Rendezvous with Rama

This is the kind of book that reads like a textbook. It is a detailed account of humankind first meeting with an object build by an alien race.

The story takes place in a near future, where other planets have already been colonized and we have probes stationed in space to monitor asteroids, to predict whether they will collide on populated areas.

One of this probes picks up a strange piece of rock in space, that turns out to be made by a long extinct, more technological advanced race.

I stopped reading as the the first chapters all detailed how this perfect spherical rock, that seems to be an artificial made planet, looks on the inside.

Read: 19%, 1:41/9:01 hours

I read this one back in high school, and often cite it as one of my favorite sci-fi books. I think it will keep that status, if mainly beause it was like nothing I had read up to that point. Interestingly, the technology in the book isn't very dated, but the characterization and limited plot do feel a bit dusty. (There is a paragraph explaining how boobs work in zero G, as if female astronauts wouldn't wear bras, just as a for-instance.) And yet, it's still a fun book–in a way it reminded me this time of the straightforwardness of Old Man's War by Scalzi.

It's still a fun, quick read, if one likes first-contact stories. I remember not loving the sequels much, and probably won't go on to them, but it was fun to revisit this one.