Paperback, 455 pages
English language
Published May 10, 1997 by Orbit.
Two and a half millennia ago, the artifact appeared in a remote corner of space, beside a trillion-year-old dying sun from a different universe. It was a perfect black-body sphere, and it did nothing. Then it disappeared.
Now it is back.
I know it's not fair to the book itself, but I struggled to finish this one because the narrator's voice did not agree with my ears. It's quite interesting overall, a bit complex but I think necessarily so given the topic.
(Reread.) Revisiting this was rewarding. Probably my second-favorite Culture novel. I think I picked up on a lot more of the intricacies this time around. The plot is convoluted enough that motivations are hard to understand on the first go-round.
