Hard SF discussion

Hi:
I finished Hyperion. It may be a bit early in the month for some of you, but let me make a few comments.
First, it's closer to being a collection of six short stories / novelettes than a novel. The stories do take place in a common universe / civilization and include references to places and/or beings on the planet Hyperion. There is a meta-story containing the six stories, but it takes up no more of the book than one of the stories. [isfdb.org does not list short stories by Simmons published before Hyperion that seem to correspond to these stories.:] Your enjoyment of the book may depend on how much you tend to read short stories and whether you prefer novel-length material.
The stories were well written and kept my interest. They would not necessarily have been my first choice of stories in terms of plot or theme, but that's personal taste. Each story is one character's tale providing the background to what lead them to be part of the meta-story. So, each story has an ending of sorts, but in another sense requires the meta-story to complete the story. In the second sense, the six stories are left unfinished in Hyperion. Perhaps, that is dealt with in later books in the series.

David

Read the next one...;-)

If I read The Fall of Hyperion, will I find myself with another cliffhanger requiring me to read both of the Endymion books? And if I read those, will I find them hanging waiting for not-yet-published continuations in other books? I wish I had the time to read every SF book that's been written, but I'm not a fast reader and have to take such things into consideration.

Thanks,
David

It's ok it's just one more. The next two are a pair as are ilium and olympos. All worth the time. Great stuff. :-)

Richard wrote: "It's ok it's just one more. The next two are a pair as are ilium and olympos."

[A different Richard here:]

I read Hyperion some time ago, so I wasn't afraid of Wikipedia's spoilers, and confirmed. Excerpts:

The Fall of Hyperion
This book concludes the story begun in Hyperion. It abandons the frame structure of the first novel, instead using a more conventional chronological narrative (although several jumps in time take place).

Endymion
The story commences 272 years after the events in the previous novel.

The Rise of Endymion
This final novel in the series finishes the story begun in Endymion.

I think I read the original pair just before the latter pair came out, so I guess I've got some catching up to do. Sigh.

I would agree, also, that Hyperion is more than the sum of its parts. I'm not sure that the individual stories could hold up on their own, without the illumination of central themes and facts shown by others. Unlike Chaucer's, say, "The Miller's Tale" (the only of his stories I distinctly remember).

Thanks for the info.
I put in a request for Fall of Hyperion.

David

Richard wrote: "It's ok it's just one more. The next two are a pair as are ilium and olympos. All worth the time. Great stuff. :-)" As far as I know, Ilium and Olympos are unrelated to Hyperion and Endymion. These are all good books, I want to read Endymion, but I feel I´ll have to re-read Hyperion first. It was too long ago that I read them. I don´t think re-reading them would be a waste of time. They are good, dense with ideas and having a clue of what is ahead may benefit a second reading...

Username wrote: "As far as I know, Ilium and Olympos are unrelated to Hyperion and Endymion."

Agreed; I didn't mean to imply they were connected to the Hyperion universe; just that Simmons seems to do things in pairs :-)

I understand that authors sometimes write what is essentially a single novel that is so long that it would be inconvenient to publish it in a single volume. However, I wish that when they did this they would explicitly say so. For instance, if the Hyperion story requires two volues, give them the titles Hyperion Volume 1 and Hyperion Volume 2 - or something like that. Currently, sometimes there is a "book series" which is essentially one novel - in which case the individual volumes are not entirely satisfying if read without the other volumes. Other times, a "book series" are essentially multiple novels with various common elements. I would find it helpful if they more clearly distinguished between the two kinds of series. Not only would I like to know whether I need to read more than one volume, but if I do have to read more than one volume, I'd prefer to have all the volumes already in print when I start reading. I'd rather not read volume one and then have to wait a year for volume two to become available. Just as I wouldn't want to read pages 1 through 200 of a 400 page book this year, and then read pages 201 through 400 a year later, I don't want to do that with a multi-volume novel. And, of course, there's always a small possibility that second volume will never be published.

David

That's one of the reasons I think Goodreads and sites like it are such a wonderful thing. If something is likely to annoy me about a book (no index and/or endnotes in a semi-academic book, for example), I'm pretty confident it'll be mentioned in someone's review.

For many books, Wikipedia does a bang up job too, although it's spoilerville for the unwary.

I read Hyperion a few months ago... then followed on with Fall of Hyperion. I think the books are very different in style, in so far as the first is six short life stories of a group of characters travelling on the same 'meta' story, and the second book is a 'what happened next' story. I loved the first book. It was a book where I can visualise all the characters as if I had seen the movie (which does not exist) (yet?). Whereas some hard sci-fi can be a bit too cold and techy, Hyperion is quite explicit and colourful. I really liked the drunken poet's tale. Martin Silenus manages to upset and offend everyone he meets with his uncaring manners and self indulgences. I must admit though, I was left a bit shocked by the 'cliff hanging' ending. I didn't quite expect it to end quite so suddenly. It felt like Dan Simmons's pen ran out of ink! That's why I read the next book straight away.

For anyone who has read Hyperion and the Fall of Hyperion, but NOT Endymion and The Rise of Endymion, I felt that those two books really wrapped up the emotional arc of the story. I don't want to give things away, but I felt that it was vastly sastisfying to read the Endymion duo and that those books really provided a sense of overarching purpose.

David wrote: "Hi:
I finished Hyperion. It may be a bit early in the month for some of you, but let me make a few comments.
First, it's closer to being a collection of six short stories / novelettes than a..."

All four are excellent books and if you read the first, keep reading till the end.

I find it interesting that you see the first book as 6 short stories. I see it more like the The Canterbury Tales. An overarching narrative with sub plots within to explain the characters. I read Hyperion when my 20 year old son was a newborn. I was a newly minted father when I read about Sol and his issue. I was left devastated because I could actually relate because I was all thumbs with my newborn at first and felt that I couldn't do anything right and felt helpless. I am being totally ambiguous to prevent a spoiler. it is well worth the read.

David wrote: "I understand that authors sometimes write what is essentially a single novel that is so long that it would be inconvenient to publish it in a single volume. However, I wish that when they did this..."

Well put David. I couldn't agree more. I rarely read series. In fact I've only read 1 series in it's entirety, but that was an exception.
I prefer 'stand-alone' novels. I know some readers enjoy series because from page one, they are already familiar with the core characters/plot. I liken this to donning a pair of literary, cosy old socks. Personally i would rather read a novel with a beginning, middle & end, & have those same socks blown off. I've enjoyed the odd trilogy, quartet & even the odd quintet, but a series that rambles on for 10-20+ installments makes me think the author is just too lazy to write something original.