Aurora

English language

Published Sept. 2, 2016

ISBN:: 9780316098090

(2 reviews)

Aurora is a 2015 novel by American science fiction author Kim Stanley Robinson. The novel concerns a generation ship built in the style of a Stanford torus traveling to Tau Ceti in order to begin a human colony. The novel's primary narrating voice is the starship's artificial intelligence. The novel was well-received by critics.

3 editions

enne📚 reviewed Aurora by Kim Stanley Robinson

3 stars

I enjoyed this Kim Stanley Robinson take about (the problems of living in) a generation starship. A friend who once saw KSR's WisCon talk about this book recommended it to me.

This is not my first KSR rodeo, so I knew a bit of what to expect from his writing style. It's a bit of a dry, plot-driven story. There's not particularly strong emotional beats. And, it's a vehicle :drum: for KSR's opinions on generation ships, insular biogeography, and the Fermi Paradox.

One thing that I think works very well in this book is that the narrator is the ship itself, having been exhorted to summarize the journey in words by the chief engineer. It can explain away some of why the book focuses on only a few characters and also why it's largely dry and descriptive. (The ship does in time learn to enjoy metaphors and wordplay, like "once …

I enjoyed this Kim Stanley Robinson take about (the problems of living in) a generation starship. A friend who once saw KSR's WisCon talk about this book recommended it to me.

This is not my first KSR rodeo, so I knew a bit of what to expect from his writing style. It's a bit of a dry, plot-driven story. There's not particularly strong emotional beats. And, it's a vehicle :drum: for KSR's opinions on generation ships, insular biogeography, and the Fermi Paradox.

One thing that I think works very well in this book is that the narrator is the ship itself, having been exhorted to summarize the journey in words by the chief engineer. It can explain away some of why the book focuses on only a few characters and also why it's largely dry and descriptive. (The ship does in time learn to enjoy metaphors and wordplay, like "once in a blue muon".) The ship is probably the best character in the book.

I have mixed feelings about the end of the book, but it's hard to talk about things without being too spoilery. Suffice it to say that I found the penultimate 10% of the book fun and think it would have been stronger to end there before the shift into the more didactic final 10%.

Kenobit reviewed Aurora by Kim Stanley Robinson

Una nave generazionale raccontata come si deve

4 stars

Ho sempre amato l'approccio scientifico e sociologico di KSR. Non si preoccupa solo della fattibilità scientifica, ma anche delle dinamiche sociali. In questo caso, la storia di una colonia sparata verso un astro lontano offre spunti notevoli sui cambi generazionali.