Memory

Rating:
Summary: A second reading helps quite a lot
Review: I read this book when it first came out. It was good, but didn't make much of an impression. Just this week I read it again and I think it's really, really good.

The key to following the story might be this. Picture a story set in the far, far future, where people have godlike powers. Two people create a whole new planet and populate it with organisms. The organisms are very close to human; their bodies and personalities are initially patterned on the avatars of folks who are "playing" in this new "playground," but they are real biological (as opposed to mechanical) beings and they proceed to establish their own families, traditions, and civilization. Meanwhile, the "gods" who created this place have a furious argument, resulting in planet-wide ecological damage. Then they get bored and abandon their project!

BUT! -- "Memory" is not about these far-future "gods" -- it's about THEIR far future! -- the legacy of their creation as it plays out among the people living on their artificial-planet-project many tens of thousands of years later. For the people living there, the original genesis of their entire planet and its population have become mysterious ancient myths. Only IMPLICITLY is the book about "long-ago" era when the "gods" created their world and seeded it with life.

I hope this helps some of the readers who are having trouble. This is a beatifully written and truly thought-provoking book.

"Memory" is not as good as Nagata's earlier "Vast," which I would give five stars. For the uninitiated, however, "Vast" is even harder to follow than "Memory" -- MUCH harder, I would imagine.

Rating:
Summary: I loved it, of course
Review: Nagata is on my always-buy list. Some modestly new ideas here, and I read this book slowly to enjoy it longer. Her other books are a little more novel, hence the lack of the fifth star.

Rating:
Summary: I loved it, of course
Review: Nagata is on my always-buy list. Some modestly new ideas here, and I read this book slowly to enjoy it longer. Her other books are a little more novel, hence the lack of the fifth star.

Rating:
Summary: powerful insightful coming of age science fiction thriller
Review: Ten year old Jubilee lives with her parents and her brother Jolly in the remote outpost Temple Huacho located in the isolated wild of Kavasphir Hills, a place known for the frequency of the killing silver floods that terraforms the landscape with each new deluge. The family "owns" metabolic machines to keep them safe from the deadly quick flow of the silver. However, that fails when the silver claims Jolly while his younger sister watches in abject horror.

Several years later, a mysterious stranger seemingly walks out of the silver up to a teenage Jubilee asking for Jolly. Beside the awe of seeing what this man did, her fear of him makes her flee, but also wonder if her sibling lives. Needing to know, Jubilee plans to go on a quest to find her brother and learn the secrets of the silver accompanied by her Uncle Liam.

MEMORY is a powerful insightful coming of age science fiction thriller starring a wonderful protagonist seeking answers, but what she learns makes her wonder about a whole different set of personal questions rather than what she originally sought to understand. The story line is action packed yet contains a subtle theme of finding one's self to comprehend the world in which an individual resides. Though the silver remains ironically a somewhat unsolved puzzle, the reader will have a great time observing the brave heroine on her journey to ascertain the truth that takes her as much inside her self as the weird world she lives in.

Harriet Klausner

Rating:
Summary: Too much was left unexplained
Review: This book was OK, but somehow it didn't quite live up to my expectations. For one thing, it left a LOT of things unexplained at the end. I like a little shocking revellation with my sci-fi, and there was none of it here. This is, as others have noted, a coming-of-age tale first and foremost. The fact that it takes place in an alternate world is secondary, and while Nagata seems to have created a rich and fascinating history for her world, she doesn't bother sharing most of it with us.

What's left is the story of Jubilee, a young woman who has just learned that the brother she thought she lost seven years ago might still be alive. She sets out to find him, and on the way discovers that she is destined to either save or destroy the world - again. The premise of reincarnation is one that Nagata presents as matter-of-fact yet never bothers to explain, so we're left to take it on faith that Jubilee has, indeed, been there and done that before.

Perhaps the most interesting, and the most frustratingly enigmatic, character in the novel is the silver which rises to coat the land every night. the silver is an agent of both destruction and creation, taking away anything it touches and leaving in its place fantastic and surreal structures from eons past. Jubilee soon realizes that the balance of silver hangs on a knife-edge - too much and the world will drown in it, too little and the world will starve. Part of her destiny is to make that fateful choice.

But what is the silver? A biological entity? The fever dreams of an injured goddess? Illusion? We never find out, and for that I just can't forgive Nagata. She sets that question up over and over again, and it never gets answered or even addressed. Talk about leaving us hanging!

The writing is good, and what story is there is interesting. The characters needed some more development, and the plot tended to drag. I was torn between two and three stars, but the above issue with the silver just pushed me over the edge. I can't see recommending it to anyone who likes action and surprises in their fiction.