Poseidon's Wake
Ratings11
Average rating4
15
Ratings11
Average rating4
In the conclusion of Alastair Reynolds’ epic Poseidon’s Children saga, the Akinya family receives an invitation from across the stars—and a last opportunity to redeem their name... Send Ndege... The cryptic message originated seventy light-years away from the planet Crucible, where Ndege Akinya lives under permanent house arrest for her role in the catastrophe that killed 417,000 people. Could it be from her mother, Chiku, who vanished during a space expedition decades earlier? Ndege’s daughter, Goma, a biologist, joins the crew of the Travertine, dispatched to Gliese 163 to uncover the source behind the enigmatic message. Goma’s odyssey will take her not only into the furthest reaches of space but centuries into her family’s past where the answers to the universe’s greatest mysteries await...
Featured Series
3 primary booksPoseidon's Children is a 3-book series with 3 primary works first released in 2012 with contributions by Alastair Reynolds.
Reviews with the most likes.
The first book in this trilogy was good, the second was just OK, and this, the third volume, is not so much bad, but just dull.
Perhaps I ought to give this book an ironic score of 4.2 as it does set out a rather nihilistic answer to the question, “What's the meaning of life, the universe, and everything”.
Ho, Hum.
The final book in the trilogy has a similarly grand sweep to the first two, showing yet further developments in Earth and its solar system, even as the main focus moves further away to the exploration of a new star system. The claims on the cover that it's standalone aren't really accurate. While it's true that most of the characters are new - the two main protagonists are the children of some of those in the previous book, continuing the generational nature of the saga - it's very much an extension of what has gone before, and there are plenty of references back to the events of the prior books.
It's perhaps not quite as good as the previous books, either, though still high quality. There are some great scenes here, particularly the interaction between the humans and the elephants (also the descendants of those in the prior books), but some of the technology being encountered is just a little too alien and mysterious to be generating quite the same ‘future of humanity' vibe. But I'll note that I also really liked the ending, which brings both a sense of finality to the trilogy, and a sense that the grand sweep of future history marches on to new vistas.
A nice fitting end for this pretty good Trilogy. It had less “bumps” as the second book in my opinion. Definitely a good read, and a recommend for all who read the first two books and were a bit turned off by the content of the second one.
