Macroscope by Piers Anthony and Tim White

Throughout history, man has been searching for better ways to gather information about his universe. But although they may have longed for it, not even the most brilliant minds could conceive of a device as infinitely powerful or as immeasurably precise as the macroscope, until the twenty-first century. By analyzing information carried on macrons, this unbelievable tool brought the whole universe of wonders to man's doorstep. The macroscope was seen by many as the salvation of the human race. But in the hands of the wrong man, the macroscope could be immensely destructive-infinitely more dangerous than the nuclear bomb. By searching to know too much, man could destroy the very essence of his mind. This is the powerful story of man's struggle with technology, and also the story of his human struggle with himself. This novel takes us across the breathtaking ranges of space as well as through the most touching places in the human heart. It is a story of coming of age, of sacrifice, and of love. It is the story of man's desperate search for a compromise between his mind and his heart, between knowledge and humanity.

I remember reading this as a high schooler and thinking that it was some of the most difficult reading I'd attempted up to that point. After this epic novel, I returned to lighter fare.

Love hate relationship with this one... Started reading it two years ago and stopped reading around 50% of the book, because I couldn't stand those long discussions about astrology. Also, I'm not a SJW but I had a feeling that the author is just too much focused on Afra's womanly parts (a bit sexist and chauvinistic), maybe I'm wrong tho.

Started reading it again a few weeks ago, just to see if I was wrong, this time I've just fast forwarded through (semi-serious) astrology book parts and focused on the story about Macroscope.
The first thing I've noticed that while at the beginning of the book there was a big focus on overpopulation, but that focus suddenly disappears once the group is gone rogue, and it seems that search for overpopulation solution died with Brad. After that, the part about Neptune and Triton seemed a bit like filler content to me, no clear purpose or doing. And after this part book get a bit better, there are finally some interesting stories being told, still with some astrology spiced over but oh well...
Really a great idea for the story, with (sort of) interesting and a unique main character but it failed abysmally. In the end, I felt divided about the book: did I liked it or not? I guess something in between. 4/10