Review: A Fire Upon the Deep

A Fire Upon the Deep by Vernor Vinge

My rating: 3 of 5 stars



A Fire Upon the Deep came highly recommended to me as one of the must read volumes in science fiction. It's easy to be let down when something comes along with such high praise, and that was the case for me. There were certainly quite a lot of elements that I enjoyed. I really enjoyed the way Vinge slowly introduces you to a new concept or element of the story without simply spelling it out for you explicitly. The subtle shift in the sex of pronoun usage and the way the tines are introduced really impressed me. There are some really interesting concepts here, and they are well realized within the story. On the other hand, the pace of this book is dreadfully slow. If you are looking for a high stakes, action / adventure story, this is not it. The ending really put me off, with the climax coming at a whimper rather than a bang. Overall, I liked the book, but it would not be in the short list of books I've recently read that I would recommend to folks with similar tastes.



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