2001: A Space Odyssey

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Summary: 2001 A Space Odyssey
Review: In this compelling journey through space I could feel the star dust fly by me as I sat in the cockpit of Discovery steering my ship towards Jupiter's outer moons. Flying with me is HAL, a super-computer that is hiding something from me. She tried to destroy me but she did not exceed. I think that I might have to shut her down. As I peer out into space I feel the loneliness swwep into me. If you like fantasy books that are thrilling and have a twist ending then you should read 2001 A Space Odyssey.

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Summary: Fascinating and beautifully written story
Review: I guess I won't say too much because the consensus is that it is a great book. I was utterly confused by the movie so I bought this book and suddenly things became clearer. The three sub-stories threaded so well together and the amount of detail is staggering, but not overwhelming. I never considered myself a science-fiction fan, but Clarke and Kubrick hit the nail on this subject and it was just fun to read this book.

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Summary: Superb writing with great ideas!
Review: Thank you Mr. Clarke for bringing this book into existence!

The many ideas brought forth in the book (especially written decades ago)are so fresh and mind-blowing even as we review them today...

Read it and see if you agree.

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Summary: Clarke's best
Review: I read quite a lot of Arthur C. Clarke in late childhood and reread as an adult what I considered then to be his best works. I've decided this is the best of his best. The movie version, by the way, depends utterly on its soundtrack, and contrary to popular misconception very little of that is Richard Strauss's music. No, over thirty minutes of Gyorgy Ligeti's music, especially his "Atmospheres", is crucial.

I recommend interested readers get hold of Richard Toop's GYORGY LIGETI (20TH-CENTURY COMPOSERS).

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Summary: 5 STARS -- An excelent variation on a theme.
Review: 2001 has since it's premier, been my favorite SF work of all time. Following my seeing the film, I bought the book. The novel was very different from the film (Saturn instead of Jupiter) but still an excellent rendering of a vision of a still possible future. It is not so much translation of Kubrick's film, but rather a reflection. Reading it gives answers to many questions and raises new questions in the process. Although this work exists only independently of ACC's later 3 sequels, it stand's on it's own and is a must for any SF fan.

But I still do wish Clarke would go back and write a parallel novelization of the film. It would make the reading of the sequels a little less confusing for the readers who didn't or can't see the film.

Rating:
Summary: 2001: A Review
Review: 2001: A Space Odyssey was written with optimism towards the future. Yet, we have reached 2001, and none of these incredible machines dreamed up by Arther C. Clark have been invented yet. The story tells a tale of a long lost artifact discovered having aged a long time. This spawns the launch of a mission to Jupiter to follow this mysterious signal back to it's origin. Aided by the monitone voiced HAL9000 computer, several astronauts make their way to Jupiter. A small kink in the journey develops when HAL goes berserk, but regardless, Dave (Main Character) makes it to Jupiter and finds the source of the signal. Will we ever make it to Jupiter? Will we ever develop A.I.? I guess we will have to wait and see.

In my opinion, this is an advanced book, with a lot of hidden meanings and ideas. If you are a creative thinker, with a taste for Science Fiction, this is the book for you. Although, I am an avid Science Fiction reader, I found this book difficult to follow.

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Summary: A thought-provoking book
Review: I'm 21 and haven't seen the movie. Yeah yeah, I know, I know. Am I the only one? So I've heard all this hype about the movie, and I always see the book at local bookstores, so one day I just picked it up.

This is an awesome book. It reminds me of Carl Sagan's "Contact" in a way. Actually, it reminds me of so many other science-fiction books...which is probably because so much of our outer space culture is based off of the ideas in this book.

This book is a classic. It really is. It talks about issues that Man probably thought of a while ago, but never had the technology to actually think of doing it. Like cloning...the book mentions cloning organs, so people with heart/lung/tissue damage can live. Then it goes further, saying: Is that all we can do to help ourselves live? What about bionic skin? What about instead of putting one artificial organ into us, why not put one of our organs into something artificial -- like our brain into a machine? Then we'd live (or our thoughts would live -- what else are we?) for a much longer time.

But this is just one of the MANY concepts the books goes into. I can't say enough about this book, except that I can't believe I still haven't seen the movie yet. I doubt, even though all I've ever heard was wonderful things, that the movie can even halfway compare with the book.

*reminds himself to add Clarke to the new favorite author list.*

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Summary: WOW!
Review: This book is so deep. The ending is AMAZING. I can say nothing but that Clarke is a god of the genre, and he kept me glued to the pages of this one for two sittings of enjoyable reading. Beginning with the evolution of man, and ending with one man's rediscovery of the race that prompted their evolution, this book is a masterpiece of SF.

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Summary: The book that explains the movie
Review: "2001" the movie was a tour de force. Over thirty years after its release, HAL's "eye", HAL's voice, and the monolith are instantly recognizable, even to those who were not born when the movie was first released. Despite this instant recognition, how many people do you know truly understood the movie, especially the end?

If you want a deeper understanding of the story, if you want to know why HAL did what he did, if you just want to know what that ending was about, or if you want to showoff for your friends by "knowing" what all that weird stuff was about, then I recommend you read this book. Even if you have read it before, I would encourage you to read the book again this year, because it is the year 2001.

"2001" is actually three relatively independent stories tied together by the mystery of the monoliths. The story begins several million years ago at the dawn of mankind. Actually, we are still little more than apes, and our ancestors are on the verge of extinction. The story follows one ape-man named Moon-Watcher and his interactions with an alien artifact. The story then jumps forward to modern times (which was roughly 35 years into the future when Clarke wrote the story), and we follow the story of Dr. Heywood Floyd and the discovery of an ancient alien artifact buried on the moon. Finally, we move a little further into time as Dave Bowman, Frank Pool, and their AI system named HAL voyage to Saturn (Jupiter in the movie).

I both enjoyed and was saddened by Clarke's vision for our present day. In only a dozen years we went from the very first satellite (Sputnik) to putting men on the Moon. Now, over thirty years after that first moon landing, mankind cannot even escape low earth orbit. So, while Clarke's vision of our future three decades out missed the mark , I would argue the failure was ours and not his. Nevertheless, I found reading a vision of our present day that was written over thirty years ago exciting.

The book, like the movie, is not exactly fast paced. It focuses heavily on the "science" in "science fiction," and the characters are never developed very much, and for these reasons I did not give it a full five stars. However, I still strongly recommend you read the book. It is, after all, 2001.

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Summary: Boring and mundane
Review: I'm surprised by all the five-star reviews this book is getting. It took me months to finish this book because it was so boring. After discovering a black slab on the moon that is thought to have been planted by aliens, a team is sent to Saturn to investigate. The first half is utter torture to read, as the book jumps from one story to another, leaving the reader frustrated. Things picks up in the second half when HAL, the ship computer, begins to act up. But overall, this book is a big disappointment. I haven't seen the movie, but it must be better than the book.