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    The Golden Age
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    The Golden Age
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    The Golden Age
    Ebook520 pages8 hours

    The Golden Age

    By John C. Wright

    4/5

    ()

    Currently unavailable

    Currently unavailable

    About this ebook

    The Golden Age is Grand Space Opera, a large-scale SF adventure novel in the tradition of A. E. Van vogt and Roger Zelazny, with perhaps a bit of Cordwainer Smith enriching the style. It is an astounding story of super science, a thrilling wonder story that recaptures the excitements of SF's golden age writers.

    The Golden Age takes place 10,000 years in the future in our solar system, an interplanetary utopian society filled with immortal humans. Within the frame of a traditional tale-the one rebel who is unhappy in utopia-Wright spins an elaborate plot web filled with suspense and passion.

    Phaethon, of Radamanthus House, is attending a glorious party at his family mansion to celebrate the thousand-year anniversary of the High Transcendence. There he meets first an old man who accuses him of being an impostor and then a being from Neptune who claims to be an old friend. The Neptunian tells him that essential parts of his memory were removed and stored by the very government that Phaethon believes to be wholly honorable. It shakes his faith. He is an exile from himself.

    And so Phaethon embarks upon a quest across the transformed solar system--Jupiter is now a second sun, Mars and Venus terraformed, humanity immortal--among humans, intelligent machines, and bizarre life forms that are partly both, to recover his memory, and to learn what crime he planned that warranted such preemptive punishment. His quest is to regain his true identity.

    The Golden Age is one of the major, ambitious SF novels of the year and the international launch of an important new writer in the genre.



    At the Publisher's request, this title is being sold without Digital Rights Management Software (DRM) applied.

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherMacmillan Publishers
    Release dateApr 14, 2003
    ISBN9781429915601
    Unavailable
    The Golden Age
    Author

    John C. Wright

    JOHN C. WRIGHT is an attorney turned SF and fantasy writer. He has published short fiction in Asimov’s SF and elsewhere, and wrote the Chronicles of Chaos, The Golden Age, and The War of Dreaming series. His novel Orphans of Chaos was a finalist for the Nebula Award in 2005.

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    Reviews for The Golden Age

    4/5

    209 ratings9 reviews

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    • 5/5
      Deep, flamboyant & very satisfying unusual ways. Crammed with detail & thoughtfulness; I enjoyed this journey very much.
    • 3/5
      Excellent world building. Superb descriptive prose. Story - not enough to draw me into the sequel.
    • 4/5
      John C. Wright's _The Golden Age_ is a worthy read. Taking place in the far future, 10,000 years from now, it is a world where the transhuman 'singularity' has occurred long before and the population of the solar system is made up of humans of massive (and varied) intellects and powers as well as the 'sophotechs', huge supercomputers of intellectual capacity to dwarf even their superhuman creators who make sure that the society of humanity does not lack for anything except perhaps risk and adventure, "deeds of renown without peer" as the main character would
      have it.

      This main character is Phaeton, the aptly named son of Helion. His father is one of the seven peers who are the richest and most powerful of men in the richest and most powerful age that humanity has ever known. Something does not sit well with Phaeton though, even in this golden age of peace and prosperity. Phaeton hungers for even more than the world can give him, namely the above-mentioned deeds of peerless renown. In addition to this he soon discovers that he has large gaps in his memory and is given some uncomfortable indications that he is not the man he thinks he is and perhaps the world is not as rosy a place as it seems. So begins Phaeton's quest to discover his true identity while his father, wife and seemingly the whole of humanity stand against him. The secrets that Phaeton uncovers will shatter his life and may, in the end, also shatter the world. John C. Wright has created a wonderful glimpse of a far-future for humanity. It is a solar system where FTL has not been discovered, forcing humanity to still live in its cradle system, but they have been able to engineer the planets and the sun to suit their every desire and need. They also live mostly in the cyber-like world of the Mentality where everything from their self-image to their perceptions of the world around them can be tailored to suit their varied tastes and desires. Over all watch the immense minds of the Sophotechs ensuring that no human hurts another (unless it be himself) and keeping track of the endless calculations needed to keep the golden age running smoothly.

      The story is a fairly straightforward quest tale in which Phaeton must overcome insurmountable opposition in order to reach his goal, though it is laced with numerous insights into human nature, both personal and political, as well as the philosophical implications of such a utopian world that make it more than an adventure story. The prose is also excellent, a well-crafted piece of work reminiscent of Jack Vance whom the author has sited as a great influence. The ideas are also 'big' in the best tradition of both space opera and tales of human life after the singularity. The book is the first part of a trilogy and ends on something of a cliffhanger, so don't go into it expecting to get a neat resolution to the plot. All in all this was an excellent book and I think you'll enjoy immersing yourself in the world that John C. Wright has created in an erudite and well-crafted story.

    • 4/5
      This book is a twisty turny maze of hidden memories and factions vying for control of a weird distopian future where the human right to fail and take risks is in danger. It's also monstrously imaginative and just a joy to read.
      Can't wait to read the second one.
    • 5/5
      This is the first book I've read from this author and he completely blew me away! He is brilliant! This story weaves an intricate plot with utterly believable science of the far future. His portrayal of intellects ranging from the mere human level to millions of times smarter than us is amazing. Many times there are arguments between two "people" with augmented or machine intelligence and they duel back and forth with with perfect logic on subjects ranging through good vs. evil, objective vs. subjective morality, identity, security vs. freedom, and many others. He creates new sciences and teminologies as easily as breathing and they all seem perfectly believable and are woven seemlessly into the story. The plot is engrossing and the unveiling of its mysteries is kept at a perfect pace. I quickly snatched up the other two books in this series and devoured them. This is one of the best stories I've ever read.
    • 2/5
      It's the rare transhumanist story that faces possible defects of a singularity society. Wright's 'Golden Oecumene' is excellent in this respect -- a well imagined singularity future, dense with both good and evil. In the initial scene a 'primitive' has created a piece of conceptual art as caustic commentary on the golden age around him -- silvered trees which cannot respond to sunlight and which he has instead programmed to track an imaginary sun. A fabulous metaphor for a society focused on the shadows on the cave wall.So there's tremendous potential here, but unfortunately it Wright never quite realizes with. As with so much sci-fi, the contents of the puzzle box ("what would make a man alter his own memory") can never be as interesting as the box itself. The unveiling of the plot is disappointing, and after 400 pages, you don't even get the full reveal. (That comes in Books 2 and 3, I suppose)...
    • 2/5
      Unfortunately for John C. Wright, the sci-fi of today must exist in the shadows of its predecessors. Wright has tried to live up to standards set by authors such as Aldous Huxley and Philip K. Dick. He has created a utopian society of the future. He included the initial of his middle name on the cover.The Golden Age is an NMP: novel of mass production; as potentially dangerous for the literary world as any country’s WMDs for our world. In an attempt to overcome this problem, Wright created another. The horrendous amount of scientific jargon. The reader is mercilessly bombarded with Wright’s habit of displaying his scientific knowledge. Sure, the intricacy of the setting and theme demands some scientific explanation but Wright has gone too far.It is hard to feel a part of Wright’s world, which is an important aspect of any good story. You should be transported to the fictional world and perhaps haggle for a beard with one of the characters. You simply cannot relate to a character named Nebuchednezzar! No bullshit! Get on your knees in the bookstore and find out for yourself. The scientific jargon and unpronounceable names serve only to inhibit the flow of a good story. In the end, I do not regret reading this book. It was enlightening – I now know never to read John C. Wright again. But seriously, for what it is – a sci-fi NMP – The Golden Age is worthy. You will never be bored with the myriad of characters and ever changing settings. Some trippy scenes spark a competent reader’s imagination well. To finish on the best note possible, the concept behind the book – though borrowed from the above authors amongst others – was great. Set 10, 000 years in the future, The Golden Age is a story amongst intergalactic worlds. It is a prediction of what our world could come to be, should it survive our mistreatment of it.If you’re a sci-fi geek, you’ll love this book. If you’re a pseudo literary critic, steer clear.This review was originally published in On Dit, the student newspaper of Adelaide University.
    • 3/5
      The beginning of this book was so confusing that I almost stopped reading. The world created for the story is complex and rich, but it is not explained very much. I was on my own to figure out what was going on. Eventually, I caught up and the plot was worth the effort. I really came to enjoy the idea of a future society of immortal humans who use machines as extensions of their bodies and minds. Unfortunately the book ends abruptly with a note announcing that the story will be concluded in the sequel.
    • 3/5
      The protagonist of this novel is Phaethon of Radamanthus House on an Earth many millenia in the future where humanity is immortal and the people of society come in a range of material and mental forms. As the book begins, Phaethon discovers that there are large holes in him memory, ranging back through at least the last 250 years. As he tries to discover the truth, he begins to learn that all is not perfect in paradise. Civilisation has become stagnant and focussed on the safety of now, rather than the possibilities of th future. Phaethon has threatened that stability and great measures have been taken to neutralise him. This first book of a trilogy focusses on Phaethon's attempts to rediscover the memories he has lost while avoiding exile from the society that sustains him all while learning what kind of man he had been before and how that compares to the man he is now. Which does he want to be? I'm having real trouble working out what I thought of this book, as it felt something like a bipolar reading experience. There were parts that dragged me in and pulled me along and places where I felt like I was trying to wade through a bog. As a far future novel, it was full of new technical terms, but these didn't particularly worry me. I loved one of the main themes, that is summed up by a quote from Babylon 5 where Sinclair says that "all of this was for nothing unless we go to the stars" which has always resonated with me. (And to say any more out that would introduce spoilers, which I'm trying not to do.) But all the same, now I've finished it (and also while I was reading it) there was some kind of weight that dragged me down and made it a struggle. I'm not sure what it was though. There was a certain feeling of "just get on with it already" I think. I alternated between desperately wanting to read the rest of the story and deciding I couldn't face it. I'm still not sure. I expect I will read the other books, but not just yet as I want a few easier reads (especially since I also worked hard to read Kushiel's Dart and had a similar ambivalent reaction to that) in between.