Andrew's Fiction Reviews

The Golden Age by John C. Wright

 This is one of those books that I wouldn't give to someone who doesn't read much SF.  While a dedicated SF fan will go "Oh my gosh, he doesn't explain anything!" with an expression of positive glee a neophyte will go "Oh my gosh, he doesn't explain anything!" and promptly quit in disgust.  So as much as I loved this book, I can't recomend it to everyone.
 The setting is a far, far future hard SF solar system which is just getting ready for the big party they throw at the turn of every millenium.  Technology is like magic, near immortality is commonplace, and its been pretty peaceful for a very long time.  It isn't perfectly peaceful, though, and the story centers around Phaedrus and his struggle with conspiracies, with his previous self's decision to seal off portions of his memory from his conciousness, and with his own ideals.
 I think the thing that I most enjoyed about this book and the rest of the series was the grappling with ideas about what it means to be good, what it means to be heroic, and what it means to be the same person.  In Heinlein books, for instance, he might address issues like this but then hit you over the head with a lecture about the proper choice Wright generally provides multiple points of view and the drawbacks to the ideals his society is built on.  The other really nice thing about this book is the setting.  Like Middle Earth, there is a lot of history that seems to sit underneath the world - history that is touched on but not fully explained.