Customer Reviews

The Naked God: Faith - Part 2

5 star:		(10)
4 star:		(7)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(2)

 

 

The first book of the series got me interested enough to read the rest, and although I had problems with many aspects of the story, I kept reading, hoping that the ending would make it worthwhile. I was warned about the ending by a cousin, but I kept on, hoping that he was just being too critical. He was not. The bad guys were really bad, which is good, but the good guys were not particularly good. It was very difficult to like any character much past his or her introduction, as they all tended to shed any morals they had at the first opportunity. The expectation was that the ending would point them in the right direction, but instead we got the wave of a magic wand, and everything's okay, even though no one deserves it.

The shame of it is that the effort, the scope, and many of the ideas were impressive. A touch of decency would have gone a long way.

If you got this far that means you are already hooked on this series. And what a great series it is.

Finishing off something of this scale is always a daunting task. One the one hand there is the danger of leaving lots of loose ends dangling, which annoys some readers and leaves you wondering if there will be further sequels.

On the other hand there is a danger in trying to tie up every loose end.

Hamilton falls somewhere in-between on this one. He solves the immediate problem in a rather neat way, that puts the loose ends on a long finger, beyong the scope of any immediate sequel.

Not everyone will love the end, but for me, it works!

For hard core Sci-Fi, the "Night's Dawn" Trilogy has it ALL!!!He-Man heroes, classy heroines, nasty bad guys (not to Even forget THE DEAD RETURNING!!!) New Worlds and Old;Aliens, space battles, suspense, intergalactic conflict and politics; who could ask for MORE? Starships, living space habitats, Biotech, Neurotech, Cyborgs, Genetic Engineering; it's all here; just be prepared to read nothing else for the next couple of MONTHS, 'cause this one is IT!! I originally was hooked into this Epic in the Hardcover Sci-Fi Book Club Edition, buying "The Neutronium Alchemist" first (somehow, I missed "The Reality Disfunction" when first offered; then had to wait another two weeks for that delivery rather than read the story out of sequence. THEN was forced to go through several cowhides, chewing leather and making a complete nuisance of myself until "The Naked God" was finally published and released in Nov. '99. BOTTOM LINE: If you're going to dive into this Epic, Buy the complete Trilogy as a complete set and be prepared to be enthralled by a whole new universe of the caliber of Heinlein, Asimov, or Clarke (and to stay for awhile!!!)

After reading this series twice, and after reading the reviews on here, I do have to say that I think many of the reviewers really missed the boat here.

My take on the book was that it was exactly what the author was promising, and exactly what the readers wanted. It gave us new plotlines that tied into the main plot. It gave us new characters that played a role to move the story on. It tied up all the loose ends of the subplots as they all came together (and for all the subplots that Hamilton was weaving here, thats saying a lot). The characters (good and bad) all grew and changed. The action scenes were fantastic. And most importantly: it gave you the ending that Hamilton was hinting at and indeed that the characters were trying to achieve: a deus ex machina.

Humanity couldn't fight the possessed on their own and win. The Kiint would not help them, the Tyrathca were running away and hiding, and mankind was losing the war. They tried for a Hail Mary pass with no time remaining (pardon the football metaphor) and it worked! They found their deus ex machina (even with the back cover of the book cleverly headlined as "Deus ex Machina" for crying out loud). For everyone who is kvetching about the ending - you should pay attention to what you are reading. This was no "bait-n-switch" or a twist ending. Hamilton delivered exactly what he promised.

Granted - Hamilton waited a really long time to get to the ending, but in a 4000 page series like this, its the journey, not the ending.

This is a review of this author's complete series the NIGHT'S DAWN TRILOGY. Rarely have I been treated to such a sweeping panorama as in this space opera mural painted by a master storyteller. By the time you finish it, you will be dreaming of the universe he has displayed.

I highly recommend anyone with a true love of the hard science fiction genre to make the effort to acquire all 6 books at once together with THE CONFEDERATION HANDBOOK, pull up a chair, grab your metaphorical napkin & tuck in!

Wonderful reading!

The scope of Peter Hamilton's work is, as always, breathtaking. Even in the dying pages of the series, he finds room for a most intriguing new species. However:

I think that Hamilton bit off more than he could chew with the various problems he gets the human race in, and sees no other way out than a rather simplistic, deux ex machina solution whereby a wand is figuratively waved and everything is made all better. It is sad, and as I looked at the pages of the book dwindling to the right, and realized that the characters were not coming up with anything on their own, I knew this would happen.

Hamilton seems to have trouble with endings--Fallen Dragon is another example. Maybe he'd do better to stick to open ended series, where nothing need ever be truly shut down?

I loved this series. I really did. It's going to go down in my lists as one of the best Space Opera series I've read (comparisons of Peter Hamilton to Arthur C. Clarke and Isaac Asimov are very much deserved, in my opinion). This series is very intricate, with lots and lots of memorable characters and locations, large interstellar mysteries, alien races (both malevolent and benign), and plenty of action and warfare.

The thing I think I enjoyed most about this series was the characters that you learn so much about, and about whom you really learn to care by the end of the story. Also, the horror present in parts of this story is very much akin to what you'd read in stories by HP Lovecraft or Brian Lumley (witness what happens to Dariat and his companions and you'll get a taste of what true hopelessness and desperation feel like).

This series is so good, there isn't enough space here to talk about all the things I like about it. It's truly epic in scope, and comes to a very satisfactory conclusion. I especially enjoyed watching Quinn Dexter finally get what was coming to him.

My only reason for removing one star from this final book is due to the quick ending to the book. Humanity is truly at a point of final desperation, and it really appears that nothing is going to be able to stop the dead from taking over the universe. The solution to this dilemma comes literally in the last 20 pages of the book. It's the result of a quest that Joshua and his crew have been on for a long time, even getting involved in the civil war of a newly-discovered alien race in the process. Joshua is seeking an alien artifact with 'God power', and is hoping that this artifact can help them. However, when Joshua finds this artifact, rather than finding a solution that can help them solve their own problem, the artifact literally solves the problem for all of humanity in the matter of just a few pages. After all the work (mostly enjoyable) I had gone through reading all 6 of these books, it was a bit of a letdown to have things solved so completely and so quickly by an alien entity with all the answers.

But this is a minor criticism. Peter Hamilton has done something that not many authors even attempt, and even fewer ever do successfully. He's created a very detailed and interesting universe with lots of memorable characters and settings that's a lot of overall fun to read. If the ending is a bit hurried, it's at worst only a minor disappointment that's definitely overshadowed by the scope and greatness of this series.

I loved this series. I really did. It's going to go down in my lists as one of the best Space Opera series I've read (comparisons of Peter Hamilton to Arthur C. Clarke and Isaac Asimov are very much deserved, in my opinion). This series is very intricate, with lots and lots of memorable characters and locations, large interstellar mysteries, alien races (both malevolent and benign), and plenty of action and warfare.

The thing I think I enjoyed most about this series was the characters that you learn so much about, and about whom you really learn to care by the end of the story. Also, the horror present in parts of this story is very much akin to what you'd read in stories by HP Lovecraft or Brian Lumley (witness what happens to Dariat and his companions and you'll get a taste of what true hopelessness and desperation feel like).

This series is so good, there isn't enough space here to talk about all the things I like about it. It's truly epic in scope, and comes to a very satisfactory conclusion. I especially enjoyed watching Quinn Dexter finally get what was coming to him.

My only reason for removing one star from this final book is due to the quick ending to the book. Humanity is truly at a point of final desperation, and it really appears that nothing is going to be able to stop the dead from taking over the universe. The solution to this dilemma comes literally in the last 20 pages of the book. It's the result of a quest that Joshua and his crew have been on for a long time, even getting involved in the civil war of a newly-discovered alien race in the process. Joshua is seeking an alien artifact with 'God power', and is hoping that this artifact can help them. However, when Joshua finds this artifact, rather than finding a solution that can help them solve their own problem, the artifact literally solves the problem for all of humanity in the matter of just a few pages. After all the work (mostly enjoyable) I had gone through reading all 6 of these books, it was a bit of a letdown to have things solved so completely and so quickly by an alien entity with all the answers.

But this is a minor criticism. Peter Hamilton has done something that not many authors even attempt, and even fewer ever do successfully. He's created a very detailed and interesting universe with lots of memorable characters and settings that's a lot of overall fun to read. If the ending is a bit hurried, it's at worst only a minor disappointment that's definitely overshadowed by the scope and greatness of this series.

The sixth & final volume,thank God,(no pun intended) of a six volume series. See series review on the Reality Dysfunction: Emergence page.

This story is a galaxy - Some brilliant ideas trapped in a mind-numbingly large volume of nothing. Read it at warp speed.