Sol's Reviews > Neutron Star
Neutron Star
by
by
Sol's review
bookshelves: barlowes-guide-to-extraterrestrials, science-fiction, collections, series-known-space, ussr-eternal, precursors
Jul 27, 2024
bookshelves: barlowes-guide-to-extraterrestrials, science-fiction, collections, series-known-space, ussr-eternal, precursors
A marked improvement on Niven's World of Ptavvs. That book felt like it was stuffed to bursting with way too many ideas for a short action novel. As if he wasn't sure he was gonna get a second chance, but he need have feared no such thing. Niven got about a dozen Known Space books out, not even counting the 17(!) book Man-Kzin Wars series mostly written by other authors.
Neutron Star's focus is tighter, mostly on cosmology and the aftermath of the ancient war of the Thrint empire that was described in Ptavvs. About half of the stories follow Beowulf Shaeffer, a starship captain who inadvertently ends up exploring strange celestial bodies in the galaxy, while most of the others show how the Slaver war a billion years ago has had lasting effects on the galaxy. While not directly related to each other, there is clear continuity and chronology between the alternating streams, with the exception of "Ethics of Madness" which is set much earlier than the rest of the stories and not much related to them, though a comment in "Flatlander" touches on a similar scenario.
The overwhelming impression was the monetary bent of the stories. The majority feature people either worrying about getting paid, or the economy more generally. Beowulf doesn't travel to a neutron star for science, or the allure of exploration, but because he's offered a lot of money. The researcher in "Relic of the Empire" doesn't oppose his kidnappers for his own safety, but because he fears their actions will cause a stock market crash. Unless a scifi book is actually about commerce or piracy, these things tend to get glossed over, even if paying off a debt provides the impetus to start off. But here, it's an integral part of witnessing the cataclysmic future of the galactic core.
The exploratory/cosmological side of the collection, combined with the precursor war backstory lends a certain resemblance to the later Xeelee series by Stephen Baxter. Neutron Star lacks the reverential, Stapledonian mode that the Xeelee and Manifold books sometimes entered. From Baxter, witnessing the death of the galactic core would be a moment for awed contemplation, here it's closer to mere spectacle.
Interestingly, while neutron stars had been theorized to exist since the 30s, the first were only discovered a year after the publication of "Neutron Star", as it was found that a rapidly rotating neutron star creates beams of radiation that are detectable from Earth when oriented toward us.
Introduced in this collection are one of the major species of Known Space, the Puppeteers. Finally, another entry in Barlowe's Guide where the alien is both alien and actually integral to the story. The Puppeteers are descended from herd-based herbivores, and so they have evolved an in-born extreme cowardice, all flight, no fight. This drives the plot, as they hire Beowulf to explore dangerous locations that no Puppeteer would risk getting anywhere near, and their paranoid secrecy regarding the location of their homeworld is a plot point in several stories. Unfortunately, (view spoiler)
Barlowe does justice to the weird concept of the Puppeteers, where the hand/mouth/heads are mere appendages. The rear leg anatomy is complex, a concept which would be elaborated on in his Expedition. That ended up inspiring C.M. Koseman's Snaiad project, which coincidentally used a similar concept to the Puppeteers, where Snaiadi "heads" are not heads, and even takes it further, where the mouths don't look like mouths, and the beak is no such thing. Don't know whether this is a case of actual influence, but it's plausible.
"Neutron Star" - Beowulf is hired to determine why a crew died unexpectedly doing a flyby of the first discovered neutron star. If it gets out that there is an unknown flaw in Puppeteer-built ship hulls, it would be absolutely disastrous for business. A fun puzzle-story, and the resolution gets Beowulf an extra blackmail payout.
★ "A Relic of the Empire" - A scientist studying the remnants of the Slaver empire's biological rocket "stage trees" is captured by pirates, who want to blackmail the Puppeteers with knowledge of their homeworld. A tense escape and chase story, with knowledge providing the edge for survival. The interstellar reproduction of the feral stage trees is a great xenobiological concept.
★ "At the Core" - Beowulf is hired once again by the Puppeteers to test an experimental hyperdrive far faster than anything on the market. A publicity stunt journey to the core of the galaxy is planned, but proves far more trying than Beowulf anticipated, and what he discovers there has implications for the future of the galaxy. (view spoiler)
"The Soft Weapon" - A group of Kzin get their hands on an ancient Slaver-war weapon, both them and their captives attempt to determine how it works. Really long, but ultimately thin as a story. The highlight is the insane Puppeteer Nessus, who is willing to attack in defence of another.
★ "Flatlander" - Beowulf joins a rich acquaintance's voyage, where they ask the information-broker Outsiders for the location of the most interesting system in known space. They are directed to a proto-sun with a single planet travelling rapidly through the plane of the galaxy. Things get so interesting that (view spoiler) Has a surprisingly pragmatic "safety first" outlook.
★ "The Ethics of Madness" - A simple accident ends up plunging two men into a vendetta that leads to death and insanity. It's a freaky little thriller, with a grotesque twist ending. There's a gesture at examining who is responsible for an insane man's crimes, himself, or the cause of his insanity? but ultimately it's much more about madness than ethics.
"The Handicapped" - A manufacturer of tools for handless species investigates the sessile Grogs of the planet Down. There's no direct evidence of their intelligence aside from massive brains, but that brain has no obvious purpose to their biology. What's more, it has proved impossible to raise Grogs in captivity or even feed their adult forms. (view spoiler)
"Grendel" - Beowulf gets mixed up in a plot to kidnap an alien sculptor. It's a solid adventure, especially the Wile E. Coyote physics ending, but compared to the earlier cosmological journeys it's a step down for Beowulf. Plus the plot point about him being a willing cuck. Like, I get it, it's the future, things change, but dude. At least as a consolation prize (view spoiler).
A typology of fix-up novels is desperately needed (by me, anyway). Despite not actually being a fix-up, Neutron Star actually ends up among the more novelistic collections out there, beaten out only by Mike Resnick's Kirinyaga.
There are many dimensions to consider with a fixup. There's the extent of new material, removals, edits, frames, combining related and unrelated material, not even getting into assessments of quality. I have found:
Unrelated material given the widest, barest frame story possible: Starswarm by Brian Aldiss.
Related material, not originally intended to be part of one whole, given a frame story: Vacuum Diagrams by Stephen Baxter.
Unrelated material, edited together to be a true novel: The War Against the Rulls and Changeling by A.E. van Vogt.
Related material, edited together to be a true novel: Voyage of the Space Beagle by A.E. van Vogt
Related stories, some directly sequential and some not directly connnected, assembled as a novel: Neutron Star by Larry Niven.
Chapters of a single story originally published as independently comprehensible stories, as distinct from a serialized novel: Kirinyaga by Mike Resnick.
Neutron Star's focus is tighter, mostly on cosmology and the aftermath of the ancient war of the Thrint empire that was described in Ptavvs. About half of the stories follow Beowulf Shaeffer, a starship captain who inadvertently ends up exploring strange celestial bodies in the galaxy, while most of the others show how the Slaver war a billion years ago has had lasting effects on the galaxy. While not directly related to each other, there is clear continuity and chronology between the alternating streams, with the exception of "Ethics of Madness" which is set much earlier than the rest of the stories and not much related to them, though a comment in "Flatlander" touches on a similar scenario.
The overwhelming impression was the monetary bent of the stories. The majority feature people either worrying about getting paid, or the economy more generally. Beowulf doesn't travel to a neutron star for science, or the allure of exploration, but because he's offered a lot of money. The researcher in "Relic of the Empire" doesn't oppose his kidnappers for his own safety, but because he fears their actions will cause a stock market crash. Unless a scifi book is actually about commerce or piracy, these things tend to get glossed over, even if paying off a debt provides the impetus to start off. But here, it's an integral part of witnessing the cataclysmic future of the galactic core.
The exploratory/cosmological side of the collection, combined with the precursor war backstory lends a certain resemblance to the later Xeelee series by Stephen Baxter. Neutron Star lacks the reverential, Stapledonian mode that the Xeelee and Manifold books sometimes entered. From Baxter, witnessing the death of the galactic core would be a moment for awed contemplation, here it's closer to mere spectacle.
Interestingly, while neutron stars had been theorized to exist since the 30s, the first were only discovered a year after the publication of "Neutron Star", as it was found that a rapidly rotating neutron star creates beams of radiation that are detectable from Earth when oriented toward us.
Introduced in this collection are one of the major species of Known Space, the Puppeteers. Finally, another entry in Barlowe's Guide where the alien is both alien and actually integral to the story. The Puppeteers are descended from herd-based herbivores, and so they have evolved an in-born extreme cowardice, all flight, no fight. This drives the plot, as they hire Beowulf to explore dangerous locations that no Puppeteer would risk getting anywhere near, and their paranoid secrecy regarding the location of their homeworld is a plot point in several stories. Unfortunately, (view spoiler)
Barlowe does justice to the weird concept of the Puppeteers, where the hand/mouth/heads are mere appendages. The rear leg anatomy is complex, a concept which would be elaborated on in his Expedition. That ended up inspiring C.M. Koseman's Snaiad project, which coincidentally used a similar concept to the Puppeteers, where Snaiadi "heads" are not heads, and even takes it further, where the mouths don't look like mouths, and the beak is no such thing. Don't know whether this is a case of actual influence, but it's plausible.
"Neutron Star" - Beowulf is hired to determine why a crew died unexpectedly doing a flyby of the first discovered neutron star. If it gets out that there is an unknown flaw in Puppeteer-built ship hulls, it would be absolutely disastrous for business. A fun puzzle-story, and the resolution gets Beowulf an extra blackmail payout.
★ "A Relic of the Empire" - A scientist studying the remnants of the Slaver empire's biological rocket "stage trees" is captured by pirates, who want to blackmail the Puppeteers with knowledge of their homeworld. A tense escape and chase story, with knowledge providing the edge for survival. The interstellar reproduction of the feral stage trees is a great xenobiological concept.
★ "At the Core" - Beowulf is hired once again by the Puppeteers to test an experimental hyperdrive far faster than anything on the market. A publicity stunt journey to the core of the galaxy is planned, but proves far more trying than Beowulf anticipated, and what he discovers there has implications for the future of the galaxy. (view spoiler)
"The Soft Weapon" - A group of Kzin get their hands on an ancient Slaver-war weapon, both them and their captives attempt to determine how it works. Really long, but ultimately thin as a story. The highlight is the insane Puppeteer Nessus, who is willing to attack in defence of another.
★ "Flatlander" - Beowulf joins a rich acquaintance's voyage, where they ask the information-broker Outsiders for the location of the most interesting system in known space. They are directed to a proto-sun with a single planet travelling rapidly through the plane of the galaxy. Things get so interesting that (view spoiler) Has a surprisingly pragmatic "safety first" outlook.
★ "The Ethics of Madness" - A simple accident ends up plunging two men into a vendetta that leads to death and insanity. It's a freaky little thriller, with a grotesque twist ending. There's a gesture at examining who is responsible for an insane man's crimes, himself, or the cause of his insanity? but ultimately it's much more about madness than ethics.
"The Handicapped" - A manufacturer of tools for handless species investigates the sessile Grogs of the planet Down. There's no direct evidence of their intelligence aside from massive brains, but that brain has no obvious purpose to their biology. What's more, it has proved impossible to raise Grogs in captivity or even feed their adult forms. (view spoiler)
"Grendel" - Beowulf gets mixed up in a plot to kidnap an alien sculptor. It's a solid adventure, especially the Wile E. Coyote physics ending, but compared to the earlier cosmological journeys it's a step down for Beowulf. Plus the plot point about him being a willing cuck. Like, I get it, it's the future, things change, but dude. At least as a consolation prize (view spoiler).
A typology of fix-up novels is desperately needed (by me, anyway). Despite not actually being a fix-up, Neutron Star actually ends up among the more novelistic collections out there, beaten out only by Mike Resnick's Kirinyaga.
There are many dimensions to consider with a fixup. There's the extent of new material, removals, edits, frames, combining related and unrelated material, not even getting into assessments of quality. I have found:
Unrelated material given the widest, barest frame story possible: Starswarm by Brian Aldiss.
Related material, not originally intended to be part of one whole, given a frame story: Vacuum Diagrams by Stephen Baxter.
Unrelated material, edited together to be a true novel: The War Against the Rulls and Changeling by A.E. van Vogt.
Related material, edited together to be a true novel: Voyage of the Space Beagle by A.E. van Vogt
Related stories, some directly sequential and some not directly connnected, assembled as a novel: Neutron Star by Larry Niven.
Chapters of a single story originally published as independently comprehensible stories, as distinct from a serialized novel: Kirinyaga by Mike Resnick.
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Reading Progress
January 8, 2020
– Shelved
July 15, 2024
–
Started Reading
July 25, 2024
–
Finished Reading