I tried with this one, I really did. But it just got to me in the end. And before you go and say, “but it’s partially set in New Zealand!”, that’s one of the reasons it pissed me off so much.
Earth is about a scientist who has accidentally released a singularity. It has sunk from Brazil where it was created into the Earth’s core (hence the name), and threatens the world. Good premise right? Right. And it should be a good read.
What’s most interesting is that in the science-fiction stakes a lot of what Brin contemplates is now reality. His vision of the internet is very acurate (though a little more Usenet than Twitter), and his concern about global warming is currently unfolding across the planet. But… he was off the mark on CFCs (which global action averted the danger of), and his description of Maori is irksome at best.
Regarding Maori, he’s obviously taken a trip to New Zealand, read some guides and some mythology, and woven it into his tale. And some parts of it are really nice, such as the description of our roading network. But the stuff about Maori just provided a case in point of how and why Maori should be unhappy about people appropriating their culture, badly.
In the end it all just got a little too turgid for me. Perhaps I’m finding that some scifi is only good when it’s current and working on the boundary of contemporary imagination.
5 April, 2009 at 10:51 am
Haivng read Earth before I really knew what a “Maori” was, I thankfully missed much of the irksomness. I enjoyed it at the time, but I think your characterisation of “turgid” already applied and the book is likely to have dated rather badly. As indeed The Postman did.
5 April, 2009 at 10:04 pm
Yes, turgid. At some point in the thanks, he mentions having attended a sci-fi conference in NZ, and talking to lots of Kiwis who helped him to get the NZ and Maori bits right.
I can only think that sci-fi fans must have an odd view of NZ. Or maybe it’s just the types who attend sci-fi conferences who don’t quite see the world through the same eyes as other people.
6 April, 2009 at 8:20 am
yup. it’s a combination of odd-view + “dusky romanticism” of maori.
pretty bloody annoying.
but as i say, some mighty accurate predictions of the web.
16 June, 2009 at 11:49 am
Hmm. I’ve met Maori in Australia, the U.S. and Antarctica, and I have to say that what Brin depicted wasn’t that much different from the tropes they self-advertise when they’re outside, drinking people like me under the table. He wrote with respect, and at least he saw the Maori as being technological players on a global level. An awful lot of writers would have treated the Maori the way “The Right Stuff” treated the Australian Aborigines, burning fires to signal the gods.
Bill
16 February, 2013 at 4:45 am
Yes, I have to agree with the review! I came to pretty much the same conclusion when I read it. Mind you the predictions for the internet are pretty damm good for 1990! Did we even have wais then – let alone mosaic. The CFC issue was pretty amazing for an impending global catastrophe that was quickly avoided by new manufacturing science and global agreements. Wow! How often does that happen. Brin can’t be judged too harshly for not seeing that! Having said all that – a novel is about characters, mainly, and your use of the word ‘turgid’ is very apt!
For what it’s worth my review is at;
http://www.book-steps.co.uk/2013/01/earth-book-review/