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    Blue Remembered Earth
    Blue Remembered Earth
    Blue Remembered Earth
    Audiobook21 hours

    Blue Remembered Earth

    Written by Alastair Reynolds

    Narrated by Kobna Holdbrook-Smith

    4/5

    ()

    About this audiobook

    Critically acclaimed author Alastair Reynolds holds a well-deserved place ''among the leaders of the hard-science space opera renaissance'' (Publishers Weekly). In Blue Remembered Earth, Geoffrey Akinya wants nothing more than to study the elephants of the Amboseli basin. But when his space-explorer grandmother dies, secrets come to light and Geoffrey is dispatched to the Moon to protect the family name- and prevent an impending catastrophe.
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherRecorded Books, Inc.
    Release dateJun 5, 2012
    ISBN9781464049644
    Blue Remembered Earth
    Author

    Alastair Reynolds

    Alastair Reynolds was born in Barry, South Wales, in 1966. He studied at Newcastle and St. Andrews Universities and has a PhD in astronomy. He stopped working as an astrophysicist for the European Space Agency to become a full-time writer. Reynolds is a bestselling author and has been awarded the British Science Fiction award, along with being shortlisted for the Hugo Award, the Arthur C. Clarke Award, the John W. Campbell Memorial Award, the Theodore Sturgeon Award, and the Locus Award.

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    Reviews for Blue Remembered Earth

    4/5

    329 ratings23 reviews

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    • 5/5
      Loved it, can't wait for a sequel
    • 2/5
      I'm a big fan of Reynolds, but he didn't deliver the goods for me with this book, which is oddly strange since I'd consider this one of his best written ever. Confused? I suppose I'd be too. Here's what I mean by well-written but not a great book.

      Reynolds is hitting his writing stride. The characters in this book were well rounded (really and truly), visualizing the events on the page was quite easy, and the many settings had real life to them. The problem was the story itself. It lacked punch. It had some good moments where I felt the books was going to take off but almost always the story returned to being flat.

      The other notable item was the tech. There was some cool tech in the book, but not enough for my tastes. When you read Reynolds earlier novels, you have a sense that tech is very real, alive, and not necessarily in our control or are friends. This book wasn't in that realm. Too bad.

      But hey, Reynolds had earned a pass or two from this reader. He clearly enjoyed writing this story and sometimes that's who a writer writes for.
    • 4/5
      I'm not much of a sci-fi reader, so this review is probably woefully naive, but: this book was somewhat awesome.

      Reynolds nicely balances the various elements of the book. The story is a mystery of sorts, as two siblings uncover their grandmother's amazing secrets. It's also an adventure, a conspiracy tale, and a gripping look at a future all too possible. Reynolds has a wonderful grasp of the scientifically possible and probable, but also conjures up a world that is cleverly imagined. I don't know how likely this future is, but the thing I enjoyed most about the book is that it's neither explicitly utopic or dystopic. Instead, Reynolds raises the questions of a technologically-advanced society, such as when machines and implants may suppress creativity and individuality; whether we need struggling and suffering to compel progress; and so on. At the same time, he doesn't deny the many advantages and uniting forces of such a world.

      Because the book is constantly exploring new facets of the world, there is always something more to learn. The central mystery is gradually resolved, although it leads into what will apparently be future, loosely-connected works. I'll certainly look forward to reading them.

      Occasionally, Reynolds' dialogue can be a little stilted, and so can his descriptions, but they're usually when he's trying to exposit great chunks of technological information. Personally, I enjoyed the depth and research enough to overlook this flaw, but I'm sure some more literary friends of mine would have a problem with it.

      Still, this kind of reasonably serious sci-fi is about ideas and possibilities, and on that scale, "Blue Remembered Earth" succeeds absolutely.
    • 2/5
      Dan Brown in space - a shaggy dog breadcrumb trail that exists solely to justify a travelogue of Reynolds' (admittedly vividly imagined) near future dystopian utopia.
    • 4/5
      After decades of reading science fiction, I discovered Alastair Reynolds about three years ago and, given the scope of his work, am astonished that I had not previously encountered him. Blue Remembered Earth is the first of a trilogy of books set in the near future. Africa, India and China are ascendant, along with a confederation of “Aquatic” nations. As usual, Reynolds has created a world with highly believable technical innovation and excellent hard science fiction. The human race has expanded to the Moon, Mars and beyond to the outer reaches of the solar system. The underlying story involves a highly influential, dysfunctional family and a scavenger hunt of sorts when the family matriarch apparently dies and leaves a trail of breadcrumbs to be followed by two of the “black sheep” of the family. While I can’t say that this was among the best of the Reynolds books I’ve read, it was sufficiently engaging to proceed to the remainder of the trilogy.
    • 4/5
      Blue Remembered Earth, the first volume in Alastair Reynolds new 'Poseidon's Children' series begins in Africa, now the worlds economic powerhouse. The Akinya clan, lead by matriarch Eunice has been at the forefront of humanities expansion into the solar system. After the death of Eunice, who has spent the last 60 years as a recluse on a lunar orbiting satellite, the black sheep of the family, elephant cognition researcher Geoffrey, and lunar artist Sunday follow a breadcrumb trail left by Eunice for the family to follow. It leads to the furthest reaches of the solar system, through danger and intrigue to a discovery which has the potential to change the future.
    • 4/5
      I liked this one. It was not as harsh as some other novels by Reynolds. The characters were better and more likable. The setting in a future Africa was great, not too many other books even notice Africa. I do wish the alien technology hadn't been involved though. That didn't seem actually necessary and detracted from the more positive human advances.
    • 3/5
      There's a mystery woven in this story that keeps you reading. What did the main character's grandmother do or discover that has some of family so concerned? Actually, I'm never entirely sure what they suspect it is. The main character (Geoffrey) doesn't seem to have a clue, nor does his sister. The family is rich, though, and they don't want anything to besmirch their business's reputation. The politics and economics of the future Earth setting are a bit vague, but there are spaceships and asteroid stations and androids, and none are ridiculously implausible or clear violations of known physics, so that's a big plus.
    • 5/5
      If there was a sixth star, I'd give it, too.
    • 3/5
      A convoluted but enjoyable read... just not on a par with the far future Revelation Space books for me. I'm sure it'll be a grower, like House of Suns, which didn't thrill to start with but scenes keep coming back in later weeks...
    • 4/5
      Blue Remembered EarthAuthor: Alastair ReynoldsPublisher: Ace / Berkeley / Penguin BooksPublished In: New YorkDate: 2012Pgs: 512REVIEW MAY CONTAIN SPOILERSSummary:Ten thousand years of future history tracing the Akinya family from Africa across the solar system into interstellar space and the dawn of galactic society. Africa has become an economic and technological superpower 150 years in our future. Geoffrey Akinya is being drawn into the secrets that his grandmother Eunice kept prior to her death, the secrets that could shatter the utopian world that many Earthlings are living in. Secrets hidden in the glove of an old astronaut’s glove kept in a safe deposit box at a bank on the Moon. Secrets that could fracture family and society. Secrets that may be the key to the future of Man.Genre:FictionScience fictionSpace operaWhy this book:I love Reynolds work. This was sitting there taunting me at a dollar store, so it had to come home with me.______________________________________________________________________________Favorite Character:Geoffrey Akinya. He’s the central and main character. The majority of what does happen in the book flows through him and his perspective. He seems sort of milquetoast through most of the story. The bravest thing he does is when he goes against the cousins wishes and tells Sunday about the astronaut glove that he recovered from Eunice’s safety deposit box at the bank on the Moon. Up until, he takes a swing at one of the cousins. At that point, another whole level of his character is revealed. He takes on an added dimension that I wish he had had throughout the story.The Feel:The novel feels big. Big future history. Big Africa. Big space. Big future. Big science fiction.Favorite Scene:The railgun to orbit under Kilimanjaro firing at Eunice’s funeral.The chase across East Africa as the Mechanism and the Family chase Geoffrey for his daring to attack another human being, justifiably or not.The run across the Evolvarium in search of the next of Eunice’s clues. And the machine intelligences that run rampant across that region scavenging and “living” out their lives.The rapprochement scenes between Geoffrey and Hector on the Winter Queen and Sunday and Lucas, via proxy telepresence, on Mars. This also fed into the flowering of Geoffrey’s character.Memphis’ funeral on the snows of Kilimanjaro.The denouement.Pacing:The pacing is glacial. Nothing happens for large swaths of text. Luckily the mystery and future history of the novel are so well done. Good prose makes up for a lot. The pace does pick up after they get beyond Earth. Read more in episodic chunks like it was a television series instead of a movie, it flows much better.Hmm Moments:I like that this represents a post-climate change world with humanity taking responsibility and trying to live in harmony with her damaged homeworld.The settings are great. Tiamat, the Indian Ocean subsea habitat filled with altered humans who have made themselves into fully aquatic lifeforms. The Evolvarium on Mars, a survival of the fittest arena a couple thousand miles across where machine intelligences battle for survival and scavenge for bits and pieces to improve themselves and occasionally create something unique that human scavengers swoop in and appropriate for the “greater good”. The intellectual soap operatic family elements of the story would normally have turned me off, but played against the big sci fi background of this novel and with the well apportioned action that slips and slides through the story and the awesome special effects of the worlds that the story moves through, the story makes me smile.The Pans flipping back and forth gives them a schizo aspect that considering how the rest of the culture looks up on them makes sense. But it leaves you wondering if there are factions within the Pans. Large groups of people, even ones following the same causes, won’t always act in unison. Now take and spread those people across the light minutes and light hours of the solar system and let a extraterrestrial game of telephone grow between those factions and maybe this is what you would get. Though, it remains to be seen if there are different factions within the Pans. I could see Truro and Arethusa falling onto different paths and leading factions at odds with each other.Why isn’t there a screenplay?They would have to butcher it between novel, screenplay, and the screen, possibly beyond recognition. Though as I’m reading it, I could see this as a television series.Casting call:Sam Jackson as Memphis, the Akinya’s Alfred, would be great casting.Whoopi Goldberg as Eunice, the matriarch of the Akinya family.John Boyega as Geoffrey Akinya.______________________________________________________________________________Last Page Sound:That was awesome.Author Assessment:Totally read something else by Reynolds.Editorial Assessment:Could’ve been encouraged to put his foot on the gas a bit here and there. On second thought, this was excellent told in just this way.Knee Jerk Reaction:instant classicDisposition of Book:HardcoverWould recommend to:genre fans______________________________________________________________________________
    • 1/5
      Could not get into it.
    • 4/5
      Hard to put down. Can't believe I have to wait until next year for volume 2!
    • 4/5
      Loved it even more on the second read.
    • 5/5
      I thoroughly enjoyed reading this book. Looking forward to the next in the series.
    • 3/5
      Basically, Reynolds took too long and set up too elaborate a plot to bear the weight of the plot's major revelation, which was obvious hundreds of pages before it was described. Still, I was interested in this book because it seems to me part of a resurgence of novels, and therefore of interest, in the idea of humanity settling the available moons, planets and asteroids in the Solar System before setting out for the stars.
    • 4/5
      May be Al Reynold's best book yet. I can't put a finger on it just yet but the combination of worldbuilding, characters, and the story just clicked and this book worked for me.
    • 4/5
      3.5 stars. Set in the not too distant future, climate change has actually helped Africa's economy and there is a powerful family who have helped humans explore, and even make colonies, in the solar system. The adult grand-kids of one of the space pioneers uncover clues from beyond the grave that lead them on a romp around our solar system to uncover what she is trying to tell them, and perhaps understand her better and the legacy she has left them. I listened to the audiobook and it was an interesting listen, the accents were quite amazing, and something I'd never listed to before. It was a very long book though, and I don't know if the final mystery delivered, but it was quite a fun journey to get there.
    • 1/5
      I was hugely disappointed in this book. The three main characters are all unlikeable and massivly self centered, humorless and dull. I love me some Alastair Reynolds but I couldn't get halfway through this pointless scavenger hunt of a book. This is likely a minority opinion but there are too many books to read to invest time in this one.
    • 4/5
      When I started the story I wasn't sure if I would like it. In the end it turned out to be a very solid book, perhaps the best Alaistar Reynolds book I have read.
    • 5/5
      The beginning of Reynold's newest series, a trilogy set much closer to our current timeline than anything he's written before. Much lighter in tone but with the same grasp of scale and long term consequences it doens't quite have the same impact of characters that some of his earlier works have achieved, partly because the action is shared between two siblings. The Aikanya family is one of hte gobal superpowers, risen from the ashes of Africa following the devastaing AI bot driven wars driven by the Resources and Relocation shortage periods following the 20th century. The world is now in enforced peace with nanotech augmentation ensurring humanity behaves itself. Advanced AI constructs are forbidden, but local golems and automatics are prevalent, and the natiure of human conciousness fully understood - allowing personality mapping and 'chinging' - the ultimate in teleconferenceing where you cna inhabit another body. The Aikayna family made their fortunes a generation or two back with Eunice understanding the power to be gained form exploring the outer limits of the solar system and even if the trip took years, suspended annimation technology could cope. Now her fmaily has two black sheep - Geoffrey and Sandy, - who choose not to devote their time to family concerns and are studying elephant nurology and artisty outside of the Surveilled world, respectively. After Eunice's death the family require Geoffrey to travel to the Moon to inspect a bank vault Eunice left behind, and he takes this opportunity to catch up with his sister. Starting them on a massive chase following the clues that Eunice left for anyone to solve, and to make the decision that she couldn't face.Inventiv an imaginative Reynolds again manages to keep withint the laws of known physics - somethign that is truly impressive for a science fiction writer. The posabilities and constraints of hte societal implicatoins of nano-tech and the full understanding of neuro-biology are only touched upon, but that deft touch is enough. An interesting Afterward explains the decisions regarding Africa and the Elephants, a personal whimsy but well woven into the plot, I certainly didn't see the explanation coming. The only downside I experienced was the frequent swapping of viewpoint between Sandya nd Geoffrey leading us to situtations where we knew more than the characters did - Reynolds was pretty good at maintaining their perception of ignorance though.Enjoyable and another excellant work from one of the leading lights in Space Opera.
    • 4/5
      Good book tracing the birth of interstellar sub-light travel by following generations of a family. I liked the focus on the attempts to discern the intent of the family matriarch through exploration of both her history and the race to find clues to the message she left. Really a good read.
    • 4/5
      I await for every new novel by Alastair Reynolds with great anticipation, and am always left satisfied.I feel it's not an exaggeration to claim that Blue Remembered Earth is a new chapter, "A New Hope" if I may, in this wonderful author's career.Which is why it is very important to understand that this book resides in a universe much closer to home both in space and time than his previous works.Putting aside strong expectations of style, scope, setting and pace, instilled by such powerful mid-far future sci-fi bodies of work as Revelation Space Universe (if you've read the novels) is a first step in properly appreciating this near-mid future, (mostly) hard sci-fi, yet gently heartfelt novel.The prose is deceptively simple, in that it's clever, in the way that only a wise grandpa can express complex ideas with simplest of words and expressions; something I always found intriguing.As for the plot and central ideas, ... well - it's about ever looking onward, longing for the unknown, and trepidations of leaving the deceptive safety of the mundane.The rest you should find out on your own ;)The only reason I didn't give 5 stars, is the ending. It felt strangely open-ended (pardon the tautology), even considering that this is an opening volume in a new series. Something was somehow askew about it, perhaps even somewhat underwhelming, but maybe I am nitpicking.All said considered, I enjoyed this book, as one would enjoy a glass of fine wine accompanied by Bach cello suite.Highly recommended for Reynolds' fans, seasoned science fiction readers, and readers new to this author and/or the genre alike!P.S. And I am back to the state of anticipation.