Hybrids

Rating:
Summary: Rewarding
Review: A fantastic and rewarding conclusion to a very enjoyable series. Character development is great, you really care for these people. We got back into the Neanderthal world here which I had hoped for in the second book. Sorry it had to end. All too short.

Rating:
Summary: A terrific conclusion to a terrific series
Review: A terrific conclusion to a terrific series! Sawyer just won the Hugo for HOMINIDS, the first book in the Neanderthal Parallax trilogy, but this final volume should be a real contender for that award too. It wraps everything up very nicely, with some stunning insights into the nature of religion. I recommend the whole series -- Ursula K. Le Guin would be proud to have written it.

Rating:
Summary: Better than Humans, but that's not saying much
Review: After reading Homonids, the first book in this series, I had high hopes for the series. Because, despite what I thought was too much focus in that book on Mary Vaughn's personal problems, I still really enjoyed the book, and thought the premise was very interesting. However, in the second book, Humans, Sawyer takes the story completely in the wrong direction, focusing almost entirely on the relationship between Mary Vaughn and Ponter Boddit, and ignoring the more interesting story of the comparison and contrast between the two different Earths.

While this book was better than Humans, with a little more focus outside of their relationship, it still is way too heavily skewed towards that storyline. While that mediocre story plays out in detail in each chapter, a much more intresting story goes almost undeveloped in little snippets at the beginning of each chapter. I also found myself wondering how the Neanderthal technology would have managed to progress like it had without a population anywhere near that of the Gliksins. It seems that with the limited population and without so much war to drive technology, they would have moved much slower.

I will continue to look for more from Sawyer in the future, but nothing else from this series. I think Sawyer could have done a much better job with this story, but he just went down the wrong path. If you read the other two books in the series, you will want to read this one as well, but don't expect anything great.

Rating:
Summary: Wonderfully satisying conclusion to great trilogy
Review: Each book in a trilogy has its own special challenges: the first has to satisfy in its own right, so that those who only read it don't feel they've been merely teased, leading up to a cliffhanger designed to force the purchase of another volume. HOMINIDS was perfect: a wonderful novel in its own right, with its own satisfying ending. Sawyer knows that the way to get readers to come back is by giving them a good, complete story, not by jerking them along. There's no cliffhanger at the end of HOMINIDS, but, after reading it, I knew I'd have to stick with this terrific series until the end.

The second book is traditionally thought of as the hardest, since it has to bridge, moving the story along while not wrapping everything up. HUMANS again was perfect: it has some of the best scenes in SF, period -- the scene at the Vietnam wall, the great, not in the least gratuitious bedroom scene, and more.

And the final volume has to wrap everything up with a bang. Sawyer is batting 1000: HYBRIDS does just that. It's an incredibly moving story, but also full of action and adventure. Sawyer's characters don't go in for soap opera histrionics. Rather, they convey volumes to each other through a lift of an eyebrow, a downturned glance, a trailing off of words. It's subtle, sophisticated, adult characterization, and it packs much more of an emotional wallop than yelling or screaming ever does.

It's hard to know what other trilogies to compare the Neanderthal Parallax to. It's much more humane and emotionally engaging than Asimov's FOUNDATION, because of that focus on ordinary people, and it's not really an epic like Herbert's DUNE. Maybe it's something entirely new: a mixture of giant philosophical ideas and very real, warm, HUMAN characters. And isn't offering something new precisely what science fiction is supposed to do?

Rating:
Summary: Weak characters detract from fascinating scenario
Review: Geneticist Mary Vaughan has fallen in love with neanderthal Ponter Boddit--who comes from an alternate reality where neanderthals rather than our own breed of homo sapien prevailed. The neanderthal version of earth is clean, free of polution and overpopulation, and filled with happy and smart neanderthals--especially smart due to a genetic improvement program that has systematically weeded out troublesome or less intelligent members of the society. For a while it looks like the only fly in the ointment is the fact that neanderthals don't really spend a lot of time with male-female bonding. Despite Mary's wishes, Ponter spends most of every month with his male lover--as do all neanderthal men.

Although neanderthals and our version of humanity are biologically close, they cannot interbreed--without help. But Mary comes up with the idea of using technology to help. Fortunately there is a recently invented neanderthal machine that will do that. Unfortunately, this machine can also do a lot more--like create the ultimate super-biological weapon.

Author Robert J. Sawyer creates an interesting set of worlds. Both the genetic and anthropological bases of HYBRIDS are convincing and feel real. From a plot and character perspective, however, HYBRIDS is somewhat disappointing. As a rape survivor and the first Earth-human woman to enter into a relationship with a neanderthal, Mary should be interesting. Instead, her obsession with religion, her whining about not being with Ponter during the periods he spends with his male mate, and her lack of any real motivation and drive make her uninvolving. Only in the last fifty pages does the plot really spring into action with a threat at a second genocide of the neanderthal people--a threat that Mary discovers by complete chance.

HYBRIDS is the thrid book in a series about the earth-human/neanderthal reconnection. My guess is that Sawyer had said everything he wanted to say in the first two.

Rating:
Summary: Great conclusion to great trilogy
Review: HOMINIDS, the first book in this series, won the HUGO AWARD. The rest of the series is even better. Space isn't the final frontier. In Robert J. Sawyer's remarkable NEANDERTHAL PARALLAX trilogy, the final frontier is right here, but twisted away at an angle: other universes. What if, 40,000 years ago, true consciousness had arisen in Neanderthals, instead of our kind of humanity? What would they have done with this world, this geography, these natural resources, this biosphere? Sawyer's answer is richly detailed, and also winsome ... it makes us wish we could have gone down the same gentler, kindler route.

HYBRIDS picks up the story where HUMANS left off (indeed, despite its vast sweep, the whole trilogy only covers just five months of time). The characters we love from the earlier books -- Homo sapiens geneticist Mary N. Vaughan and Neanderthal quantum physicist Ponter Boddit -- are back, and their growing relationship is front and center. Two other characters who had minor (although important) roles in HUMANS also play key parts here, although the new character, a female Neanderthal named Bandra who loves all things Homo sapiens, is one of Sawyer's most engaging creations.

The series neatly wraps up the issues of religion versus science raised in the first two books in surprising and gutsy ways. The character live and breathe, and although I felt satisfied at the end, I wouldn't mind at all if the NEANDERTHAL PARALLAX ended up being, like Douglas Adams's HITCH-HIKER series, an increasingly inaccurately named trilogy ...

Rating:
Summary: Satisfying Trilogy
Review: HYBRIDS is somewhat of a disappointment as the concluding novel of Sawyer's Neanderthal Parallax trilogy.

HOMINIDS, the first novel in the trilogy, was a very well done novel about the accidental opening of a portal to an alternative universe where Neanderthal's became the dominant hominid. It explores the Neanderthal society and the various differences between the two cultures, human and Neanderthal. There is also very good character development in HOMINIDS, which really drives the rest of the trilogy.

HUMANS in some ways has the weakness of a second novel in a trilogy because there really is not a lot of plot development. But it is an absolutely hilarious social satire on human society, with digs at the United States' culture from a Canadian point of view. HUMANS is the novel I enjoyed the most of the three.

HYBRIDS is a good novel and conclusion to the trilogy but somewhat of a let down. Sawyer presents some really terrifying situations for both Neanderthals and humans but the emotional punch just isn't there. It's like watching a disaster with complete emotional detachment. The build up and mystery needed to evoke the kind of emotions to drive the story is missing.

Nevertheless, this is a good trilogy and recommended.

Rating:
Summary: Thoughtful, moving, joyous
Review: I am amazed at some of the silly readings people have made of this book. There's a complex, subtle vision at work here, not some simplistic message. Although it's true that the NEANDERTHAL PARALLAX series examines the role of male violence, we see during the course of these three books a number of good men (even Mary's ex-husband gets a very sympathetic on-screen portrayal in this volume). The message of HYBRIDS is very clearly that it is evil and wrong to blame all men for the bad acts of some. Indeed -- mild spoiler here -- Sawyer brilliantly contrives a situation in which we think for a time that his main character Mary Vaughan, who has good reason to be very angry with at least one man who has raped her, has come to this simplistic conclusion. But that's not what Mary is thinking AT ALL, as Sawyer makes clear in a very satisfying reversal.

Like the Hugo Award winning HOMINIDS and the equally deserving HUMANS before it, HYBRIDS is a story of big ideas and all-too-human and fallible characters. If you're used to sci-fi about gleaming heroes ... the kind of stuff Baen publishes ... you may indeed find the complex, error-prone, conflicted people populating this book unfamiliar ... except when you take your nose out of a book and look around at REAL HUMAN BEINGS, which is what Sawyer excels at writing about.

The plot here involves multiple levels of hybridization: cultural and personal. There's a quest for the best of both worlds, a mid-ground between the harshness of the Neanderthal system (yes, harshness -- I'm astonished that so many people seem to gloss over the flaws that Sawyer so clearly paints in the Neanderthal system) and our own. And there's a quest for Ponter and Mary to have a child, despite their differing chromosome counts. And, for those who (wrongly) think Sawyer has been unfair to Americans, the president of the US, who delivers a long speech broken up into small sections at the beginnings of each chapter, comes off as thoughtful, humane, and visionary -- just the sort of person we often indeed have had in the White House.

Sawyer has written a thriller combined with a love story combined with a philosophical speculation of the first water. This whole series is excellent, but this final volume is the best of the three, mostly because of the surprising twists and turns and the way Sawyer draws everything together in ways that aren't at all obvious. Read it; you won't be disappointed.

Rating:
Summary: Sawyer Must Have Gotten Tired Writing This One
Review: I'm a big fan of Sawyer. I loved the first two books of this trilogy, and Hybrid lived up to what I've come to expect from Sawyer. It was a real page turner -- UNTIL about 2/3rds through the book.

Did Sawyer just get tired of writing this trilogy?

All of a sudden, the book turns to silliness. It's almost a parady of Sawyer's work. The theological thoughts are no longer delightful little subplots of a page or two, but drag on and on into endless garbage. The ending reads like a B-Movie from the 1950s with a crazed individual trying to destroy a world. At the stroke of midnight on New Year's -- well, I don't want to spoil the ending for you. It was bad enough for me to have to read it myself.

I often recommend Sawyer's books to friends, but I can't recommend this one. Hopefully this doesn't reflect Sawyer's future work.

Rating:
Summary: But will it work?
Review: Interracial human relationships hold their own fascination. At the same time, they usually present the partners and their surroundings with distinctive challenges. Yet, these must pale in comparison to a love bond between a homo sapiens and an evolved modern-day Neanderthal. Ancient DNA expert Mary Vaughn of Toronto met Physicist Ponter Boddit of Saldek (the Neanderthal equivalent to Sudbury in Northern Ontario) after he was thrown into our version of earth by a quantum computer accident. After various exploratory visits, mainly by scientists, between the parallel universes, a constant portal is established allowing a regular exchange of scientific knowledge and philosophical ideas. The two lovers are determined to bring the two parallel realities closer together.

With great skill and immense empathy for this alternative to the homo sapiens' world Sawyer builds a far-reaching vision of Neanderthal society covering all aspects of its environment, its people and their accomplishments. Exploring the scientific innovations of "Barast" culture provides him a platform for discussing the latest thinking in genetics, consciousness studies, brain research, and physics. His comprehensive knowledge and enthusiasm for scientific subjects shine through all levels of the narrative without becoming heavy or too demanding for the reader. At one level, the Neanderthal version of the universe is presented as a mirror of what could have been in our world. Take the environment: the dialogue between Ponter and Jock, Mary's boss, during a copter flight over New York beautifully illustrates the differences between the two versions of earth as it leaves a deep impression on Jock: Manhattan IS the "Island of Hills" - devoid of skyscrapers, people and traffic. It makes him wish that we "could start all over again with a clean slate".

As Mary spends more time in Ponter's world she learns to accept the differences, up to a point. Many aspects of Barast society are so markedly different that it is not be easy to adapt. For one, our concept of individual freedoms does not mean much here. For example, while the ubiquitous communication system allows instant contact between people, it is monitoring all movements and discussions for the archival record. As one result crime is almost non-existent. Men and women live pretty much separate lives, each with a same-sex mate and their monthly four-day heterosexual coming together - 'Two become One', is treated like a holiday. Children are born according to a predefined generational schedule, allowing the society to maintain population levels stable. Besides the timing, the lovers' wish to conceive a child appears impossible due to the difference in their chromosomes. Sawyer just loves to explain complex genetics in layperson's terms! But DNA research has advanced, mainly in Ponter's world, and new possibilities emerge. The technology is also open to abuse and causes ethical dilemmas. There are more complexities to delve into concerning genetics, above all the potential existence of a specific set of genes, a "God organ". The question of religion has been a major theme throughout the trilogy and here it ends in a dramatic climax.

Sawyer's fluent style and clear, lively narrative make this one of best reads around. At the same time, you learn about some fascinating new research and scientific discoveries and can ponder some important questions about the society we live in. If you have not read the first two volumes of the Neanderthal Parallax, don't feel discouraged. The indispensable background to understand the story is sprinkled throughout this volume. Still, reading it from the beginning leaves you better prepared to savour its different layers. [Friederike Knabe]