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

It was my first Arthur C. Clarke book. And even though it is a classic I didn't have any spoilers before I read it. The idea of finding an unknown object in the sky with extraterrestrial suspicions, and going there to actually explore it was very thrilling. And well, it is hard sci-fi, so I expected a lot of scientific explanations and musings on the laws of physics.

I had some hard time trying to imagine the interior of Rama. The scale and complexity of what was inside was very difficult for me to grasp. But I tried to imagine Rama like “The Citadel” of the video game “Mass Effect”, at least to understand the cylinder design of the spacecraft.

I really expected there would be more answers in this book about the purpose of Rama and the “biots” inside. Of course, the author leaves a hint at the end indicating that there is more to the mystery.

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.