In the twenty-first century, American explorers discover alien teleportation and time-travel equipment on the moon, which leads them into a multi-dimensional struggle with a maleficent entity who plans to obliterate the universe.
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4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
"White Light" like, strong start/middle, confused ending,
By A Customer
This review is from: The Transmigration of Souls (Mass Market Paperback)
This was the first book by Barton I ever read. Albeit some of the ideas (stargates etc...) are quite worn out by now, they are intricately rendered. Interesting depiction of a background US isolated from the rest of the decaying world, employing alien technology to create a nation of immortal but infantile shapechangers. Also interesting theme of the Universe as something of a software toolkit. I found the start and middle of this "stargate"-like story actually very good, but found the end a huge letdown. It then starts to borrow to much there from Heinlein and other "classicals" to remain original, and gets entangled to much into absurd many-world quantum theoretical stuff (which the author seems to like - a little to much, for my taste). At least the "SF author becomes god" part is somewhat funny... Overall, this story is very very similar in theme, structure, setup, ideas and execution to "White Light" from the same author, albeit not so extremely entangled in sex as that story. I'd judge "Transmigration" the better story, overall, with more "involvement" in the story than e.g "Alpha Centauri". Albeit its not as good as "Acts of Conscience" or the excellent "When We Were Real" by far, I'd still judge it as recommended.
3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
A fascinating and complicated mosaic of life in a future probabilistic universe.,
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This review is from: The Transmigration of Souls (Mass Market Paperback)
I've read this book twice now but the 2nd time allowed me a deeper understanding of my first impression. During the first read I was somewhat annoyed at the display of sexual oriented obsessive/compulsive thoughts stemming from his main characters regardless of their primary occupation at any one point in the story line. But, I honestly admit this annoyance may stem from this readers stage of life (older) where sexual thoughts have been supplanted by other occupations much more interesting to me at this time of life.
That being said: My first read-through was too fast, I was too impatient and at the end I'd sense enough to realize that I'd comprehended enough of Barton's story-telling genius to know I missed out on more of its mysteries than I'd perceived. Rereading the book filled in details that allowed me to form a more satisfying appreciation of his multiverse concept story and the driving spiritual/psychological compulsions which motivate his character's along a weirdly fantastic journey through probable realities in their ultimate search for God or at least the Committee that forms the being called God (smiley face here as this is my personal observation). Obviously the multiverse, probabilistic universe concept predates Barton but he puts the concept to good use. Barton's storytelling is fast paced with few built-in redundancies allowing the reader to luxuriate or 'space-out', the scenery and emotions are descriptively well imagined and thought provoking. To briefly recap the story: After the Americans discovered the moon's Stargate system they reap the benefit of other alien technologies via explorations but they are careful to guard these secrets from the remaining world by building a wall around their territory and shutting themselves away from the rest of humanity. Literally. Within their self-imposed isolation the Americans, always known as a vastly superior consumer society (obviously not a compliment), have obtained knowledge which allows them to consume forever: They achieve immortality and the ability to manipulate matter. But multiverse exploration eventually confronts them with a terrifying discovery that they try to outrun (by leaving the gate systems and hiding back on earth in the American blockade). Fortunately for the story the American soldier (our heroine 100 years later) who was ordered to blow up the moon's Stargate disobeyed orders for reasons not to be explained here. So, the Stargate remains intact on the moon awaiting its next discoverer. Some 100 years or so later (while the Americans have been living it up and growing bored) a foreign nation sends its own team to the moon with no real clue as to what lays waiting. They are driven by the diminishment of earth's available resources and predictions of man's ultimate demise. Although the story begins on earth it leaves shortly thereafter never to return. Such is the concept of reaching a cusp and triggering a probabilistic time line. As a descriptive side note about Barton's writing style: It's never explained how the American's achieved immortality but fairly early on while ½ of the main characters (American soldiers) are chasing the other ½ (the foreign country astronauts who inadvertently discover the Moon's gate system) through very alien worlds within the multiverse the source of the Americans immortality is hinted at. During the chase the American team leader Astrid Kincaid (the soldier originally ordered to blow up the Moon's gate) makes reference to her symbiote hoping that it can withstand (and protect her) against the hard radiation weapon assaulting her team by intelligent alien green ants astride their praying mantis type beasties. The symbiote reference answered my lingering curiosity as to the means of immortality (another `Stargate' series concept). This approach is typical of how Barton slowly reveals answers to the many secrets constantly encountered by his characters (and his readers) in their adventures. Answers to secrets begging to be understood. Barton enriches his story throughout with clever, subtle references to other famous SF concepts originated from Jules Verne and Edgar Rice Burroughs through EE Doc Smith, Robert Heinlein, Isaac Asimov, and so forth. It's these concepts that make the story line fun. His brilliant and exciting (multi)universe is limited only by the depth of imagination in his readers and interestingly enough by the reluctance of his characters to believe what they see in front of them. That is until they take a second look (reading) then all becomes clear(er). They can then react with better comprehension as does the reader.
1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Internalized literary scie-fi - a must read,
By A Customer
This review is from: The Transmigration of Souls (Mass Market Paperback)
William Barton, author of what is beginning to be a significant corpus of literary science fiction, does it, again, here. I don't mean literary in the classic sence, though. Barton excells at referencing the sci-fi literature. He alludes to the great works of the genre for purpose. Too bad, I think, that many readers of the genre are not noticing it. This is a writer with great potential. In the present work, among his best, Americans have uncovered an alien technology hidden on the moon and have used it to makethemselves rather god-like. But these are gods afraid of the return of the REAL gods. At heart a quest work like Simmons "Endymion" or, even, "Gilgamesh," Barton's work glows with a knowledge of the genre and the will to pull the past into the present. One of the best (and least appreciated) writers around.
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