Rendezvous With Rama

[watervole]

I'd almost forgotten what 'hard' SF was really like until I read Rendezvous with Rama. It was wonderful to have a story where physics is integral to everything, where speed of light limitations are woven into the story, where the alien artefact has a design that takes physics into account (I'm still pleased that I managed to predict one minor plot element by recalling one of the physical properties of water.)

And how can I fail to love a story that actually takes Coriolis force into account?

The strong grounding in reality makes the whole story feel so much more real. You believe in the characters and in the dangers they encounter, because you know that no 'magic' will be used to rescue them if they get into a tight corner.

Another good point about the focus on hard science is that the book hasn't dated. There were only two small moments when I realise how long ago the book was written. One was when the shape of Rama was compared to a domestic boiler, and the other was a reference to the steady state theory. Apart from those two minor points, the book could have been written yesterday. The laws of physics don't change with fashion.

Clarke can't write in depth characters, but they work reasonably well in this book, and the setting of Rama itself makes the story live.

This was a 9/10 book for me and I'd happily recommend it to anyone.

Comments

[lil-shepherd.livejournal.com]

One of my favourite Clarkes and, I think, the last one chronologically that I would recommend. With the later books, someone had told him he was a literary novelist or he tried to become one...

[nwhyte]

I dunno, I'm fond of several of his later books - Imperial Earth, The Fountains of Paradise, 2010: Odyssey Two. Though I think I would stop there.

[lil-shepherd.livejournal.com]

I disliked Imperial Earth and remain unconvinced by The Fountains of Paradise and then I stopped. The characterisations feel as if he were desperately trying to turn cardboard into real people by sheer effort.

[nwhyte]

I concede that nobody will ever read Clarke for his deft characterisation...

[lil-shepherd.livejournal.com]

*Snork*

Though there is nothing wrong, in context, with the characterisation in A Fall of Moondust or The Sands of Mars - simply as much as are needed for a disaster novel and an exploration novel.

[watervole.livejournal.com]

Here's the review I wrote of Imperial Earth. I see that some of the same things stuck in both our memories.


I first read this book many years ago, and yet working along my shelves I failed to recognise it as familiar. I realised why as I started to read it again. It was loaded with scenes that had stayed in my memory - the boy hearing the sound of the Titanian wind and storing it for later play; the two historians conversing in slave lingo; the pentaminos, the disastrous effects of using an emotion enhancer;Duncan's first sight of a butterfly. All these came vividly back to me as I encountered them again - but none had I remembered as being from this novel.

Why?

Because it has almost no plot. It's a sequence of events designed to show the way in which fuel could be cheaply produced from Titan's atmosphere to power transport within the solar system. It's good science (though I don't know if it matches current knowledge or not) but it makes for wonderful scenes that don't relate directly to the story.

[rockwell-666.livejournal.com]

I'd second that recommendation, RwR has always been a great SF story although, as mentioned, Clarke really doesn't write characters that well :-)

What I'd also recommend is *avoiding* Rama II, Garden of Rama or Rama Revealed all of which were written with (by!) Gentry Lee with input from Clarke, but the writing style is terrible in comparison and certainly Rama II is virtually unreadable.

[nwhyte]

I second that anti-recommendation - at least for the first two sequels, I simply couldn't face the third.

[paranoidangel]

I was going to say the same thing. I have read all three, but the sequels don't live up to the first one at all.

[coth.livejournal.com]

The fact that a science fiction writer has tried to stick to the rules underlying the universe helps your faith in the story.

A lot of early sf was about people grappling with the nature of the universe, and so in a way the nature of the universe becomes an essential element of the story. Later sf is more likely to have rich plot and characters who are people, but often the characters don't engage with the actual universe so much as with other characters, so the universe sometimes dwindles into the scenery in which the story is set, rather than being an essential element of it.

[lil-shepherd.livejournal.com]

Excellent summation!

And, as I read SF primarily for the ideas (though, being mean, I still demand a modicum of style and characterisation) it's why I still prefer a lot of early SF, particularly short fiction.

[nwhyte]

I love this book to bits. (And have literally done so with the first copy I owned.)

[julesjones]

I love that book, for the same reasons given in your post and the comments. And would also anti-recommend the supposedly co-authored sequels.

[linda-joyce.livejournal.com]

I remember RwR with fondness undimmed by the following three Rama books, not so good but just about readable, or that was my thought at the time I read them,ie when they were published. If you go on with the series I will be interested to know what you think of them now.

[vjezkova.livejournal.com]

"Rama" was translated here and published in several volumes. Thus, I can agree with you totally but only about the first two volumes. After that, I become confused and got lost.
I learned that Clarke actually invented a stacionary satelite and his gravitation lift from "Fountains of Paradise" is a matter of serious reserarch.
However if you read most of his other books, you discover certain...stereotype? I may be wrong, I overdosed myself by reading Clarke then and since I haven´t opened his book:-)

[watervole.livejournal.com]

As has been mentioned by several commentators, Clarke's strong point was not characterisation - thus his characters are probably pretty likely to be stereotypes, albeit not particularly bad ones. (A Clarke stereotype would be the 'engineer', but never the 'dumb blonde')

Or are you thinking of tropes?

[vjezkova.livejournal.com]

Yes! This is definitely the right evaluation, and I was thinking of characterisation, yes!:-)

[epistrophia.livejournal.com]

You've just reminded me that I'd intended to find a copy of RwR. I listened to the BBC dramatisation whenever it was on over the winter, and wrote a note to myself. Which I have subsequently lost. So thank you!