Ringworld

Rating:
Summary: Good Sci-Fi for the non-technical teen/young adult
Review: Over all I found the story interesting and Larry Niven did good research on technology. However, I probably would have enjoyed the book more if I was about 15-20 years younger. You can definitely tell that this was written during the Hippy era. I found the alien characters and Teela Brown to be 2-dimensional. You pretty much knew how they were going to react. Some descriptions of things (vehicle controls) are antiquated. I just couldn't see how people are still using dials, buttons and switches centuries from now.
If you are looking for good in-depth Sci-fi with good characters try the Dune series or even William Gibson's work like Neuromancer.

Rating:
Summary: Good for hard sci-fi fans who don't care about the story
Review: I totally agree with all the people who give this book less than a 3.

In short, Niven's science ideas are interesting. But, the non-palpability of the characters, the childish dialogue, and the indifference to which his characters express the story all force the story (via the story*telling*) to suffer. It's simply rank amateurism.

It's painfully clear that the characters are nothing more than devices to move the plot along, and it doesn't matter (in several instances) who says what. Under no circumstances in reality would we see a wise-to-the-world 200 year old man explaining singularities to a 20 year old bimbo (that's how she's characterized); there's just no point in it. There are also conversations late in the book where I'd swear that he forgot if he was writing for Speaker or Louis.

I threw the book over the coffee table after reading the ending, which was simply awful. It literally was in the middle of a conversation, with no real resolution of any of the major underlying plot currents.

Niven has his ideas he tries to throw on the canvas. He communicates the raw ideas just fine, but does so in such an un-masterful way that it's offensive to the craft.

Rating:
Summary: Not as impressive as its hype promised.
Review: Ringworld is blah compared to good science fiction -- like Dune. The aliens are far fetched and the humans are not particularly likeable. The story seemed largely forced, and it was hard not to notice the author's love of his own witing by which he got carried away with misplaced vocabulary and complex descriptions that left no room for your own imagination.

Rating:
Summary: children's book
Review: I've noticed this work on many lists of top science fiction books, which lead me to read it. A warning for potential readers...

This is a children's book. Well written, comical, and interesting. It is well suited for a 12 to 16 year old.

I have recommended it to my daughter.

Rating:
Summary: Interesting mix
Review: One can enjoy a book I guess, quite well, and still not give it 5 out of 5 stars. Or maybe it's just me.

It was pleasant and easy to read, and I finnished it in, oh, a day. For me the concept of Ringworld didn't impress me too much. Not because it isn't a magnificent idea. But the skil required to transmit that awe, and humility one gets even glancing at stars from Earth, let alone such a sight, wasn't there. I didn't feel the thrill as when I read Contact, when the wormhole opened to Vega.
The candle-ribbon comparison was poetic, but a true sense of scale... Well imagine if _our_ sun was as big as the smallest speck of dust, you know where earth (practically invisible) would lay? 17 km!


It had many funny moments, and the action didn't lag. One thing that annoyed me was Teela, the female character. Even though she is (I think once) called intelligent, she's portrayed as a twit, or the other characters are always amazed at her occasional subtleties of thought. Sheesh!

The hole luck gene idea? Even though I tried to suspend disbelief, or buy the arguments produced, I may have the Gambler's fallacy imprinted with incandescent iron in my mind (look it up). There is no way that's possible. It just sounded all so....silly! To breed for luck? What is luck anyways? In a purely real, evolutionary point of view - being able to pass on children. The genes don't care if their temporary host gets "a stubbed toe", just as long as it doesn't die till breeding age.
And, most important of all, past luck doesn't affect future!


The alien life forms were, well, pitoresque. But it just takes one guess - how a race as quick tempered and violent as the czinti ever evolve beyond discovery of atomic power and not blow itself up - and how a race as scary, pathologically scary and prudent as the pupeteers ever discover anything (Our history of science has a lot of what now may sound, really, dangerous experiments. Chemistry to name one of them.)

The mathematics, physics and various quantum thingies, I don't know enough science to say of them how plausible they are.

All criticism aside, the book is Good. from my rating:

* - Unhumanly horrible.
** - I'd rather use it as a flower pot holder. Mediocre
*** - Good.
**** - Very good.
***** - Chef d'ouvre.

Rating:
Summary: Worth reading for the Ringworld itself
Review: As a piece of technology, the Ringworld is one of the most fantastic ideas I've ever heard. Truly a stroke of genius. As a story, Ringworld is lacking. I greatly dislike the main character, Louis Wu. I find his depth of experience and near expertise in almost all things to be irritating and preposterous, regardless of his age. The other characters are much more tolerable. Ringworld is very uneventful and shallow as far as the characters are concerned. In fact, I'm almost inclined to say that Niven first came up with the idea of the Ringworld itself, and then just tossed a story around it so he could get the concept out in the open. Despite all this, however, Ringworld does have its moments. There are several exchanges between characters and situations which are funny and entertaining. In conclusion, definitely buy this book and read it just for the Ringworld itself, but don't expect to get an award-winning story out of it.

Rating:
Summary: Absolute genius!
Review: I rank Larry Niven up there with the other great science-fiction authors. His "Ringworld" books adding themselves to works by other such sci-fi masters: "Childhood's End", "Rendezvous with Rama", "Stranger in a Strange Land" as well as the more modern cyberpunk works like "Neuromancer", "Mona Lisa Overdrive", "Snow Crash", "Prey", and "Cyber Hunter". All are must-reads for any hardcore science-fiction and cyberpunk collector.

Rating:
Summary: A classic example of "high-concept" science fiction
Review: The great thing about Ringworld is--you guessed it--the ringworld. The concepts of a world that is a ring, the huge size of said world, and the problems such a world might have are interesting and creative concepts, worthy of science fiction at its best. Too bad the characters are all one-dimensional and shallow. Louis Wu is a non-entity. Teela is unbelievable and the concept behind her (her hereditary luck) falls apart when you consider the fact that, even if luck *were* hereditary in some capacity, there's no reason to assume that she would be lucky in anything but reproduction (thus the whole premise of her luck being godlike and all-powerful immediately falls apart). Speaker-to-Animals is not an integrated character; he demonstrates ferocity and reasonableness by turns when the plot demands him to, not as developed character traits. The puppeteer Nessus is perhaps the most interesting character and I would have liked to see more of the puppeteers. This book was also clearly written pre-feminism (notice Teela's instant and unquestioning acceptance of a life of female slavery with the Seeker, the fact that Teela's reason for inclusion is solely because she is lucky, not that she has a useful skill to offer; that Teela follows because she loves Louis, not out of curiosity or interest; the fact that the Kzin and the puppeteers are species with non-sentient females; Prillar as ship's (...); comments such as "Every woman is born with a tasp," and so on.) There are some interesting ideas here, and some cool concepts to play with, but it would be nice, just once, to run across a hard-core science fiction book that did as good a job developing the characters as the science.

Rating:
Summary: What the heck was this?
Review: I heard all kinds of good things about this book, so I decided to give it a try. Wow. The characters are somewhat thinner than cardboard, the writing is childlike, and very, very bizarre. English grammar was not a prerequisite here. I read a novel a week, and this one ended up in the trash can about half way through. Strange, and yet somehow dumb.