Heaven's Reach (The Second Uplift Trilogy #3) Mass Market Paperback – May 11, 1999

Space Opera and Greed in the far future
A reader will invest in the literary characters who make daring plans and lead others into danger. Alas, Brin abandons many as their research vessel runs from one planet to another. (minus one star) Still, they loom in memories as remaining crew struggle with equipment and the actions of other species. As an AI says:
'My point is that this ship, Streaker, has suffered terrible persecution because it represents a danger and an affront to reverent tradition all across the Five Galaxies.
The relics and data you carry appear to threaten deeply held creeds.' ( p. 351)
Neither the Galactic Encyclopedia (seen in Sundiver (The Uplift Saga, Book 1) and Startide Rising (The Uplift Saga, Book 2)), or treaties protect them. Yet their goal is return to Earth.
This series breaks ground by measuring in unfamiliar units of time, velocity, communications and routes to other star systems. Nothing is familiar. In fact, travel through 'E Space' involves experiencing psychedelic illusions clustered around a tubular representation of realspace. We meet Harry, a chim who patrols and fights predatory constructs there. Loyal to the end, his last mission sends him into the blackness of space. (minus one star)
The book is an extended discourse on species that reach the peak of enlightenment and depart the temporal world.

Amazing scientific and mathematical concepts are interwoven throughout this continuation of the saga involving many of the characters introduced in the previous "Uplift Universe" novels. I did enjoy the novel but I suspect my concern for the characters was developed in the previous works and not particularly expanded here. "Heaven's Reach" seems a little hurried and sketchy despite its length. Many of the events seem too fantastic as to exceed credibility. There is literally too much deus ex machine for my taste. While there was follow up with the previously developed characters from Jijo and the crew of the Streaker, too much time was spent on a new character and we are left to speculate about the fate of Tom Orley and Creideiki who were stranded on Kithrup in "Startide Rising". "Heaven's Reach" is only a somewhat satisfying denouement to an otherwise great series.

Inhabited space is controlled by a billions of years old hierarchy of space-faring races and the highest value is any race of pre-sentient creatures that may be "uplifted" to full sentience, thereby making the race performing this service a "patron". Those on the top of the longest chains of patronage are the most respected and most powerful races. Those on the bottom as "client" races are paying off their "uplifting" by serving for up to 100,000 years as servants of their patrons. Humanity has only joined this society within the past few hundreds of years as a possible "wolfling" race, that has brought itself up by its bootstraps. Most galactic citizens, including many humans, do not believe in the possibility and think humanity must have some ancient patron that has been forgotten in the mists of time. This is the setting of the entire "Uplift" series. An easy to read, yet highly imaginative series. And a rousing good space opera!

I would agree with others that it is rather rushed. Although it is always a problem when writing about actual gods - I mean, how can you possibly come up with plausible actions for beings so much smarter, more powerful and unthinkably *different* than yourself. Rety - I think - had a good metaphor for this, it's like ants in a house trying to come up with explanations for what the humans are doing.

But, it's a decent conclusion to a great series and I've enjoyed reading it, perhaps a bit less than some previous books.

Currently, there are six books in Brin's Uplift saga. It's kind of hard to categorize these books as elements of a series, though. The first three books in the saga, "Sundiver," "Startide Rising," and "The Uplift War," are not really a trilogy or a series in the normal sense. Instead, "Sundiver" relates to the rest of the saga as Tolkien's "The Hobbit" relates to his "Lord of the Rings:" it sets the stage for all the rest of the books in the saga. "Startide Rising" and "The Uplift War" describe completely different plotlines originating from the same event far distant, time wise and space wise, from "Sundiver". In a pinch, you could read these books in any order and not really miss anything. They describe different points in time and space of the same Universe. Of course, the best order is the one listed, above.

Unlike the first three books in the saga, the second three books DO form a series. The first of this trilogy, "Brightness Reef," picks up with yet another totally independent plotline and brand new characters. However, it does contain a central character who ties the first three books into this set. Unfortunately, Brin doesn't say, specifically, who that character is until the very end of the book. Even worse, the last time the character was used was so far back in the saga that it's hard to remember anything about him. The remaining two books, "Infinity's Shore" and "Heaven's Reach," continue sequentially from the first and form a tightly knit trilogy with no breaks in time.

None of these books is "happy" or "light reading." For the most part, they're all intense, heavily detailed and fully characterized books. "Sundiver" is the least "heavy" and most lacking in the realistic feel of the rest of the books. But, for the most part, if you like "Sundiver," you'll definitely want to continue with the rest of the saga. Even if you don't like "Sundiver," I highly recommend you read at least "Startide Rising:" it has an entirely different feel to it and might be more to your liking. This saga is just too important to miss out on. As a whole, it's one of the great works of science fiction and one of the few pieces of science fiction that belong in the class of true literature.

The following are some comments on the individual books:

Sundiver: Somewhat different from the other books in the saga in that it's more of a science fiction mystery than a science fiction drama. This book sets the stage for the rest of the saga as it chronicles events that happen several hundred years before what happens in the other books. About the only thing negative I can come up with is that I wish Brin had written several prequels to it so we could read about the earlier adventures of Jacob Demwa that are referenced in this book.

Startide Rising: This book focuses on the group that starts all the other events noted in the remaining books of the saga. Though the main characters start off in a very bad way, Brin does a good job of moving them forward, and upward, throughout the book.

The Uplift War: The events in this book start from the same event that kicks off "Startide Rising." But, other than that, the two books are totally independent. Like "Startide Rising," Brin produced a gripping plot, great character development, and a good progression towards a positive goal.

Brightness Reef: This is definitely not a happy book. It starts out with many non-pleasant activities and fights its way forward from there. The biggest problem I have with it is that it's very hard to see how anything good or positive is going to happen to the main characters, no matter how much they try.

Infinity's Shore: First, the negative: once this book starts, it's very apparent that a whole lot of relevant stuff has been happening elsewhere that we missed. Essentially, there's at least one entire book that sounds extremely interesting that's missing from the saga. Brin fills in most of this back-story during this book and "Heaven's Reach." But, I'd sure like to have read that missing book. On the positive side, this book re-introduces us to old friends and subtly changes the focus to them. Everything's still happening in the same place with mostly the same characters, but the attitude changes and becomes more can-do.

Heaven's Reach: One difficulty with this book is due to how it continues from the previous book. It's merely a change of venue instead of a new set of adventures. A quote from one of the main characters near the end of this book sort of sums up my feelings about it: "...what will one more worry matter? I've long passed the point where I stopped counting them." Essentially, by the time this book and saga starts winding down (and even at the point of that quotation, it really hasn't started that yet), the reader is totally fatigued by never-ending problems. I really like these works, but the lack of a tie-up between "Infinity's Shore" and this book is grinding.