Humans by Robert J. Sawyer
Ponter, the Neanderthal from another dimension, is back on Earth – our Earth.
This time, Ponter has brought nearly a dozen of the most celebrated scientists and intellectuals from his world. Though we humans are a difficult bunch to deal with, the Neanderthals seem determined to make contact work. Thank goodness, since a lone gunman on our side shoots a member of their delegation as soon as he gets the chance. Mary, meanwhile, is recruited into an American think tank that is determined to figure out how the Neanderthals and their technology work.
All of this sounds like a very standard science fiction story about complications related to alien contact. Robert J. Sawyer’s Humans, however, is not overly concerned with the complications between the two worlds. It instead focuses on the growing relationship between Ponter and Mary. They c... Read More
Identity Theft by Robert J. Sawyer
Alex Lomax, a private detective on Mars, has been hired by Cassandra Wilkins to find her missing husband, Joshua Wilkins. At first the solution to the mystery seems obvious, but Lomax soon discovers that it’s a lot more unusual, complicated, and dangerous, than he originally thought. Both Mr. and Mrs. Wilkins are Transfers — they’ve had their consciousnesses uploaded to artificial bodies. But that’s not the only reason the Wilkins case isn’t routine — it also involves a paleontologist who has discovered a large cache of valuable Martian fossils. Can Lomax solve the crime without getting himself killed?
Identity Theft is fast, fun, exciting, and peopled with interesting characters in an original setting. The idea of uploaded consciousnesses isn’t new for Robert J. Sawyer, but he asks some intriguing questions about that idea here. I’m looking forward to r... Read More
Red Planet Blues by Robert J. Sawyer
Red Planet Blues, by Robert J. Sawyer, is a sci-fi noir novel a la Raymond Chandler set, unsurprisingly, on Mars. More specifically, in New Klondike, the domed city built during the time of the Great Martian Fossil Rush (thus the name Klondike), sparked when the pair of explorers who had found “Alpha” — the motherlode of pristine and incredibly rare Martian fossils — died without having revealed the fossil bed’s location. The rush was on to be the first to find it, but now, decades later, the rush has petered out and New Klondike is well past its prime, grim and seedy, a perfect setting for a hard-bitten detective to narrate his tale of double-crossers, sharp talking dames, young toughs, lazy and/or corrupt cops, missing husbands, unfaithful wives, murderers and thieves, buxom blondes, spaceships, brain transfers, near-immortal androids, disruptor weapons — all the usual tropes of a Mic... Read More
More books by Robert J. Sawyer
Quintaglio Ascension — (1992-1994) Publisher: In a world where the age of dinosaurs never ended, the young saurian Afsan becomes apprentice to the court astrologer, when he discovers something about the Face of God that will test his faith and may save his world from disaster.
Stand-alones:
Golden Fleece — (1990) Publisher: Aboard Argo, a colonization ship bound for Eta Cephei IV, people are very close — there’s no other choice. So when Aaron Rossman’s ex-wife dies in what seems to be a bizarre accident, everyone offers their sympathy, politely keeping their suspicions of suicide to themselves. But Aaron cannot simply accept her death. He must know the truth: Was it an accident, or did she commit suicide? When Aaron discovers the truth behind her death, he is faced with a terrible secret — a secret that could cost him his life.
End of An Era — (1994) Publisher: Archaeologist Brandon Thackery and his rival Miles ‘Klicks’ Jordan fulfill a dinosaur lover’s dream with history’s first time-travel jaunt to the late Mesozoic. Hoping to solve the extinction mystery, they find Earth’s gravity is only half its 21st century value and dinosaurs that behave very strangely. Could the slimey blue creatures from Mars have something to do with both?
Starplex — (1996) Publisher: The Aurora Award-winning science fiction novel, Starplex, is back in print! Human space exploration has expanded quickly over the last twenty years as they have made use of newly discovered artificial worm-holes. No one knows who created them, and they bring the far-reaches of the galaxy tantalizingly close. Discovery, however, is outstripping understanding, and when an unknown vessel — a ship with no windows, seams or visible means of propulsion — arrives, the already battle-scarred Starplex could be the starting point of an interstellar war…
Frameshift — (1997) Publisher: Geneticist Pierre Tardivel may not have long to live — he’s got a fifty-fifty chance of having the gene for Huntington’s disease. But if his DNA is tragic, his girlfriend’s is astonishing: Molly Bond has a mutation that gives her telepathy. Both of them have attracted the interest of Pierre’s boss, Dr. Burian Klimus, a senior researcher in the Human Genome Project who just might be hiding a horrific past. Avi Meyer, a dogged Nazi hunter, thinks Klimus was the monstrous “Ivan the Terrible” of the Treblinka Death Camp. As Pierre races against the ticking clock of his own DNA to make a world-changing scientific breakthrough, Avi also races against time to bring Klimus to justice before the last survivors of Treblinka pass away.
Illegal Alien — (1997) Publisher: When a disabled spaceship enters Earth’s atmosphere, seven members of the advanced Tosok race are welcomed by the world. Then a popular scientist is murdered, and all evidence points to one of the Tosoks. Now, an alien is tried in a court of law-and there may be far more at stake than accounting for one human life.
Factoring Humanity — (1998) Publisher: In the near future, a signal is detected coming from the Alpha Centauri system. Mysterious, unintelligible data streams in for ten years. Heather Davis, a professor in the University of Toronto psychology department, has devoted her career to deciphering the message. Her estranged husband, Kyle, is working on the development of artificial intelligence systems and new computer technology utilizing quantum effects to produce a near-infinite number of calculations simultaneously. When Heather achieves a breakthrough, the message reveals a startling new technology that rips the barriers of space and time, holding the promise of a new stage of human evolution. In concert with Kyle’s discoveries of the nature of consciousness, the key to limitless exploration — or the end of the human race — appears close at hand. Sawyer has created a gripping thriller, a pulse-pounding tour of the farthest reaches of technology. Factoring Humanity is a 1999 Hugo Award Nominee for Best Novel.
Flashforward — (1999) Publisher: The basis for the hit ABC TV series and the Aurora Award-winning novel that started it all! FLASHFORWARD. Two minutes and seventeen seconds that changed the world. Suddenly, without warning, all seven billion people on Earth black out for more than two minutes. Millions die as planes fall from the sky, people tumble down staircases, and cars plow into each other. But that’s the least of the survivors’ challenges. During the blackout, everyone experienced a glimpse of what his or her future holds — and the interlocking mosaic of these visions threatens to unravel the present.
Calculating God — (2000) Publisher: An alien shuttle craft lands outside the Royal Ontario Museum in Toronto. A six-legged, two-armed alien emerges and says, in perfect English, “Take me to a paleontologist.” In the distant past, Earth, the alien’s home planet, and the home planet of another alien species, all experienced the same five cataclysmic events at the same time (one example: the meteor that wiped out the dinosaurs). Both alien races believe this proves the existence of God: i.e., he’s obviously been playing with the evolution of life on each of these planets. From this provocative launch point, Sawyer tells a fast-paced, morally and intellectually challenging story of ambitious scope and touching humanity. Calculating God is SF on a grand scale. Calculating God is a 2001 Hugo Award Nominee for Best Novel.
Mindscan — (2005) Publisher: Robert J. Sawyer’s Hominids, the first volume of his bestselling Neanderthal Parallax trilogy, won the 2003 Hugo Award, and its sequel, Humans, was a 2004 Hugo nominee. Now he’s back with a pulse-pounding, mind-expanding standalone novel, rich with his signature philosophical and ethical speculations, all grounded in cutting-edge science. Jake Sullivan has cheated death: he’s discarded his doomed biological body and copied his consciousness into an android form. The new Jake soon finds love, something that eluded him when he was encased in flesh: he falls for the android version of Karen, a woman rediscovering all the joys of life now that she’s no longer constrained by a worn-out body either. But suddenly Karen’s son sues her, claiming that by uploading into an immortal body, she has done him out of his inheritance. Even worse, the original version of Jake, consigned to die on the far side of the moon, has taken hostages there, demanding the return of his rights of personhood. In the courtroom and on the lunar surface, the future of uploaded humanity hangs in the balance. Mindscan is vintage Sawyer — a feast for the mind and the heart.
Triggers — (2012) Publisher: On the eve of a secret military operation, an assassin’s bullet strikes President Seth Jerrison. He is rushed to the hospital, where surgeons struggle to save his life. At the same hospital, researcher Dr. Ranjip Singh is experimenting with a device that can erase traumatic memories. Then a terrorist bomb detonates. In the operating room, the president suffers cardiac arrest. He has a near-death experience — but the memories that flash through Jerrison’s mind are not his memories. It quickly becomes clear that the electromagnetic pulse generated by the bomb amplified and scrambled Dr. Singh’s equipment, allowing a random group of people to access one another’s minds. And now one of those people has access to the president’s memories — including classified information regarding the upcoming military mission, which, if revealed, could cost countless lives. But the task of determining who has switched memories with whom is a daunting one- particularly when some of the people involved have reason to lie…
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(1960- )
