Rating: 
Summary: Fantastic
Review: This novel is absolutely incredible. The author has taken and made an STL civilization, and created a fantastic Space Opera with it. For all those that thought that SF with large, grand scales, a fast pace, and absolutely gripping writing required FTL travel...you are wrong. Yes, there is some FTL travel in this book, but very little is time is spent in that civilization, instead most of the book takes place in the Cycler Compact, a region of space where STL dominates, and a cooperative society is needed for any interstellar travel. This novel incorporates some elements from Ventus, such as the concept of Inscape and the use of nanotech, but is otherwise completely seperate from it. It also, I think, vastly outdoes Ventus as well. This novel has so many plot twists, and many different but interconnected plots, that it can't help but draw you in. There are conspiracies around every corner, massive intrigue, espionage, sabotage, and ultimately a race to save or destroy civilizations. It's simply fabulous! Although if you are not a fan of large, epic works of fiction....it's probably not for you.
Rating: 
Summary: Better than his first, but still shows amateurish touches
Review: Ventus, Karl Schroeder's first novel, received much positive -- and undeserved -- acclaim. Although a few interesting ideas and situations were tossed around, Ventus was a thoroughly amateurish effort. Characters were introduced in such a way to suggest they would become important, then they vanished. Much of the plotting made little sense when you thought about it, and characterization was of the "funny hat" school.In Permanence, Schroeder has vastly improved. The first three-fourths of the book is actually compelling and reasonably well-constructed. Characters have a degree of depth. The story moves with excellent pacing and cross-cutting between scenes. The side details that flesh out the science-fictional setting are well-wrought. Unfortunately, Schroeder still shows some amateurism around the edges. Characters are introduced and kept in the picture almost by brute force. For instance, the crew assembled by the main character agree to go along on a risky mission for no set of believable reasons at all -- they just seem to think it would be a good idea to go. Character motivations get confusing toward the end, as does the storyline itself. Finally, this novel is ultimately about "the transcendent", which of course can never be shown directly. Schroeder has his characters talk around it, very unconvincingly. So this book ends in a whimpering, silly manner. But, as I said, for most of the way it's a decent ride. Schroeder still displays plenty of shortcomings as a writer, but he has really leapfrogged his first published effort, and in a few years he may be turning out stories that are polished from start to end.
Rating:
Summary: Classic, wide-screen space-opera with a sharp hard-sf edge.
Review: ___________________________________________
Permanence is set in the 25th century, when humanity has
settled dozens of extrasolar planets -- the so-called "lit worlds" -- and
thousands of brown-dwarf colonies -- the halo worlds. All the
colonies were linked by big, NAFAL [note 1] starships, each travelling
a fixed circuit of worlds -- the cyclers [note 2]. The cyclers never stop, as
the energy cost to boost them to relativistic speeds is, well,
astronomical. Ultralight shuttles transfer passengers, crew and cargo at
each port. Permanence is a quasi-religious order set up to support the great
starships, and to preserve human civilization for the indefinitely long
future. It's a noble and admirable organization, which has been
seriously disrupted by the recent discovery of FTL travel -- which, it
turns out, will only work near a full-size star. FTL travel is *much*
cheaper than the sublightspeed cyclers, so the halo worlds' economies,
and the Cycler Compact, are near collapse. It gets worse -- the lit worlds
are joining the new Earth-based Rights Economy, an aggressively-
centralized property-rights setup that forbids any non-commercial
transactions. Hmm -- could this be socially-conscious Canada vs. the
great, grasping Colossus of the South? (The halo worlds are cold, too...) Meadow-Rue Rosebud Cassells lit out from Allemagne station when
her bullying brother got to be too much. Enroute to Erythrion, Rue
discovers, and files a claim on, a new comet. [Minor *SPOILER*
warning -- but no more than is on the dust-jacket.] Her claim is denied
-- her 'comet' is really a spaceship -- but then reinstated: it's not
a *human* spaceship, and it doesn't answer calls, though the drive is
still working. Rue must take physical control of the ghost ship to make
good her claim, but Powerful Forces want the ship for themselves... The framework of the novel is Rue's growth from scared kid to
respected starship captain. I like bildungsromans, and this is a good
one. But the real power of Permanence is the good old sense-of-
wonder techstuff: "[The colonies] swarmed like insects around
incandescent filaments hundreds of kilometers in length. Each
filament was a fullerene cable that harvested electricity from
Erythrion's magnetic field... The power running through the cables
made them glow in exactly the same way that tungsten had glowed in
light bulbs... on twentieth-century Earth." I love this stuff. And it's
even plausible -- see Schroeder's neat website, kschroeder.com At times Permanence may remind you of Ken Macleod's political SF,
though Schroeder is much less in your face (which I prefer). You'll
see nods to Pohl's Gateway, Norton's Forerunners, Brin's and
Pellegrino's hostile-universe Fermi-paradox ideas... Schroeder's still
looking for a distinctive voice, which is pretty standard for a
writer's early books, and anyway he s/t/e/a/l/s *borrows* from the
best... Schroeder's very good at delivering the short, sharp shock: Rue's
poor, then she's rich! Oops, bad claim, poor again. Wait, she's rich
after all! This 'Perils of Pauline' plot structure works pretty well for
most of the book, but was wearing thin towards the end. Again,
these are sophomore-book teething problems, easily forgiveable
within the terrific story (and backstory!) that Schroeder's got to tell.
Which is: classic, wide-screen space-opera with a sharp hard-sf edge
-- my favorite kind of SF! Folks, this is the good hard stuff, which is
never in oversupply. So if you haven't yet tried Schroeder's brand of
thinking-being's hard-sf adventure stories, Permanence is an
excellent place to start. Then you can go back and pick up on last
year's Ventus, which might even be better. They're both terrific
books. Happy reading!
_____________
Note 1.) Not as Fast as Light, an Ursula K. LeGuin coinage. Or is it
Nearly as Fast? And did you know that her ansibles are an anagram
of lesbians? 2.) The cyclers are the neatest part of the backstory -- see
Schroeder's website for the
details, which are interesting of themselves (for spaceflight buffs like
me, anyway) and spoiler-free. I was a bit disappointed that the cyclers
had become obsolete by Permanence time -- well, sort of -- and I hope
that Schroeder returns to earlier times in the future history of the
Cycler Compact. And I wouldn't be surprised if Ventus turned out to be
in Permanence's future... Review copyright 2002 by Peter D. Tillman
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