Reflection's Edge

Book Review: Pandora's Star and Judas Unchained, by Peter F. Hamilton

Reviewer: Romie Stott

In a universe where controlled wormholes connect hundreds of habitable planets and advanced medicine makes all but the poorest humans immortal, humanity has settled into gradual, sustainable expansion. After all, what's a hundred years to a person who will live forever? Even accidental death has become little more than an inconvenience, thanks to electronic memory backups and accelerated cloning. All that security is brought into question when a lone faster-than-light starship travels over a thousand light-years to investigate a star that has simply disappeared, cloaked inside a seemingly-impossible Dyson sphere. Soon a fringe terrorist group, The Guardians of Selfhood, is claiming that sinister alien interests have infiltrated the highest levels of human government. Others look for their own answers - others like ex-NASA captain William Kime, genetically-engineered supercop Paula Myo, and eccentric billionaire Ozzie Issac, who seeks the truth among an enigmatic alien race. What they discover about the Dyson aliens - and about the Guardians of Selfhood - is more dangerous than they could have imagined.

As one of the only contemporary authors writing epic science fiction, Peter F. Hamilton is a godsend to genre fans living on Asimov and Niven backcatalogues; for the same reason, his enthusastically sprawling plotlines, unashamedly stock characters, and grandiose tone will seem silly to readers more used to today's subtle, character-driven SF. Hamilton's newest offerings, Pandora's Star and Judas Unchained, are essentially two halves of one epic novel - one that comes in at just under two thousand pages.

Pandora's Star opens like most of Hamilton's books. Over the first two hundred pages, he introduces dozens of seemingly unconnected characters; most appear for five pages at best, then vanish for at least a hundred. In the meantime, Hamilton lingers over extensive, scenery-chewing descriptions of cities that look a lot like Earth's. Readers unfamiliar with Hamilton could easily assume that Pandora's Star is a collection of vignettes which share a common universe; it often feels like little more than a travelogue.

The story picks up as we start to see how character stories interweave into a larger plotline, but unprepared readers may have already given up in frustration. Disorienting perspective shifts aside, the text itself is rough going. Nearly half the sentences are comma-spliced run-ons; even non-English-teachers will have trouble reading at their usual speed. Furthermore, Hamilton's word choice is at times nonsensical: "light ebony," "virtually semiautonomous," "subtle and heavy" perfume, and the meaningless "intersolar." Even the science can seem oddly nonspecific, as though it was gleaned from diverse fictional sources.

It's a shame Hamilton throws up so many barriers, because the underlying story is compelling, and not something that can be told on a smaller scale. The sheer magnitude of the universe is rivalled only by Asimov's Foundation series, and the larger-than-life story scenarios go further than even the most ambitious blockbusters. A four-page string of meandering description will suddenly be redeemed by a clever sentence about how recoverable memories have entirely changed the nature of police work. After a half-dozen bland worlds, Hamilton will unexpectedly introduce a sentient space station, or a goofy, tantalizing quirk of gravity. Even the flat characterization works as a platform for savvy insights into basic human nature.

If you make it to Judas Unchained (and if you got past Pandora's Star's first three hundred pages, chances are you will), you're in for a treat; either Hamilton got a new editor, or he started listening to his old one. Judas Unchained opens with a dramatis personae that is equally helpful to those who weathered the two-year publishing hiatus since Pandora's Star and readers who just have trouble keeping track. Grammatical errors are few and far between; Hamilton has finally abandoned his beloved comma splice. The usual three-pages of scenery have been pruned into single paragraphs. Moreover, from the start of Judas Unchained, we know how the characters are linked and where the story is going. All in all, it makes for a tighter, faster, more exciting book - one it would be easy to recommend to anyone, were it not for the hard slog through the early parts of Pandora's Star.

In the end, Pandora's Star and Judas Unchained are somehow both extremely derivative and completely imaginative, and because they don't take themselves too seriously, they can be exceptionally fun. Hamilton gleefully careens through courtroom drama, space exploration, nuclear war, alien first contact, Dune-style political intrigue, and survivalist adventures, in the groove of a television show that has unreservedly jumped the shark.

Don't pick this series up unless you have significant time to invest in it, and don't feel ashamed if you find yourself jumping ahead to the sections that interest you. If you've got the time, and the willingness to soldier on even during times of extreme frustration, plunge in. You may be surprised when you look back and notice you had a great time.

To buy a copy of Pandora's Star, click here. To buy a copy of Judas Unchained, click here.

If you liked this book, you may also enjoy:

The Foundation Series, by Isaac Asimov

The Known Space Series, by Larry Niven

The Dune Series, by Frank Herbert

Star Trek Enterprise (TV series)



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