Helpful Score: 1
An interesting book. Lots of science waved away, but that's ok. I do generally like the stories Sawyer tells, and he's got some interesting cross-cultural dialog and introspection going on in this one.
It's the story of a tunnel opened between two similar universes: the one we're currently stuck in, and a slightly altered one where neanderthals, rather than our own ancestors became dominant. And the story of how a neanderthal from the other side got sucked through into our world and then has to deal with us.
(With a separate sub-plot of 'what happened to our scientist' in the neanderthal universe.)
Note that these aren't cavemen. They've arguably got more advanced science than we do. (Though a 40-year tech gap is nothing given 40,000 years of divergent history.) In fact, the magical things that let things like language not be a problem are essentially hand-waved away by advanced neanderthal technology, so it's actually a useful plot device.
Because the interesting things are the interactions between these two different peoples, so we need to get to that interaction.
This was quite enjoyable.
Note however: One of the scenes early in the book is a rape scene, where one of the human scientists gets assaulted by a mystery stranger and subsequently goes through the remainder of the book scared of men. This whole sequence made me feel smarmy... I'm not sure Sawyer handled things as well as he might have, and I can't help but feel that there should have been a different way to get his characters into the state he needed without it. The whole scene doesn't have a whole lot of relevance to this book anyway (though it gets more important in the subsequent novels). The fact that this plot thread is here is why I can't give the book the rating I think it otherwise deserves... The whole thing just kind of hangs over my impressions like a black cloud.
4 of 5 stars.
It's the story of a tunnel opened between two similar universes: the one we're currently stuck in, and a slightly altered one where neanderthals, rather than our own ancestors became dominant. And the story of how a neanderthal from the other side got sucked through into our world and then has to deal with us.
(With a separate sub-plot of 'what happened to our scientist' in the neanderthal universe.)
Note that these aren't cavemen. They've arguably got more advanced science than we do. (Though a 40-year tech gap is nothing given 40,000 years of divergent history.) In fact, the magical things that let things like language not be a problem are essentially hand-waved away by advanced neanderthal technology, so it's actually a useful plot device.
Because the interesting things are the interactions between these two different peoples, so we need to get to that interaction.
This was quite enjoyable.
Note however: One of the scenes early in the book is a rape scene, where one of the human scientists gets assaulted by a mystery stranger and subsequently goes through the remainder of the book scared of men. This whole sequence made me feel smarmy... I'm not sure Sawyer handled things as well as he might have, and I can't help but feel that there should have been a different way to get his characters into the state he needed without it. The whole scene doesn't have a whole lot of relevance to this book anyway (though it gets more important in the subsequent novels). The fact that this plot thread is here is why I can't give the book the rating I think it otherwise deserves... The whole thing just kind of hangs over my impressions like a black cloud.
4 of 5 stars.
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