Foundation and Chaos (Second Foundation Trilogy) (Hardcover)

~ (Author) "Hari Seldon stood in slippered feet and a thick green scholar' robe on the enclosed parapet of an upperside maintenance tower, looking from an altitude..." (more)
Key Phrases: neural whip, prime radiant, positronic brain, Linge Chen, Hari Seldon, Vara Liso (more...)

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

This is book number two in the new Second Foundation Trilogy being written by hard science fiction authors Gregory Benford, Greg Bear, and David Brin, otherwise known as the "Killer B's." In this book, Bear continues where Benford's Foundation's Fear left off, as the trial of legendary psychohistorian Hari Seldon is about to begin. Bear writes with a style uncannily similar to Foundation creator Isaac Asimov's, and he even manages to incorporate some of Asimov's own writing in the novel. Aside from the trial, Bear also focuses on the nearly immortal robots that serve the Foundation, including R. Daneel Olivaw, who is set to guide one of the Foundation's first great undertakings. But Olivaw runs into trouble from an unexpected quarter, his best operative, Lodovik Trema, whose positronic brain has been irrevocably altered in a strange accident that has given him freedom from the supposedly immutable laws of robotics. --Craig Engler

Review

"Brings out the complexities of a galactic empire that Asimov

never filled out."

-- -- Denver Post

"Brings out the complexities of a galactic empire that Asimov never filled out." -- Denver Post

"Exciting and well written." -- Publishers Weekly --This text refers to the Mass Market Paperback edition.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Hardcover: 352 pages
• Publisher: Eos; First Printing edition (February 17, 1998)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0061052426
• ISBN-13: 978-0061052422
• Product Dimensions: 8.2 x 5.8 x 1.1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (52 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #1,000,834 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

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• This is item 2 in The Second Foundation Series.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

46 of 48 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars So you want to talk about ROBOTS? Fine, let's!, January 8, 2000

By A Customer

This is a hard hard book to review.

Firstly, I must congratulate the author who did a fantastic job after the 1st mess of a book to put the series back together again. The concise, clear style is much appreciated by this reader (despite what anyone may say about individuality and style, the readers here are the original fans of Asimov and therefore probably prefer the Good Doctor's style! ).

But more damage is done precisely because of this. Benford's work I can completely ignore because it is so far from it's foundations (sorry ;-)) that it's virtually unrecognisable. The same cannot be said about 'Foundation and Chaos'. It's an easily recognisable/acceptable episode in the Asimovian Galaxy.

Spoiler alert: I'm going to discuss plotting, characters and theme here.

Firstly, thank you Mr. Bear for getting rid of (or as much as you could) wormholes, memes, sims and most of the other unnecessary additions by Benford.

Secondly,why is everyone focusing so much on robots? This is the FOUNDATION series - a series originally about human resourcefulness and ability to triumph, remember? This is NOT THE ROBOT series. Just because the Good Doctor decided they take place in the same universe doesn't mean robots now fill every page of a FOUNDATION book. In the 3 foundation novels that robots were mentioned (F&Earth, Prelude and Forward), only 1 novel had a significant portion of the novel devoted to robots. In this new series we are presented with 2 (and mostly likely 3) novels packed full of robots.

Don't take me wrong - I like the robot series very much - probably more than I did the original Foundation series. I whooped with joy when Daneel appears in 'Foundation and Earth' and was glad to greet him like an old friend in all subsequent novels. But a Foundation novel filled with robotic characters, robotic underground wars, robotic betrayal and humans in pursuit of robots? Where's the Foundation in this novel?

Alright Killer Bs - if you want to play with robots, go head. But at least do it well. Alas, there is very little left of what feels like the original Asimov robots. The simple/virtuous humanity present in the Good Doctor's robots are practically gone and we are left with quibbling, controlling, assuming beings. I don't like any of them in this novel, including Daneel and I blame the authors for that. By turning Daneel into the God-like figure he now is, he has lost our sympathy and empathy. He is no longer gentle Daneel who has carried an immense weight alone for so long (F&Earth, Prelude). He is now omniscient, suffocating, cold and calculating. Why?

The Calvinian robots is a ludicrous idea - where have they been all these years? How did they leave the Spacer worlds? (Neither earth nor Settlers allowed robots) And what is the logic behind hurting a human (Seldon) to defeat another robot to promote the 3 Laws? To harm/change Seldon's mind is a violation of the 1st Law. To do this for future good is clearly the Zeroth Law working. What gives?

And finally... why Seldon? As a previous reader pointed out - we've had enough of Seldon. Asimov devoted 2 novels to him. We want to know what happened to Golan Trevise and the fate of the rest of the galaxy.

4 stars for bringing me a whole night of solid entertainment and for bringing back, if not in spirit, the Asimov universe.

15 of 15 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Ah, definitely a sigh of relief due here, July 21, 2003

By	Neal C. Reynolds (Indianapolis, Indiana) - See all my reviews (TOP 500 REVIEWER)    (REAL NAME)

This review is from: Foundation and Chaos: The Second Foundation Trilogy (Foundation Trilogy Series) (Mass Market Paperback)

I hate repeating what has been said in the other reviews, but let's be honest and admit that FOUNDATION'S FEAR by Gregory Benford was abysmal, and this book by Greg Bear has done much to get back on track. I did groan a bit when the sims, Joan of Arc and Voltaire, came back in it, but Bear got stuck with them thanks to Benford's bizarre plotting, and did what he could with them.

Basically, this deals with Hari Seldon's trial and the conflict between two factions of robots, those who identify with Susan Calvin, the pioneer in Robotics, and those who identify with the legendery R. Daneel Olivaw. Throw in a couple of mentalists at odds with each other, and you have a rather good Foundation novel.

Read FOUNDATION'S FEAR if you think you must, but it's not necessary because this far better written second novel stands well by itself.

9 of 9 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars True to Asimov form. Good addition to series., July 3, 2001

By	Jeff Nyman (Chicago, IL USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Foundation and Chaos: The Second Foundation Trilogy (Foundation Trilogy Series) (Mass Market Paperback)

Unlike Foundation's Fear (the first book in the new Foundation trilogy), I can categorically recommend this book to anyone who is interested in the Foundation saga started by Isaac Asimov. Granted, you have to read Foundation's Fear to really get the full benefit from this book - but this story was told in a much better fashion and one that, in my opinion, was more true to the Asimov mold of writing and thinking. (In fact, a few times it was easy for me to forget that this was not vintage Asimov.)

The story is very well fleshed-out and the plot (and plotting) are excellent, including the political aspects. (After all, Hari Seldon always operated in the sphere of the political regime). I highly recommend it. It makes slogging my way through the first book in the new trilogy (which I was not as thrilled with) well worth the effort. Foundation and Chaos also ties in very nicely with the events from the Part I section of the original 1951 Foundation novel and fills in a lot of gaps as well as keeping the wonderful Robots-Foundation combination story going. We also get a little taste of what the events in Asimov's Foundation and Earth foreshadowed.