¿Es un mal libro? Ni de broma, pero...
No ha sido el momento adecuado para leerlo. Y lo se porque me ha parecido algo confuso, porque tenía que releer algunas partes, porque no me enteraba de lo que estaba leyendo, había días que no me apetecía coger el libro, etc.
Quizás en un futuro lo relea y cambie mi percepción de esta historia -ojalá sea así, porque siento que me he perdido algo muy bueno por no leerlo cuando debía.

I found this book incredibly difficult to rate.

Parts were thrilling and addictive and wouldn’t let me put the book down. The continued stories of the seven pilgrims and the way they grow as people together. The huge stakes and wars between different molds of human, between AI and human and between the gods of these different group. The political maneuvering of Meina Gladstone was captivating and never once dry or overly convoluted.

There were other points where the narrative dragged and really took away from the overall story. Specifically, the large regions of recited poetry that weren’t particularly relevant and the long portions of theology, where characters do nothing but mentally contemplate one god/religion or another.

I had to take a break from this incredibly heavy series after The Fall of Hyperion, but I am looking forward to picking up Endymion next.

This is the sequel to Hyperion, but unfortunately I didn’t find that it could live up to the majesty of its predecessor. That’s not to say I didn’t enjoy it, it’s just that I can’t rave about it frothing at the mouth like I did for Hyperion.

The tale continues with the travelers but also we have a story in parallel about what is going on with the greater universe. We meet two of my favorite characters in this series. Meina Gladstone is the CEO of the Hegemony and a complex and fascinating character; there are some shocking revelations about her as the story goes on and in many respects I look up to her for her foresight, but it’s also not all good. She is a political leader worth studying.

Then there’s Joseph Severn, who is another cybrid of Keats (the character Johnny, from the first book, was also a cybrid of his). But Joseph Severn has dreams, dreams of the group of pilgrims on Hyperion that are actually reality. This turns out to be of major import to the plot, as CEO Gladstone is able to receive remote information on the happenings on Hyperion through him.

As expected, there are developments on the planet of Hyperion. Sol Weintraub’s daughter, Rachel, continues to age downward towards age zero, and that tension gets palpable by the end. We also learn more about the Shrike and about the identity of Monica, the mysterious woman from Colonel Kassad’s story. Likewise, the characters continue to die one by one in appalling ways.

And that story does have some rather satisfactory loose ends tied up by the end. It takes a while to get there, though, and there’s a lot of brooding and wondering about when the Shrike is going to turn up, and not being able to do anything about it but just worry about it. There’s lots of wandering around in storms and the group keeps getting separated. I found this story to sag in the middle but grow compelling towards the end.

Although even at the end, it never quite felt like absolutely everything was explained, such as the true nature of the Shrike.

But while that story is going, there’s a second story going on with CEO Gladstone, Joseph Severn, and the unfolding war with the Ousters. That story actually has quite the enjoyable, epic arc. It starts with utmost confidence in the war and ends in disaster of Biblical, epic scale.

And it turns out that that whole bit about the AI TechnoCore doing some weird stuff with a copy of Earth? And trying to invent the Ultimate Intelligence? That turns out to be pretty relevant. So I was glad to see that a lot of those things weren’t wasted. There was a point to some of those earlier stories with the original Hyperion book.

I felt like, once these two books are taken together, there definitely is an epic scope, there is a lot about it that is satisfying, but somehow the second book just didn’t feel as neatly wrapped up as the first. Still glad I read it, but I guess it’s hard to compare to the first book when it’s such a masterpiece.

There’s a lot going on here.

Dan Simmons’ wildly popular and successful Hyperion Cantos continues from the first Hyperion to this 1990 publication. While some readers of the first book were a little miffed at that books truncated ending (ahem) word on the street was that Simmons delivered the plus size behemoth in one package and the publisher was the one with the bright idea to split it in half.

Either way, Simmons’ incredibly ambitious tale of the pilgrims on Hyperion continues and his megalithic world building is as impressive as in the first half.

Full to bursting with classical and biblical references, this also reveals inspiration from Frank Herbert, Asimov, Clarke and maybe even Tolkien. Blending elements of science fiction, fantasy and horror, this could also take a page from Bradbury. The numerous allusions to John Keats work also demonstrates Simmons unique ability.

The theological underpinnings and the meaning of the Shrike and his nefarious and mysterious effect on this work will inspire much discussion. The Lord of Pain (I’m a Police fan so I sang King of Pain whenever he took the stage) adds a further depth to this already multifaceted narrative.

A phenomenal work of speculative fiction.

Wow. So different from the first book, but every bit as great, maybe even greater.

The time tombs are opening, and the universe will never be the same. Our Pilgrims, each with their own agenda, are standing between the destruction of humanity or its rebirth.

Can the CEO save the world? Is the info she's acting on correct? Are John Keats dreams enough? Do the Shrike really want a now newborn baby Rachel? How is the Catholic Church involved? Are the Ousters our enemy or our friend? Are the AI's really our allies? Aren't their gifts rather dubious? So many issues, and none of the answers obvious. I love books that surprise me! :)

This could have easily become a trite novel, ala DaVinci Code. This doesn't...it has real people with deep backgrounds, with issues that though seemingly small are important to them. What happens when you place your heart against the good of humanity?

4,5 / 5

Recogiendo el testigo del final de Hyperion, La Caída de Hyperion nos sitúa instantes después de los últimos sucesos, cuando nuestros peregrinos ya han alcanzado las Tumbas de Tiempo. En esta segunda parte de este primer ciclo de Los Cantos de Hyperion, conoceremos el final de la aventura de nuestros peregrinos, tendremos la aparición de nuevos personajes con mucho más protagonismo y descubriremos que una gran amenaza asola a la Hegemonía, el gobierno de la Red.

A través del cibrido Joseph Severn y sus “sueños”, visitaremos a todos los personajes y conoceremos los detalles que le ocurren a cada uno de ellos, danzando entre las Tumbas de Tiempo y Centro Tau Ceti, foco de gobierno de la Hegemonia de la FEM Meina Gladstone. El estilo de Simmons cambia radicalmente, pasando a ser una novela más al uso, con capítulos cortos, cargados de acción y de giros y tramas entrecruzadas de manera espectacular. Aparte, ya no tenemos historias cortas como en Hyperion, si no que será a través de un narrador omnisciente del que conoceremos de primera mano todos los sucesos, con rápidos cambios de puntos de vista cada pocas páginas.

Para mi este ha sido un punto en contra y lo que la pone un peldaño por debajo de su antecesora, ya que deseaba continuar con ciertas historias cuando de repente me llevaba a otras que no me interesaban tanto. Aún así, el conjunto de ambos libros es impresionante, entretejiendo una trama de unas 1300 hojas en un universo muy rico tanto en elementos como en personajes, y que además casi cada punto de la novela queda hilado y concluido. Queda claro que Simmons tenía planificada su obra con bastante antelación, si no es imposible cerrar de tal manera una historia tan basta.

Me quedo con ganas de que se publique ya el segundo ciclo de esta gran tetralogía, Endymion y La Caída de Endymion para conocer los sucesos que acontecen 300 años después del final de esta novela.

Executive Summary: While the ending was satisfying the book as a whole wasn't nearly as enjoyable for me as Hyperion. 3.5 stars, rounded down because it was just too slow at times.

Audiobook: After how great the audiobook for Hyperion was, this one was a bit of a letdown. Victor Bevine does a good job, but to go from an ensemble to a single narrator was hard. Given the structure of this book compared to the last, it makes sense to only have 1 narrator, but I wouldn't have missed it if they had only used Mr. Bevine for the first as well. Still, audio is a decent option here in my opinion.

n  Full Reviewn
After finishing Hyperion there was no way I couldn't jump right into this. I just had to know what happened next.

However, the format of this part of the story was largely different than the last book. Instead of several different stories with different narrators combining into one larger story, we had a single narrator acting as our conduit to several different subplots.

However the format change wasn't my main issue. I just found the story moving far too slow. Maybe it is the format's problem. If I wasn't liking one story, it wouldn't be too long before a new one started that I might enjoy better. This was just one contiguous story (albeit one that jumped around between subplots rather frequently).

Many of the elements I enjoyed from the first book are still present. The mystery of Hyperion and the Shrike. The politics of the Web worlds and the Ousters. Battles and intrigue. And the well written prose. But I found my attention wandering, and there were several points when I hoped things would just move along faster.

Overall, I was happy with the ending of this. The main question/theory I wanted answered was done so by the end. In fact I feel like I could stop here and not read the next two. I do plan to read them eventually, but for now I'll be content taking a break to focus on other stories.

Concludes the Hyperion Duology with Big Canvas Pyrotechnics, Mind-Expanding Idea
This is the concluding half of the story begun in Hyperion, so for those who complained that the former book didn't have a proper conclusion, they've only read half the tale. This time Simmons abandons the Canterbury Tales format of the former book, which told the back stories of the seven pilgrims to Hyperion in distinct stories, in favor of a linear story that needs all its considerable length to cover the massive and tangled plot and space battles, dueling god-like AIs, space portals, galactic empires, and a final confrontation with the avenging angel called the Shrike. The Time Tombs on Hyperion are central to the plot, as are the two god-like AI beings vying for supremacy. So much happens that it's a thankless task to summarize it. Suffice to say that it's definitely one of the most impressive epic SF space operas in the genre, and well-deserving of its accolades. I'll be interested to see how Simmons follows it up in his Endymion duology set several centuries after the climactic events of Hyperion, since it's always difficult to create a second act to a story that has already reached a satisfying conclusion.

Normally I would try to write a complete review of each book and my reactions/impressions, but I just don't have the time or energy to write reviews that would do this series justice at the moment. I'm listen to the entire 4-book Hyperion Cantos series and just enjoying it as I go...

Freedom and empathy for everyone, people!!!

This is an amazing book that perfectly wraps up everything since the very beginning of the first book. I enjoyed every page of it. What's more important, all those drawbacks I've mentioned in my review of "Hyperion" are non-existent in "The fall of Hyperion", and I've said that "Hyperion" is a very good book despite those drawbacks. So... You should read this duology, you must! It's a perfect blend of sci-fi and a sort of suspense/detective, full of engaging topics like morale, ethics, religion, freedom, evolution, artificial intelligence, etc. The ideas are really great and inspiring and what is even more important, they are really well expressed and constructed despite, well, being grandiose. There's a few unexpected, but well executed plot twists, and a couple more that couldn't be classified as "unexpected", but that do not make them worse, trust me, I'm an engineer. (No, actually I'm not but I couldn't hold myself from writing it, lol).

Very interesting and complete characters makes it easy to root for them and resonate them and feel lots of empathy towards them, and that is very, very important. Feeling empathy, I mean. Read this book and you'll know WHY empathy is a backbone of the universe as we know it.

I would gladly mention something, anything that I did not like in this book, but I'm unable to do so, because I liked everything about this book, as cliche and cheesy it might sound.

I'm rating this book a very solid and well deserved 5* and the fact that I'm doing this even though this book is, more or less/sort of pro "god", you might call it, and I'm really, REALLY not fond of religions and gods and higher powers, speaks for itself.

I recommend this book/series for everyone. It's not that hard sci-fi that would alienate people who dislike or normally don't read science fiction, and at the same time a very interesting premise and cool execution would grab the attention of "nerds" and "normals" alike.

Oof. How the mighty fall.

This is the second half of Hyperion, which I thought was clever, inventive, and intriguing. I think it was, generously, about twice as long as it should have been, and about 1000X too preachy. Goddamn. This book needed way more cornflakes and soccer, because it did not stop enjoying itself for nobody.

The first book is a spin on old tropes (tropes that were old when it was written, and even older now) which was refreshing. The mystery was alluring. The pacing was fine for where we were going.

This one has literal chapters--20-30 pages at a stretch--where no plot happens. I know, because I counted when I started skipping them. I think in reality there are about 12 chapters that have any forward momentum for the story whatsoever, everything else is infodump or orgiastic drivel about the sins (in a distinctly Catholic sense) of mankind and Keats and the poetry that the author thought might be at the same level as Keats. GUESS WHAT MY THOUGHTS WERE ON THAT.

It could have been great, if only its attention rose above its navel for more than a paragraph at a time. I shall remember this book next time I wonder where editors are "these days." It turns out they've been pushed to the side much longer than I'd like to think about. Sorry editors. I have your back.

CONTENT WARNING:  rape, loss of a child, lots of religion, loss of a loved one, torture, imperialism, tuberculosis

Ok, so I got a little distracted, but it's finished. Quality writing and interesting story but it just wasn't compelling enough to get excited about reading it. I'll need to think about this one for a while, but I couldn't appreciate Dan Simmons' apparent goal to provide a literary, somewhat mythological experience in a decent SF wrapper. My Hyperion Cantos journey ends here for now.

Beautiful continuation of the first installment. I have no words to say how wonderful and thoughtfully constructed this book is - finished with a sense of having just touched something pretty close to perfection. Read this after you read Hyperion - it's definitely worth it.