Product Description

The ship's millenia-long mission was to preserve humanity. But humanity was becoming more alien, and the ship--impossibly--more human...

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #2730375 in Books
• Published on: 1992-01-22
• Released on: 1992-01-22
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Mass Market Paperback

From Publishers Weekly
The latest novel from award winner Brunner ( The Crucible of Time ) reads like a series of short stories loosely linked by a framing narrative and a potentially intriguing plot device: a sentient spaceship. Called simply the Ship, this technologically superior vessel placed human colonies 500 years ago on the hundreds of hospitable worlds in the densely packed Arm of Stars. Programmed to return periodically and monitor the colonies' progress, the Ship is permitted to rescue endangered settlements--or individuals--and carry them to a more suitable planet. Since the Ship was developed with the capacity to think, Brunner depicts it striving to understand its own ultimate purpose and evolving personality. As it visits the various colony worlds, Brunner chooses several of these planets for closer inspection, producing a largely self-contained short story in each case before the Ship moves on. These sections display the author's impressive imaginative powers as he creates detailed, unique cultures and histories for each of his worlds. These independent narratives do not, however, add up to a successful novel. The passengers become little more than talking heads, asking the Ship questions that allow Brunner to fill in background details. The final section, in which Brunner explains the origins and purpose of the Ship, is flat and hurried.
Copyright 1991 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From Library Journal
Trapped in an endless progression through time and space, a sentient ship visits and revisits the 600 planets it once seeded with human life, occasionally picking up passengers for enlightenment and entertainment and always questioning its purpose in a universe where human adaptability has too often proven its undoing. As is often the case in metaphysical meditations disguised as sf novels, this ambitious work by the author of Stand on Zanzibar (1968) suffers from too much philosophy and too little continuity, as intriguing characters appear and disappear in a few short chapters. Libraries with large sf collections may want to consider.
Copyright 1991 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From the Inside Flap
The ship's millenia-long mission was to preserve humanity. But humanity was becoming more alien, and the ship--impossibly--more human...

Customer Reviews

Great book! One of my all time favorites
All right, I'll admit I'm a diehard John Brunner fan (hey, I even managed to get through about half of Shockwave Rider) but this is a great book. Quite possibly one of the best current science fiction novels out there. No joke. By the way, the story does not 'fizzle out' at the end, as the previous reviewer said, although it does end quickly. I had to re-read the ending to get it. It shows the Ship as growing in humanity, but not quite in the way you'd expect. I was shocked at the end, to tell you the truth. Anyway, buy this book. It's worth it.

In Retrospect...
I read this book in 1991 and recently found myself hunting for it to re-read (yes, 17 years later). That's how compelling a story collection it is. It is in fact a collection, held together in a common framework by the Ship's journeys and at times somewhat ponderous ruminations. Yet there's a vivid kaleidoscope of descriptions of what humankind might become, from the surprising timidity of the settlers of the outermost worlds to the many bizarre biological adaptations of humans in different local environments.

Those looking for an action-packed space western should look elsewhere. Those looking for something much more thoughtful would be advised to give this book a read or two.Kindle: Amazon's New Wireless Reading Device

Arm of Stars need an overseer, The Ship
A vast vessel, the Ship, is visiting inconspicuously in seemingly random order its 600 seeded colonies of human stock after 500 years from its initial voyage. On the odyssey, the Ship discerns people at risk of their lives and save them with their consent. It does not like to be alone. Consequently each human passenger evokes a processes that makes the Ship dig deep into its memory banks to reveal more about its mission; which keeps evading and being barred from closer study. The Ship's lack of control or knowledge over its course may be due to programming error or malfunction by space particle: it doesn't comprehend that for sure. At each planetary inspection stop the reader gets a peek at how humankind has adapted, merged or blent in with the organisms.

This is very thoughtful, considerative, musing book: a contemplative Ship who doesn't know its exact mission parameters no more, the human companions which help it to develop concepts of black humor, pity, terror and sadness and termination of existence, the death. This is an intellectual book to the point that the Ship's thinking is obscure and vague to keep the interest only for the first 30% of the pages. The momentum towards to the end is lacking because the stops and human rescues become predictable. There is no grand finale, but a more like a exhalation of a steady breath.

Three (3) stars. The idea of stops with self aware ship that learns human mannerism and the ending where the builders' complacent plans are exposed, is interesting. But not that interesting. The sensation is like being attended to a retrospective Sundance cinema festival. The book is like a independent showcase of wildflower that the mind remembers after years go by. Yet, recommended only for those that can hold sustained intellectual exertion in spite of thoughts of "I want to quit".