children from extinction.
While I'm hesitant to derive social commentary from sci-fi adventure novels, this final tome is more than just a light-hearted adventure or an abstract exploration of social strife arising from the use of technology. It is in fact (deliberately or not), a pointed reminder that mankind can in fact engineer its own demise. Whether through the nuclear genie of radiological and atomic weapons, the pandoras box of nanotechnology (and nano-pollution), or the threat to liberty of the expanding capacity of supercomputers to catalog information about individuals, if we as a race aren't careful with the use of technology, we move to abuse, and then destruction.
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8 of 8 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
My reviews of previous books were wrong(sort of), October 21, 2005
I can admit it. this book is just plain good. I had said that I bought the entire series after reading the Collapsium (which was great) and was disappointed through the next two books. I was not looking forward to this book, but this was as good as the first book. Excellent in fact, and I discovered the difference. In both the first and last book, which are good, the plot is characterized by man versus man (or robot) and in the other two books (the second and third) the plot is mostly man vs society (yawn) and man vs nature (yawn). Now there are elements of each in all four books but the main plots are thos I just listed. Let me tell you man vs nature/society just is not that entertaining. It was intelligent and thoughtful but not that fun. The first and last books are also intelligent (which the author has obviously) but enjoyable. Read through the second and third novels (which should be combined into one shorter book) and find the light at the end of the tunnel. The series is saved.
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5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Close to one of the best, and most overlooked, recent Hard SF series, May 13, 2006
With To Crush the Moon Wil McCarthy brings one of the most satisfying recent series of Hard SF novels to a close. This series, collectively called, perhaps, The History of the Queendom of Sol, began in 2001 with The Collapsium (itself an expansion of a 1999 novella). That novel told of brilliant scientist Bruno de Towaji, who saves the Solar System three times from the dangers of super high-tech combined with a jealous rival. The Collapsium introduced the key technologies of the series: various types of programmable matter, and matter transmission. The latter technology, combined with an editing process, allowed for practical immortality. This first book was cheeky and playful and rather Tom Swift-like in ways.
The subsequent three novels are more closely linked, and quite a bit darker in tone. By the end of The Collapsium, Bruno had married the Queen of Sol. In The Wellstone (2003) his son, Bascal, was the ringleader of a group of young people frustrated by their lack of opportunity in a world of immortals. The main character is Bascal's friend Conrad Mursk. The two of them and a large group of rebellious youngsters are exiled to Barnard's Star at the end of the book, and Lost in Transmission (2004) tells of the establishment and ultimate failure of the Barnard's Star colony. Conrad chooses to return to Sol, and To Crush the Moon is the story of what happens after his return.
The Wellstone and Lost in Transmission both had sections set thousands of years in the future, with Conrad (now called Radmer) retrieving Bruno de Towaji from self-imposed exile and returning with him to an altered Moon (now called Lune), where the last significant remnants of humanity are fighting a war with emancipated robots. Earth and the other major planets have been "Murdered". To Crush the Moon tells first of the crisis in Solar System politics that led both to the alteration and terraforming of Luna into Lune, and then to the tragic missteps resulting in the "Murder" of Earth. Conrad and Bruno are central to these events, and so are their wives, Queen Tamra and Xiomary Li Weng (Xmary). Much of this section is savvy portrayal of what seems like inevitable political problems - particularly problems dealing with fanatics who wish to restore death to society, and with the impatient returnees from various failed star colonies. Then the conclusion continues the story of the far future war on Lune, with Radmer leading Bruno de Towaji on a desperate mission to, quite literally, save humanity.
The story is satisfying on multiple levels. The scientific (and politico-economic) speculation remains scintillating. The pure adventure aspects are thrilling. The prose is clever, sardonic, successfully darkly funny even in the shadow of the deaths of billions. Conrad and Bruno are very well realized characters, though most of the remaining characters are a bit flatter. (In particular the leading women, Tamra and Xmary, never really come to life.) Lines like "Bruno was elbow-deep in wormholes. Not literally, of course - he'd lost more than one arm that way already -" are simply delights. The ultimate scope of the story is really impressive, in space, time, and theme. The ending is perhaps a mild disappointment - it's logical enough, and the reader is not cheated, but it seems just a touch off tonally.
I've truly enjoyed this series of novels, and I confess to slight puzzlement that it hasn't received more notice. For my taste, this is what 21st Century SF ought to be. (Of course there are other recent SF stories that are also "what 21st Century SF ought to be", such as Charles Stross's Accelerando stories.) The latter three novels have all been mass market originals - perhaps their failure to appear between hard covers has told against them. If so, that's a shame - I urge readers to seek out these first rate novels.
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