DRAGON'S EGG by ROBERT L. FORWARD | Sci-Fi Book Review
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- Опубліковано 11 вер 2024
- Dragon's Egg is a classic science fiction novel from physicist Robert L. Forward. It's a hard sci-fi book that often gets compared to Children of Time by Adrian Tchaikovsky. Here are some thoughts on the book and what types of readers might enjoy it!
I read this in the early 90ies and bought it again just last year. It’s premise has stayed with me forever. Great book.
That’s awesome Colin! While I might not have loved the entire reading experience, I agree that it is an intriguing premise and I felt the ending was thought provoking.
Just to answer your question at the end regarding numbers.
The cheela end up knowing how to count as it would have been very weird indeed.
You probably didn't pay too much attention but their counting system is invented when they migrate below the lost zone away from the volcano. During this period, they only count up to 3 because there's no need for more. Basically their math skill is one of a 4-5 years old that didn't learn to count. If you'd notice, kids tend to have an easy time counting up to 3-4, sometime 5. But then it's harder and they start getting confused. The logical reasoning behind that is that you often manipulate 1, 2 or 3 items at once, but rarely more. Therefor, Cheela had "1, 2, 3, many" which should be enough to cover about 99% of your needs. It is hard to imagine but if you'd go back in time before writing and counting. I'm talking some very distant past here, when agriculture wasn't even a thing. You would probably end up with people having roughly the same counting system. They'd count up to a certain value around "beyond that point it's too many we don't need a word for that"' and call it a day.
Their numeral system is then based on 12, the number of eyes they have.
Thanks for sharing Sylvain, it’s an interesting concept to wrap your mind around! I will think about it 1, 2, 3, many times!
Love this book and it’s sequel, “Starquake” quite a lot. Love how nuclear reactions take place a million times faster than human ones, because that’s just such a mind boggling but close to understandable thought. Have you read the sequel? In a lot of ways i actually liked it quite a lot more than the first one, but the first one is sort of more complete as a “human” story. Love people talking about these tho, so thanks!
I agree, there were some mind boggling concepts! I haven’t read the sequel, I’m glad to hear you enjoyed it!
I want to say that they had a word for some sort of mythical creature in their own past that we decided the closest word for whatever it was in our language was “dragon”. They may have not literally had a word for dragons but I’m sure they had some sort of religious beliefs at one time where a beast akin to a dragon may have appeared in myths.
Thanks Austin, that’s a logical explanation!
@@WordsinTime I haven’t read the book yet but I plan on it, so just an uninformed guess to be honest but it makes sense in my head haha 😅
I read this book and the sequel decades ago - one thing I do remember is another species on the star that is a big, dumb predator type. Could have been a plant? Anyway, I love these two novels and highly recommend for the hard scifi lovers ;)
Hi, jumping back in time to comment on Dragon's Egg.
As I said, this is probably my second favourite novel, after The Heechee Saga. I mean, I think it is - I haven't looked back at everything I ever read, let alone ranked them. Yet these books are those that spring to mind.
The premise of these books is *extraordinary*. I haven't read this book by Tchaikovsky, so it's my only reference point. The Cheela are amazing creations, with so many great characters among them, and while the humans aren't so well-drawn - well, I'm not that worried about that, to be honest. Robert Forward isn't the greatest stylist and his books aren't character-driven, but his descriptions of the Cheela show where his true interests lie. The fate of one in particular made me tear up, I recall that.
I must admit that like the Gateways I haven't read these books in a long time.
I've read and enjoyed Forward's other books (often co-written with members of his family): the situations described and the aliens encountered are always creative. None of them quite match Dragon's Egg and the Cheela.
Bit puzzled by the things you're puzzled by: didn't the Cheela count on Base 12, the number of eyes they have? Could be wrong. And I don't don't know why they shouldn't have a mythological creature called a dragon? I mean, we have! I actually don't remember this, so I'll look out for it on my re-read!
I'd have to do that re-read to do a fair score but at the moment this is an easy 9.
I’m glad you enjoyed it as well as other Forward books! I understand a base number system but the way it was written made it sound like the cheela didn’t conceptually understand higher numbers, but perhaps I misinterpreted it. While this is a book I might not have loved all of at the time, it is one I still regularly think about!
@@WordsinTime As i said, it's been a while so a lot of the elements of detail are missing from my memory. I will do a re-read soon. Yes, I too think about parts of these books now and again - remember the scene where a Cheela climbs a 'hill' and looks down on her colleagues for the first time, giving them that missing third dimension? Little things.
I liked this one a lot
Fun Trivia: Pierre Carnot Niven is named after Forward's friend SF legend Larry Niven. Niven had featured a Julian Forward, a descendant of Robert Forward, in his story Borderland of Sol.
I love that! Thanks for sharing! I’ll look out for that if I pick up Borderland of Sol.
Schild’s Ladder by Greg Egan is definitely the hardest SciFi I have ever read to date…I have not read this one but it sounds a bit more like Flux by Stephen Baxter which is the 3rd book in the Xeelee Sequence than it does Children of Time and somewhat more similar sounding to The Crucible of Time by John Brunner but since I haven’t read it I am just going by your review…I will add this one to my TBR but it will not be a high priority…A very good review though…New to your channel and liking it so far…Keep up the good works 👍🏻
Thanks for the kind words Bob! Permutation City is on my TBR list, do you think that’s a good place to start with Greg Egan?
@@WordsinTime I always recommend to reader’s that the best place to start for Greg Egan is “Instantiation” it’s a collection of 11 short stories which gives people a feel for his writing style as he isn’t a traditional SciFi writer…If you could let me know what you thought I would love to hear your take on it…
@@UncleMonk23 Typically I am drawn more to novels than short story collections, but if you think it’s a good place to start I will add it to my list. Thanks!
@@WordsinTime I understand not everyone cares for the short story but some of his short stories are very good…but if you want to start with a novel then Permutation City which is the 2nd book of a trilogy entitled “Subjective Cosmology” the trilogy covers similar concepts but they are not connected in any other way and can be read as a stand alone…So it’s fine to start there or with the first book in that trilogy entitled Quarantine…So you are good with Permutation City…Hope you enjoy it…
@@UncleMonk23 Thanks so much for the info! Looking forward to it!
This is one of my favorite sci fi books. Just a really fun read that had me laughing and engaged throughout it.
Awesome, I’m glad you loved it Zach!
I am sold by the title of the book alone! Then mentioning Children of Time?! Picking this up for sure 😁
Haha awesome! I preferred Children of Time but it does share some interesting aspects. I’ll be interested to hear your thoughts!
They could count up to 12. They had a base 12 system. They used names of things for 4 through 12. Like the number of directions, the number of teeth a swift had and the number of eyes a cheela had.
It’s an interesting concept to use a base 12 system and not have numbers for 13, 14, etc.!
They could only count one, two, three and many, until they plan the move to "Bright's Heaven". Then they develop the base 12 system.
@@randomcomments101but before the base 12 system they could still use the number of eyes a swift has as a reference for a number bigger than 3. But they just wouldn't have a word for it.
I saw this at the thrift store today and was all: Oh no! I haven't watched Words in Time's vid yet!
Now I have and thanks! Sounds like I made the right choice for me leaving it behind - while it sounds neat, I don't do well with slow and technical :(
Also... plants have a word for dragon but not 4+? Hmmm
Haha it might be worth trying at some point, but if doesn’t sound like your thing, then it makes sense to prioritize things you are more excited for. I think the numbers and the dragon were at different points in the cheela’s evolution. It wasn’t anything that negatively influenced my overall opinion of the book, just seemed odd at the time haha
Lol, that language does seem odd!
I have a lot of other sci-fi to get to in the near future so maybe in the further future!
Star Trek Voyager did a really good episode based on the story called Blink of an Eye, if you're wanting the story to be shorter. I saw the episode first and then read the book, part of the book was weird but it was very interesting too and I'm not into technical stuff either.
how did i miss this book? 🤔 there was a time i practically haunted Barnes and Knoble looking for good science fiction.
I hope you like it if you find it!
The Voyager episode Blink of an Eye was based on this story, I had seen it recommended on Reddit and then I watched the episode and eventually read the book. There were some weird parts in the book but otherwise I really liked it.
@@sarahberkner That’s cool!
You wondered about the word "Dragon" and the Cheela using it, although they cannot have an idea what a dragon is. Dragon doesn't depict an animal, but a place! Draco (aka Dragon) is a constellation in the far northern sky. This is where the neutrino star evolved. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Draco_(constellation), en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dragon%27s_Egg#The_neutron_star
Woah, very cool! Thanks for sharing!
I like your review, but I think you are being idiosyncratic about what a dragon is. Do you think the Cheela would have imagined wings? Lizards? Fire? Check out Overly Sarcastic Productions video on dragons. It may change your mind about what you think about dragons. Also, one of the things I love about this novel is that it is not character driven. At all. That's pretty unusual. It still manages to have some emotional moments though. The old one bringing food to the clan and the death of pink eye for examples. I've subscribed now so keep up the good work! Ya young whipper snapper!
Great points, I’ll check out that video! Welcome to the channel!
kudos
Thanks Mal!
no film adaptation of this?
Not that I know of!
You'd need an electron microscope to watch it.
Maybe their counting system was a base3 counting system! Sounds like it's trying to be "different"...perhaps a bit too different that
spoils the whole thing! Hollywood produces a lot of "different" things that are boomers for that very reason. Not that different
can't be good, but in pushing different most of the time pushes silliness! Let's make a bicycle out of popcorn! That's different!
Life on a neutron star! Okay. Done. "Dragon" was the RAGE in the 80-90s! Like vampires and zombies in titles/themes in the 2000s!
I think it was a base level counting system, but it sounded like they didn’t conceptually understand higher numbers, but perhaps I misunderstood haha