Coyote

Rating:
Summary: ALAN STEELE as in "STOLEN"
Review: HUCK FINN meets "The LEGACY OF HEROT". Read both of these which are masterpieces and then see why this is not up to the excitement or TERROR or Humor of the originals. He needs a better editor on this one. I know they started out as a string of short stories but he destroys all the mystery by telling what is going to happen in the first paragraph of each chapter or at the end of the preceeding chapter.(I know TWAIN did that, but that was the general style in the 1800's). I'm a great STEELE fan and loved his last two CHRONOs. If you are Steele fan read this otherwise just read Larry Niven's "LEGACY OF HEROT" from 1970.ALSO his diagram of the ship is incomplete(He has a key with missing labels on the ship), Also the map sort of gives away alot of the story, It's helpful but reveals too much of the plot.It's probably his second worst book after Jerico It.

Rating:
Summary: Reasonable story, but lazy science
Review: I agree with the reviewer who said, basically, "good story, lousy science." The low biodiversity and other problems are all there. Another one that Mr. Steele missed was the small problem of tides. The tidal forces near a super-Jovian gas giant are thousands of times stronger than anything we experience on Earth. On a tidally-locked moon, this isn't so bad. On a rotating planet (such as Coyote), the ocean basins basically would empty and refill twice per day (with appropriate tides)... I assume that Mr. Steele wanted to avoid trying to figure out a tidally-locked world, but his solution (ignore the details) is inadvertantly humorous. Basically, enjoy the book for its well-drawn characters. I don't regret buying it, but it's not a great book.

Rating:
Summary: Reasonable story, but lazy science
Review: I agree with the reviewer who said, basically, "good story, lousy science." The low biodiversity and other problems are all there. Another one that Mr. Steele missed was the small problem of tides. The tidal forces near a super-Jovian gas giant are thousands of times stronger than anything we experience on Earth. On a tidally-locked moon, this isn't so bad. On a rotating planet (such as Coyote), the ocean basins basically would empty and refill twice per day (with appropriate tides)... I assume that Mr. Steele wanted to avoid trying to figure out a tidally-locked world, but his solution (ignore the details) is inadvertantly humorous. Basically, enjoy the book for its well-drawn characters. I don't regret buying it, but it's not a great book.

Rating:
Summary: Great escape fiction
Review: I have to confess, this one takes me back to my younger days, when as an adolescent, I would search for a good sci-fi adventure story. Coyote is such a book. I would have loved it as a young teen, I enjoy it immensely now. Sure some of the science is suspect; hence the 4-star rather than 5-star rating. But, hey, it's a great adventure story!
In the not too distant future, a tyrannical government in what used to be part of the U.S. builds a ship designed to travel 40-odd light years to a solar system with a habitable moon orbiting a Saturn-like planet.At the last minute, a plot by freedom-loving rebels comes to fruition, and the ship is taken and heads for it's destination. The system's planets and satellites are named according to native-American mythology. The moon Coyote is the site of the colony. There are forests, extensive waterways(no real oceans, altho a world girdling equatorial river reaches the size of a small sea), and native wildlife. The major characters in the book, of all ages, have to come to grips with making a home in their new world.
All told, this tale, in a distant setting rather like an alien version of Canada, will entertain readers from jr. high onward. A rollicking good time, highly recommended!

Rating:
Summary: Many Great Facets
Review: I read this novel in serialized format, and looked forward to each installment. It starts with the launching of the first interstellar voyage by man, out of a right-wing, religion-dominated section of a divided America. The captain and some of the crew, however, have plotted to take over the ship and use it to get intellectual prisoners of the state away to freedom. They succeed, but also end up with a small contingent of government-loyal, fascist police/soldiers on board. They reach their destination, establish a colony, and begin exploring this strange but somewhat Earth-like moon (Coyote) of a gas-giant planet (Bear). Much of the story has a coming-of-age slant, as it focuses on several teenage colonists.

This is a well-written novel, with great character development, good adventure, well-articulated world creation, and very human, realistic twists. One section deals with the accidental awakening of one colonist from cold-sleep/hibernation, midway through a decades-long voyage. The man must find a way to survive, and stay sane, through what he knows will be the rest of his life, living alone aboard a ship full of unconscious colonists. This section of the book is very powerful, heart-breaking, and worth buying the book all by itself.

Rating:
Summary: One of his Best
Review: I thoroughly enjoyed reading this wonderful novel. It sort of invoked some of my Alan Dean Foster images of some of ADF's early novels. The excitement of the first part and the description of the totalitarian state that the United States could become seems out of tomorrow's headlines. Indeed, when I was starting to read this book I saw a headline that NASA was given the green light to start developing a new Nuclear Propulsion system. Contrast this to the headlines detailing the breakdown in civil liberties that is inherent in our trying times and you can see the handwriting on the wall. Given the fact that this novel was started well before Sept 11 give me the wilies.

Anyway, to compare this to Niven's Legacy of Herort is to do injustice to both. While it shares some elements of both they are truely two different works. While Niven's story details a fight to the death with the unruly beasts of Avalon, Steele's world is a reatively benign world awaiting fronteersman to tame. The plot and situations are believable and the dystopian future they escape from are chilling. A good story of a new frontier to conqueor.

Rating:
Summary: An excellent novel about colonization of a new world
Review: I thoroughly enjoyed this book; unlike other readers I did not feel that it was disjointed. Although some of the chapters may have been written as separate stories they blended into each other quite well. I have read all of Allen Steele's novels and I think this one is his best by far. I hope there is a sequel.

Rating:
Summary: An editor and proofreader needed desperately.
Review: I would actually give it 3 and half stars, if possible. If some of the science was more believable I'd give this story a 4 and half or a 5.
As someone else has already mentioned, there's not near enough bio-diversity. There should be many more types of animals, birds, plants. The pull of gravity from a gas giant planet that close would have enoromous effects on the tides of Coyote.

And the author is seriously directionally dyslexic. A teenager leaves to explore on his own. A couple of time we're told he's headed west, but if you look at the map in the book, he's obviously headed east. Later on in the story the direction changes and suddenly he's headed east, which fits with the map, but these kinds of mistake should be noticed before the book is published. On one page it says, 'back on the river....head west'.
A few lines later it says since 'the prevailing winds are from the east, he was seldom able to raise his sails, so progress was slow'. These kinds of stupid errors are irritating.

OK, now that I've got those complaints out of the way, I found the story itself and the people to be interesting and beleivable.

The author may even be a little prophetic. Looking at the USA from the outside, it's completely believable that the country could turn into the kind of undemocratic place that Steele writes about. Americans seem to be more willing to give up their liberties because of religious intolerance and fear of terrorists. That's what helps make good science fiction. You can see the possibilities of the fiction becoming fact. A lot of non-Americans wouldn't be surprised to see the rise to power of the "Liberty Party" and eventually the United Republic of America.

I liked the people. I liked the story, and I liked the ending. As long as there's a sequel to finish the story. We certainly need to learn more about those 'sandthieves'.

Rating:
Summary: Great, Imaginative Sci-Fi Novel
Review: I'm not what you would call a huge fan of science fiction, but I found Coyote to be a compelling, interesting read. Coyote is a moon of a planet in a solar system many light-years from Earth. The action in the novel takes place well in the future, when the world has drastically changed. The U.S. is no longer, and what is in its place is particularly unappealing. The starship Alabama is about to launch when it is hijacked by its own crew filled with, instead of the intended party loyalists, social dissidents. The successfully make it to Coyote (and Steele gets them there with some imaginative sci-fi creations) and form the rudiments of a society. They ultimately have contact with earth again, but it is not the earth they left. Coyote is a very readable, very enjoyable sci-fi novel. Have fun.

Rating:
Summary: Pathetic
Review: If Mr. Steele's first book had been written this poorly, there would never have been a second book. The premise could have been interesting, the characters could have been engaging, the story could have been worthwhile, but none of these are true!
Save your money, avoid this piece of exploitative trash. Mr Steele can do better, and should.