Ebook en oferta: Mundo anillo, de Larry Niven

Durante el día de se puede adquirir en Amazon España el ebook Mundo anillo, de Larry Niven, al precio promocional de 1,42€. 

Ésta es la sinopsis de la novela:

El descubrimiento de un mundo hueco que orbita alrededor de una lejana estrella, desencadena una tremenda lucha entre la humanidad y otras dos razas en plena expansión imperialista. Hasta la misma Tierra se ve amenazada. 

Solo el desparpajo y la suerte fabulosa de uno de los protagonistas, permiten conducir la lucha... A un inesperado desenlace. 

Mundo Anillo es una de las novelas más laureadas en la historia de la cf. Parafraseando a uno de los maestros, Ítalo Calvino, no debemos olvidar la importancia de leer a los clásicos. Y por méritos propios, esta es una de esas obras que han adquirido el marchamo sin lugar a dudas. El tiempo la ha puesto donde debía: es una de las novelas capitales y más importantes de la ciencia ficción de todos los tiempos.

Ebook gratuito: Red Tide, de Larry Niven, Brad R. Torgersen y Matthew J. Harrington

El ebook gratuito de este mes en Phoenix Pick es Red Tide, escrito por Larry Niven en colaboración con Brad R. Torgersen y Matthew J. Harrington. El proceso para descargarlo de forma gratuita es el habitual: se añade al carrito de la compra y luego se cambia el precio sugerido a 0$, antes de realizar el pago.

Ésta es la sinopsis de la novela:

Loosely based on Larry Niven s 1973 novella "Flash Crowd," Red Tide continues to examine the social consequences of the impact of having instantaneous teleportation, where humans can instantly travel long distances in milliseconds.

This is a theme that has fascinated the author throughout his career and even appears in his seminal work Ringworld, where the central character celebrates his birthday by instantly teleporting himself to different time zones, extending his birthday. The author also discusses the impact of such instantaneous transportation in his essay, "Exercise in Speculation: The Theory and Practice of Teleportation."

Larry Niven is joined by two younger writers, Brad R. Torgersen and Matthew J. Harrington, as they take on this challenging idea and further develop the theories and concepts that Niven originally presented in "Flash Crowd."

Ebook en oferta: Ingenieros de Mundo Anillo, de Larry Niven

Durante el día de hoy se puede adquirir en Amazon España el ebook Ingenieros de Mundo Anillo, de Larry Niven, al precio promocional de 1,42€. 

Ésta es la sinopsis de la novela:

Han pasado veinte años desde que Luis Wu, Chmeee Interlocutor de animales y Nessus escaparan de su primera expedición a Mundo Anillo. Ahora, Luis se ha convertido en un cableta adicto a los impulsos eléctricos y su amigo alienígena ocupa un puesto de autoridad en su mundo de origen. Los dos serán secuestrados por el titerote conocido como Ser Último y llevados de vuelta a Mundo Anillo en busca de los tesoros tecnológicos que contiene. Durante su periplo, Luis Wu y Chmeee conocerán toda clase de extrañas razas y sociedades humanoides, desvelarán el misterio sobre los auténticos constructores de Mundo Anillo y explorarán las sorpresas y los secretos que se esconden en su interior.

Ebook en oferta: Mundo anillo, de Larry Niven

Durante el día de hoy se puede adquirir Mundo anillo, de Larry Niven, en formato digital por 1,42€ en varias tiendas online (Casa del Libro, Amazon España).

Ésta es la sinopsis de la novela:

El descubrimiento de un mundo hueco que orbita alrededor de una lejana estrella, desencadena una tremenda lucha entre la humanidad y otras dos razas en plena expansión imperialista. Hasta la misma Tierra se ve amenazada. Solo el desparpajo y la suerte fabulosa de uno de los protagonistas, permiten conducir la lucha... A un inesperado desenlace.Mundo Anillo es una de las novelas más laureadas en la historia de la cf. Parafraseando a uno de los maestros, Ítalo Calvino, no debemos olvidar la importancia de leer a los clásicos. Y por méritos propios, esta es una de esas obras que han adquirido el marchamo sin lugar a dudas. El tiempo la ha puesto donde debía: es una de las novelas capitales y más importantes de la ciencia ficción de todos los tiempos.

Ebook Deal: Three Novels Published By Tor

Currently, you can get three ebooks published by Tor for only $3 each. These are the titles:

Lamentation by Ken Scholes (Amazon US, Amazon ES, Kobo)

An ancient weapon has completely destroyed the city of Windwir.   From many miles away, Rudolfo, Lord of the Nine Forest Houses, sees the horrifying column of smoke rising.  He knows that war is coming to the Named Lands.
Nearer to the Devastation, a young apprentice is the only survivor of the city – he sat waiting for his father outside the walls, and was transformed as he watched everyone he knew die in an instant.

Soon all the Kingdoms of the Named Lands will be at each others' throats, as alliances are challenged and hidden plots are uncovered.

This remarkable first novel from an award-winning short fiction writer will take readers away to a new world – an Earth so far in the distant future that our time is not even a memory; a world where magick is commonplace and great areas of the planet are impassable wastes. But human nature hasn’t changed through the ages: War and faith and love still move princes and nations. 

Building Harlequin's Moon by Brenda Cooper and Larry Niven (Amazon US, Amazon ES, Kobo)

The first interstellar starship, John Glenn, fled a Solar System populated by rogue AIs and machine/human hybrids, threatened by too much nanotechnology, and rife with political dangers. The John Glenn's crew intended to terraform the nearly pristine planet Ymir, in hopes of creating a utopian society that would limit intelligent technology. 

But by some miscalculation they have landed in another solar system and must shape the gas giant planet Harlequin's moon, Selene, into a new, temporary home. Their only hope of ever reaching Ymir is to rebuild their store of antimatter by terraforming the moon. 

Gabriel, the head terraformer, must lead this nearly impossible task, with all the wrong materials: the wrong ships and tools, and too few resources. His primary tools are the uneducated and nearly-illiterate children of the original colonists, born and bred to build Harlequin's moon into an antimatter factory.
Rachel Vanowen is one of these children. Basically a slave girl, she must do whatever the terraforming Council tells her. She knows that Council monitors her actions from a circling vessel above Selene's atmosphere, and is responsible for everything Rachel and her people know, as well as all the skills, food, and knowledge they have ever received. With no concept of the future and a life defined with duty, how will the children of Selene ever survive once the Council is through terraforming and have abandoned Selene for its ultimate goal of Ymir?

The Hum and the Shiver by Alex Bledsoe (Kobo)

Named one of the Best Fiction Books of 2011 by Kirkus Reviews, The Hum and the Shiver by Alex Bledsoe is an enchanting tale of music and magic older than the hills...

No one knows where the Tufa came from, or how they ended up in the Smoky Mountains of East Tennessee. Enigmatic and suspicious of outsiders, the Tufa live quiet lives in the hills and valleys of Cloud County. While their origins may be a mystery, there are hints of their true nature buried in the songs they have passed down for generations.

Bronwyn Hyatt, a pure-blood Tufa, has always insisting on doing things her own way, regardless of the consequences. Even though Tufa rarely leave Cloud County, she enlisted in the Army to escape the pressures of Tufa life—her family, her obligations as a First Daughter, and her dangerous ex-boyfriend. But after barely surviving a devastating ambush that killed most of her fellow soldiers, Private Hyatt returns to Cloud County wounded in body and in spirit. But danger lurks in the mountains and hollows of her childhood home. Cryptic omens warn of impending tragedy, and a restless “haint” lurks nearby, waiting to reveal Bronwyn’s darkest secrets. Worst of all, Bronwyn has lost touch with the music that was once a vital part of her identity.

Now Bronwyn finds the greatest battle to be right here at home, where her obligations struggle with her need for freedom, and if she makes the wrong choice, the consequences could be deadly for all the Tufa. . . .

Ebooks de La Factoría de Ideas en oferta

Durante el mes de marzo la editorial La Factoría de Ideas tiene en oferta (a 3,95€ en lugar del precio habitual de 11,95€) quince títulos de ciencia ficción de autores como Robert A. Heinlein, Frank Herbert, Larry Niven o Isaac Asimov. Se trata, en su mayor parte, de obras clásicas, pero también hay algunas más recientes como, por ejemplo, La ciudad y la ciudad de China Miéville o algunas novelas escritas conjuntamente por Arthur C. Clarke y Stephen Baxter.

La lista completa de títulos en oferta es la siguiente (con enlaces a la tienda de Amazon, aunque la oferta se puede también encontrar en otras tiendas de ebooks):

• Starship troopers, Robert A. Heinlein
• La luna es una cruel amante, Robert A. Heinlein
• Dune, Frank Herbert
• Ingenieros del Mundo Anillo, Larry Niven
• La ciudad y la ciudad, China Miéville
• Fundación, Isaac Asimov
• Los propios dioses, Isaac Asimov
• Preludio a la Fundación, Isaac Asimov
• Trono del Mundo Anillo, Larrry Niven
• Tormenta solar, Arthur C. Clarke y Stephen Baxter 
• Rumbo a Marte, Joe Haldeman
• El ojo del tiempo, Arthur C. Clarke y Stephen Baxter
• Mundo anillo, Larry Niven
• Hacia la Fundación, Isaac Asimov
• El fin de la eternidad, Isaac Asimov

Free Ebook: Limits by Larry Niven

Courtesy of Phoenix Pick you can download Limits, a collection of short stories by Larry Niven, for free. You need to use the coupon 9991295 (you can subscribe to the newsletter to get future promotions, including free ebooks coupons, in your email). This is the description of the book:

Here is an extraordinary mix of fantasy and science fiction from one of the masters of science fiction, Larry Niven.
The stories in this collection include some collaborations with authors such as Jerry Pournelle (Spirals) and Steven Barnes (The Locusts), as well as stories written by Niven himself.
Larry Niven’s credits include the award-winning Ringworld series, his “Known Space” novels and the Man-Kzin anthologies. His collaborations with Jerry Pournelle include such titles as Lucifer’s Hammer, Inferno and The Mote in God’s Eye.

Bowl of Heaven by Larry Niven and Gregory Benford

(Disclaimer: English is my second language, so I want to apologize in advance for there may be mistakes in the text below. If you find any, please let me know so that I can correct it. I'd really appreciate it. Thanks.)

Bowl of Heaven is a book that, apparently, had it all for me to love it. Written by two masters of the genre, Larry Niven and Gregory Benford, it is a novel about one of my dearest topics: big dumb objects. I wanted to love it. I really did. Unfortunately, I couldn't.

Bowl of Heaven has many problems. The most obvious of them all is that it isn't very original. An enormous alien artifact with an almost perfect geometrical shape, in this case a hemisphere, is found by a human starship. Nobody knows what its purpose is or who it builders are. Does it ring any bells? This could have been groundbreaking 40 years ago. Nowadays? Not so much.

Anyway, this is the kind of story that, when correctly done, can be extremely entertaining and full of sense of wonder. For instance, Pushing Ice by Alastair Reynolds is not exactly the most original science fiction novel of the last few decades, but it is a joy to read. Sadly, Bowl of Heaven is not.

A big dumb object is an enormous playground. There is almost no limit to the surprises and the wonders that an author can write in there. However, Niven and Benford choose to go the same way that Ringworld went. Once the characters arrive at the Bowl, they only explore a tiny part of it. And what they find is, to put it midly, not that interesting.

Even with this (intentionally) limited scope, the novel could have worked as an entertaining planetary adventure. It doesn't. And that is the main problem of Bowl of Heaven: it is boring. Very, very boring. I had to force myself to finish reading it. In fact, I must confess that I just skimmed through the 50 or so last pages. It was that boring. But I wanted, at least, to know how it ended.

However, the closer I was to the last chapter, the more afraid I became. And, to my dismay, when I reached the last page of the novel my worst fears were confirmed: this is only the first part of the story, though it was not stated in either the synopsis or the cover of the book. To know more (something?) about the Bowl you'll have to read Shipstar, the forthcoming second volume. You know what? I won't.

I could go on forever listing things I didn't like about this novel. In fact, I have not even mentioned how badly developed the characters are. I'll just quote something that one of the human protagonists is thinking in certain part of the book and let you judge by yourself:

Cliff recalled that if humans stared at each other for long, it meant that they would either fight of make love.

Not all is bad in Bowl of Heaven. For example, one of the alien races has a quite interesting physiology. However, this is a book I'd recommend avoiding. When I started reading it, I was not expecting the most beautiful novel ever written or the most enlightening one. I was looking for a competently written and enjoyable science fiction adventure. I didn't found it.  

(You can also read this review in Spanish, on El rincón de Koreander/También puedes leer esta reseña en español, en El rincón de Koreander)

Up for review (part 2)

As promised, this is the second part of the list of books I've received and I'll be reading and reviewing soon.

The Apex Book of World SF 2 edited by Lavie Tidhar (Apex Publications)

In The Apex Book of World SF 2, editor Lavie Tidhar collects short stories by science fiction and fantasy authors from Africa and Latin America.

An expedition to an alien planet; Lenin rising from the dead; a superhero so secret he does not exist. In The Apex Book of World SF 2, World Fantasy Award nominated editor Lavie Tidhar brings together a unique collection of stories from around the world. Quiet horror from Cuba and Australia; surrealist fantasy from Russia and epic fantasy from Poland; near-future tales from Mexico and Finland, as well as cyberpunk from South Africa. In this anthology one gets a glimpse of the complex and fascinating world of genre fiction—from all over our world.

Featuring work from noted international authors such as Will Elliot, Hannu Rajaniemi, Shweta Narayan, Lauren Beukes, Ekaterina Sedia, Nnedi Okorafor, and Andrzej Sapkowski.

 

 Bowl of Heaven by Gregory Benford and Larry Niven (Tor Books)

In this first collaboration by science fiction masters Larry Niven (Ringworld) and Gregory Benford (Timescape), the limits of wonder are redrawn once again as a human expedition to another star system is jeopardized by an encounter with an astonishingly immense artifact in interstellar space: a bowl-shaped structure half-englobing a star, with a habitable area equivalent to many millions of Earths…and it’s on a direct path heading for the same system as the human ship.

A landing party is sent to investigate the Bowl, but when the explorers are separated—one group captured by the gigantic structure’s alien inhabitants, the other pursued across its strange and dangerous landscape—the mystery of the Bowl’s origins and purpose propel the human voyagers toward discoveries that will transform their understanding of their place in the universe.

 

Seven Wonders by Adam Christopher (Angry Robot Books)

Tony Prosdocimi lives in the bustling Metropolis of San Ventura - a city gripped in fear, a city under siege by the hooded supervillain, The Cowl.

When Tony develops super-powers and acts to take down The Cowl, however, he finds that the local superhero team Seven Wonders aren't as grateful as he assumed they'd be...

File Under: Science Fiction [ Heroes In Action | A Double Cross | Kapow! | Tables Turned ]