Rating: 
Summary: An instant competitor for the Hugo Award
Review: This book is not only Vinge's best work to date, it is one of the best novels of any genre I have read in some time. I expected to have a rollicking good time (which I did) with vast scope, fascinating technology, and clever twists. I didn't expect to be moved (which I was, in several places). After reading it, I immediately re-read _A Fire Upon the Deep_ (which tied for the Hugo for best novel the year it came out) and was struck by how much Vinge has grown as a novelist. I hope this work gains him the recognition he deserves. I also hope it sells a _lot_ of copies.
Rating:
Summary: Best science fiction novel of this decade
Review: An amazing achievement by Vernor Vinge. Horrifying villains, brave heroes, and believable arachnid aliens play a decades-long game of lurk-and-pounce in the solar system of the On-Off star.If it doesn't win all the awards for best science fiction novel of the year, I will be surprised. Pham Trinli is an especially well-drawn character.
Rating:
Summary: I highly recommend this book to any science fiction fan
Review: Vernor Vinge has written his best book yet. Great characters, really interesting plot with schemes that develop over years, and of course lots of "hard sci-fi" ideas like the society of interstellar traders. And Pham Nuwen is one devious SOB.
Rating: 
Summary: Details
Review: Vinge is one of those writers that rewards readers who pay attention to small details. He gives enough subtle clues to make you think that something could be a possibility before he springs it on you. The effect does not make the novel seem predictable though. It makes you feel rewarded for your attention.
Deepness centers around two spacing groups emerging simultaneously on a strange spider planet in orbit around a star with a dormancy cycle. One of the groups ambushes the other which leads to both fleets being almost totally destroyed. Meenwhile on the planet, the spiders are going through a information age. There are two superpowers on the planet and they are played against each other in a U.S./Russia cold war type scenerio.
The book is long but fairly quick once you get into it. It is well written and the characterizations are well done. The alien spider species first person lulls the reader into a comfortable acceptence of the species, and the humanoid view, presented later in the story, revulses the reader. This revulsion is also seen in the humanoid character as well that mirrors the readers.
If you enjoy space operas, you will enjoy this book. You will also enjoy this book if you just like a great story told exceptionally well. This book does contain some violence and some sexuality, but neither is graphic.
Rating:
Summary: Very very good ...
Review: ... not perfect, but very very good. Better than 95% of the other stuff out there. Vinge has some very interesting ideas and they don't stop coming throughout the 700+ page book. Well written with reasonably realistically drawn characters.
On the down side, the book has some issues with pacing and similarities with Vinge's other book in this universe, Fire Upon the Deep. The book is fairly long, but does spread the action out decently. The climax is slow in coming, and the emphasis near the end is often misplaced. As the endgame is playing out, Vinge spends too many pages with very minor or new characters (the Spider astronomers and Spider ex-intelligence officer) and too few on very key players (Anne's backstory).
There are some very strong similarities with Fire Upon the Deep. There are two main story threads (human and alien) with the climax when they meet. There is a child constantly duped by an evil-doer. Personally, I found this annoying since the deception is so infallible (but this is explained somewhat reasonably in the text). There are some strong similarities between characters in the books (Sherk and one of the Tines scientists).
All in all, it's way better than most of the stuff out there. Vinge has some very interesting ideas that most other authors would have spun into 3 books, but Vinge crams it into just one. Definitely worth a read, especially if you've read Fire Upon the Deep.
Rating:
Summary: Couldn't put it down!
Review: Hard sci-fi, interesting believable aliens, situations that make you say "NO!" - this book is great. I liked in better than "Fire Upon the Deep."
Rating: 
Summary: Generally a good book.
Review: It is not a perfect novel. It did drag abit at times, and the anthropomorphization of the Spiders was certainly reaching a bit. The ultimate villany of some of the characters (head bad guy) was caricaturelike. Having said that, it was an enjoyable, if a bit long, of a read. When I got to the last page, I was left wanting more, and I suppose that is one measure of a book.
Rating:
Summary: Scientific Science Fiction with Heart
Review: I just finished reading "Deepness," and I would classify it as one of the top five SF novels I have ever read. Many reviewers have covered the plot, so I won't reiterate that here. Suffice it to say it is unusually complex, with heros and villains that are neither entirely good nor entirely bad.
Vinge is a professor of Computer Science, as an engineer I appreciated that his imagination of future technology seems firmly grounded in an understanding of the limitations and risks of the scientific approach to physical reality. No magic here, but there is imagination.
Yet the literary side of the novel is impressive as well. He successfully intertwines a large cast of fairly complex characters in a complicated, tense situation. The depiction of the alien race is especially good. He manages to make us care about the fate of various members of the spider race, but when the two finally do make direct contact, the clash between the human expectations and the realities of the strangeness of the spider race is skillfully drawn.
I think a few of the reviewers are a little too hard on Vinge and his appreciation of the virtues of capitalism. He has accomplished something quite difficult, combining economic philosophy, scientific speculation, and literary technique in a unique and satisfying way. More power to him. I hope he continues to write in this vein.
Rating:
Summary: Great science fiction
Review: This is great science fiction! I usually like Vinge's books, and this one was fully up to par. It intertwines two converging stories. One is about a group of (human) freedom loving space traders who travel and sell in many star systems, who are thrown together with (human) totalitarian exploiters. The other is about an intelligent race of spiders whose "on-off" star blinks with a century-long period -- thus they must endure a multi-decade deep freeze during their lifetimes (the "Deepness" in the title is a place where spiders can hibernate through a freeze). This is great science fiction. The plot is exciting, and Vinge invents and explores the ramifications of several interesting technologies plus the weird on-off star environment. He also explores social conflicts between the human societies and the spider societies. Both sets of societies appear to have intentional parallels with current societies here on earth. I believe Vinge intends those parallels to be an important part of the book, so I'm going to write a little more about them. Many of Vinge's books feature societies based around a libertarian ideal of little or no government, and privatization of government's traditional functions. For example, in a story called "The Ungoverned," a section of the former United States has no government at all, and people hire private companies with names like "Michigan State Police" and "Al's protection Racket" for traditional government services. One problem with a government-free society is the possibility that some people may completely trample the rights of others without fear of reprisal. In "Deepness," Vinge encapsulates that problem as the problem slavery. The totalitarians are not averse to slavery; the freedom-loving traders despise slavery. I see one flaw in the book, which doesn't affect the science fiction or the exciting plot; only the philosophy. The flaw is that Vinge doesn't adequately account for *why* the good guys' hate slavery. After all, one could consider slavery a form of contract, or slaves an article of trade (slavery was treated this way here on earth for thousands of years). Vinge's explanation of why the traders hate slavery is essentially social taboo -- it's part of the trader culture. But it's a taboo that has lasted a thousand years and holds everywhere in the many loose-knit trader communities. Why? We know societies change and upstarts challenge taboos, so the ones that remain must serve some very useful purpose. Vinge doesn't account for the constancy of the taboo. I think a libertarian philosophy that allowed slavery would be repugnant to many readers, so Vinge created one that prevented slavery, but his taboo mechanism is weak. I think this points up a flaw in libertarian philosophy that Vinge is struggling to deal with -- the flaw being that libertarianism may be a little to value-neutral to appeal to mainstream American readers raised on apple pie and the U.S. Constitution. I'll be interested to see how Vinge continues to deal with this issue in future writings. Never the less, as I mentioned above, the flaw doesn't affect the plot or the science fiction; only the philosophy of the book. It's still great SF, imaginative and thought provoking, and a very enjoyable read.
Rating:
Summary: A truly great book deserving 6 stars!!
Review: The Alien. A beautiful, strange world thriving in a uniquely alien climate. A totally alien sentient race, described in an evolving, and fantastically evocative, thoughtful manner. Problems of first contact language and societal issues are crucial to the story, and handled amazingly well. The Human. Terribly cruel despotic rule, involving slavery, rape, bigotry, and "state-of-the-art" diplomacy and duplicity. Millennia spanning civilizations, hemmed in by extremely well-chosen scientific, economic, ecological and societal barriers. Love is crushed, lost, rampaged and explosively rediscovered. Dreams are buried and reawakened. Deepness in the Sky is one of those very, very few novels that encompasses all of the above, in a beautifully interwoven story. A civilization of millennium spanning space traders races to an astronomical anomaly, a newly discovered planet in an on/off-star galaxy. They are met there by another group of space travelers whom they had not previously encountered. Both groups are hoping to harvest huge profits from being the first to interact with the new non-human civilization just discovered on the planet. We learn about all three civilizations in detail, via big picture views/histories, and through many, many personal characterizations. This book manages to get us involved with, and caring about at least 12 major characters. Vinge's amazing story is beautifully, tragically, magically, heartrendingly emotional, and at the same time mind-bendingly thoughtful on many levels. I cannot overstate how great this book is. The way he evolves our understanding of the alien civilization, until we can still care (strongly!!) about these beings as they are described not in translated human-conditioned terms, but rather in a true first-contact, "eye-to-eye" manner, is only one of the rare, and beautiful, back-shivering moments Vinge brings us to. Absolutely, read and enjoy this book!! I do wish a sixth star could be found to rate books like this!! 5 stars are given for lesser books, because these are such rare finds.
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