Boring. Seriously, how can someone write such an incredible first book and then go so horribly wrong from there? The pace is slow and bogged down and there is a ridiculous amount of time spent talking about packing and unpacking and preparing to go on a mission and preparing a trap. I think this is Simmons painful way of attempting to build suspense. It doesn't work. I couldn't bring myself to care about any of these characters, there was virtually no development. Revelations ocurred haphazardly and with no sense of discovery, people would just suddenly start spouting information with explanation of how they came by it or why they hadn't revealed it early. He creates these incredible worlds and spends no time really exploring them, and they are boiled down to simplistic nothingness. I think I'm done with Hyperion.

However I want to emphasize that the first book is still an amazing read and COMPLETELY worth reading. On its own.

I finally got to the second half of this amazing series!! I love me some Dan Simmons. Rich, epic world building, engaging storytelling, teaming with ideas, concepts and adventure. Loved reconnecting with the Hyperion universe. Not quite as engaging as Hyperion or as densely packed with ideas as Fall of Hyperion, but for me this is great continuation of a fantastic series. Can't wait to find out how this ends.

4.5 Stars

Listened to Audible. Victor Bevine did an excellent job.

Occasionally, I encounter this idea that a large – maybe even a majority – slice of science fiction media involves immature stories that focus heavily on pew pew lasers, explosions, and sex with attractive alien women (Darth Talon, Liara). For example, Ted Chiang says that Star Wars forever made the genre synonymous with “adventure stories dressed up in lasers.” Or, as another example, NPR Book’s review of Ancillary Justice read, "If you don't know the Ancillary series by now, you probably should. Ann Leckie's sociopolitical space opera almost singlehandedly breathed new cool into the stereotype of spaceships trundling through far-off systems amid laser battles." In other words, there’s a perception that much of science fiction is aimed primarily at teenage boys, who are supposedly largely interested in action and sex.

For the sake of focus, I’ll not dispute that claim in its entirety (though in my experience every part of it is more often untrue than true), but when I see this claim applied to science fiction LITERATURE, I become truly confused.

Cause, um, what in the nine hells are these people talking about?? I’ve never read a science fiction novel or short story that was more focused on pew pew lasers or xeno-copulation than on sociology / science / technology / culture / ideas. Have you? Even YA sci-fi like Ender’s Game is far more interested in the psychology of a young genius or children in general than in space battles.

More to the point, though, this entire dichotomy – adventure story OR science / depth / complexity / ideas – represents a fundamental misunderstanding of how science fiction operates. It uses the Trojan horse technique of hooking readers with a good story, so it can explore less immediately thrilling but ultimately more interesting complex science and societal concepts. Sci-fi is one of the few genres in which we get to have – and indeed must have – both the adventure AND the depth. To quote from Analog magazine’s submission page: “[Science fiction stories are those] in which some aspect of future science or technology is so integral to the plot that, if that aspect were removed, the story would collapse. Try to picture Mary Shelley's Frankenstein without the science and you'll see what I mean. No story!”

Well, Endymion is a perfect example of how adventure and ideas combine to form science fiction.

Now, yes, just to get it out of the way, I’ll add to that chorus of reviewers stating it’s not as good as Hyperion, but since Hyperion is one of the best science fiction books ever written, this is a bit like saying, “This ruby isn’t as good as this diamond.”

Cause Endymion is a real gem. It has everything I want and expect from my science fiction. It’s got romance (albeit a weird Lolita-esque version that I’ll talk more about in my sequel review). It’s got fantastical settings, from jungle planets with mysterious ruins to ocean planets with massive sea monsters to high-gravity frozen planets populated by yetis & ice wyrms. It’s got a flying carpet, prophecies and mysteries, a blue-skinned android, FTL travel, space marines, awesome battles, the return of the Shrike creature, dastardly villains, and more. In short, it’s unmistakably an ADVENTURE. Reading it is a bloody good time!

But to dismiss Endymion on those grounds would be to ignore its thematic foundations of religion, time, death, belief, love, space, and AI.

In Endymion, the relatively liberal values of the Hegemony have been replaced by more conservative anti-science, xenophobic ones – as one might expect given the catastrophic collapse of civilization at the end of Hyperion. The Catholic religion is back in a big way, and the primary means of their ascension is the adoption of the “sacrament” of the cruciform organism which grants immortality to all wearers. The pope (Father Lenar Hoyt from Hyperion) has died, revived, and been re-elected over and over. Meanwhile, the protagonist, one Raul Endymion, is recruited by our favorite poet Martin Silenus to meet a supposed savior, who has jumped forward some 250 years into the future via anti-entropic fields. And of course, lurking in the shadows and occasionally coming back into the light, is the AI TechnoCore. In fact, humanity’s interactions with the AI TechnoCore form the very basis of the plot, just as they did with Hyperion.

This is especially interesting to me because I’ve lately come to believe that the development and ethics of AI is the single most important topic for humanity. If I made the claim that by 2100, humanity will either be extinct or immortal, you might scoff and think I’m being wildly optimistic. You might think I’m committing the same sort of error that Back to the Future made by predicting flying cars and hoverboards by 2015. Well you’d be wrong. The 2100 date is conservative. The median expert guess at when we will develop an ASI (Artificial Super Intelligence) is about 2060. After which, it won’t be long until we’re either immortal (likely in machine or software form) or extinct.

Let me explain: if Moore’s Law holds true (and it has so far), then by 2025 a cpu that matches the computational power of the human brain will be available for a relatively inexpensive price. If we’re conservative, we might say it’ll take 25 years after that (at which point our CPUs will be insanely powerful) until we’ve sufficiently understood the human brain in order to make our first Artificial General Intelligence (AGI).

Once that happens, however, we enter a realm in which it’s no longer the HUMAN beings who will be improving the AI, but the AI itself. And as the AI gets smarter, the quicker it will be able to upgrade itself (which is also how human society works – this is called an accelerated rate of change and the recent US election shows how troublesome this is, since human institutions & corresponding values / morals are MUCH slower to change than technology). Soon after that, the AGI will become an ASI, which will be to us, like we are to ants. It will possess God-like powers, wielded with unfathomable motivations. [If you're interested in AI topics, see my reviews for Bostrom's Superintelligence, Kurzweil's The Singularity is Near, and James Barrat's Our Final Invention].

Depending on how we introduce that ASI, it will either help us immensely or it’ll erase us from existence.

While most agree that the latter option is definitely bad, the prospect of immortality wouldn’t necessarily be well-received either. Regardless, it’s important for us to begin introducing real AI (not the anthropomorphized Hollywood version) into the collective societal consciousness now. We need politicians to begin considering what their stances will be on AI issues. We need our children (and future scientists) to begin processing the idea of artificial intelligence, robot psychology, and the pros/cons of immortality. And of course, the dangers of ASI – which meet and exceed the dangers posed by global warming & nuclear weapon proliferation – need to be a part of our conversation now because work that may/will lead to such a creature is happening NOW.

And those are only future concerns! There’s plenty of AI-related issues to deal with right now. There exists a hedge fund that is entirely controlled by AI. Is that fair or wise? [See Nick Wolven’s short story: On the Night of the Robo-bulls and Zombie Dancers]. How about the current loss of manufacturing jobs to automation? Ignorance about that issue (that is, many people falsely believe manufacturing job loss is more a result of globalization than of mechanization) changed the course of an election, which in turn will likely change the American political and moral landscape for the next fifty years.

So there’s a lot of great ideas in Endymion, which fills the spaces between its adventure set-pieces with moments of discussion and reflection. It strikes a wonderful balance between depth and plot, and I heartily enjoyed it. Perhaps more importantly, it made me EXCITED to explore both new sci-fi stories and non-fiction on AI and indeed excited about the possibilities of adventure and science in the future. What more can a sci-fi reader ask for?

This is the third volume of Hyperion Cantos, which actually can be seen as a two-part story, each taking two volumes. So this is the beginning of the second arc. I read it as a part of the monthly reading for June 2024 at Hugo & Nebula Awards: Best Novels group. It is interesting to note that this volume is the only one that got no nominations for SFF Awards except for Locus Award (2nd place) – while the first won Hugo, and Locus plus nominated for BSFA, the second was nominated for Hugo and Nebula and won Locus and BSFA and the final volume was nominated for Hugo and won Locus.

The book starts almost three centuries after the events of the second volume, there are new characters in a new world, dominated by Pax, a version of the Catholic Church that can almost guarantee resurrection to its members using a parasite from Hyperion. This book is narrated as a memoir of one Raul Endymion, a hunting guide from Hyperion as he awaits his execution in a version of a Schrodinger’s box orbiting some planet.

He starts with his death sentence, but not the one he is currently under. He helped rich tourists to hunt, but when one of them killed his dog because hasn’t followed the rules and warnings, it hit Raul hard and escalated from then on, until he killed the jerk in self-defense. He was quickly found guilty and sentenced, but instead of dying, he got smuggled to the Poet from the first duology. There he receives a partner, a blue-skinned android A. Bettik, a ship, and a mission – to protect Aenea, a twelve years old from the past, a daughter of detective Brawne Lamia and John Keats cybrid, a new messiah, if she is allowed to mature.

Most of the book is a journey of Raul, Aenea and A. Bettik by the River Tethys (as can be guessed from the cover, at least in some editions) as they are hunted down by Father Captain Federico de Soya with his team, which follows orders of the Holy See to capture the girl, and if not possible, kill her.

Once again a great story, with a lot of veiled homages (I guess) to Foundation, Dune and Riverworld: To Your Scattered Bodies Go/The Fabulous Riverboat among others.

Centuries after the events of n  The Fall of Hyperionn, and three and a half years after I read that book, Endymion takes place and I read it. I had actually forgotten that there was a book between this one and Hyperion; I described this as the second book in a series when friends asked me what I was reading. Oops! And it has been so long since I read the first two that my memories of the series were distant and vague.

That proved not as much of a barrier as I worried it would be. I’m still trying to figure out why I am so ambivalent towards Dan Simmons’ other work but loving the Hyperion Cantos. It isn’t the classical allusions—as much as I love the classics, that doesn’t work so much for me. But the books in this series are just so well constructed, characterized, and compelling in their depth and scope, that I’m happy to claim that this series represents some of the finest far-future space opera of the nineties.

It took me a little while to get a feel for Endymion. I wasn’t enjoying the introduction to Raul, his meeting with Martin Silenus, etc. Once Simmons introduces Father Captain de Soya and the hunt for Aenea, however, things pick up considerably. The way in which he cuts between the two perspectives of hunter and hunted works quite well. Ideally when an author does this, they manage to make you constantly yearn for both perspectives: just as it switches from Raul to de Soya we’re supposed to wonder how the fugitives will get out of their latest cliffhanger. I admit to some preference for de Soya’s story—but that’s mostly because I was so intrigued by the internal affairs of the Pax.

When we last saw the Pax, it was a growing political movement on Pacem—but now it has taken the place of the Hegemony in the former Web worlds. Thanks to the collapse of the fatline and data spheres, the Pax has an information monopoly that allows them to manipulate public perception (e.g., of things like the Ousters). Yet Simmons hints that, despite the piety implicit in Pax life, there are more sinister elements in the upper echelons of the Church. In Father Captain de Soya he creates a great antihero: sincere in his belief and devotion to God and the Church, de Soya nevertheless has enough independent thought to begin questioning when the facts stop adding up. He is an antagonist in the sense that he is working against our protagonists’ ends—but he is not a bad man or a villain by any means.

I didn’t really warm up to Raul. He’s not a bad character, in that he isn’t too whiny. He’s just not the type of main character I want to identify with too much … I never got any grasp on his personality beyond a sense of competence and occasional references to his grandmother. I found that I best enjoyed the chapters with him, Bettik, and Aenea touring the River Tethys if I ignored the overall plot and just focused on the dangers they faced on each planet.

These subplots turn Endymion from what could be a weak-but-sprawling space opera into a fluid-but-lengthy adventure story. The three fugitives face a new challenge on every world, always escaping by the skin of their teeth. Simmons finds the right balance between no exposition and too much as he reveals just enough to keep us guessing about the identities of those who are helping Aenea and their relationship to the Pax, which is so concerned with apprehending her. There are plenty of allusions to the events of the past two books—and I’d recommend reading them before reading this one—but by and large, Endymion is much more about Aenea’s personal development than wider galactic affairs.

She keeps referring to being guided towards an architect who can teach her. Simmons hints that Aenea will be a messiah, someone special with “powers.” Fortunately, he avoids the temptation of turning her into a creepy child who manifests those powers early. Aside from a psychic episode here or there, she has to rely on her own determination and resolve—plus the help from Raul and Bettik—to survive. I loved the moment where she pointed out that, from the moment she stepped from the Time Tombs, it has all been one “very long day” for her.

Endymion is long. But I actually like that about it. My weariness was sympathetic with the weariness the fugitives felt after their long journey, and with the weariness of de Soya and his minions for their constant deaths and resurrections. Simmons underscores how gallivanting through the galaxy is not a game for the merely human: space travel of any kind places demands on us that exceed what our bodies and minds evolved to handle. Though the TechnoCore’s role in this book is greatly reduced, Simmons reminds us that the existence of AI is a thorny existential issue for humanity.

In some ways, this book feels like filler between the conflicts begun in The Fall of Hyperion and what will hopefully be the resolution in The Rise of Endymion. I still enjoyed it, though, and heartily recommend it to those who read the first two books.

My reviews of the Hyperion Cantos:
← The Fall of Hyperion | The Rise of Endymion →

n  n

Endymion es la tercera entrega de la saga de los cantos de hyperios del autor Dan Simmons. Aunque es la continuación de los anteriores libros del canto de hyperion, no es por así decirlo la continuación de la historia que conocemos de los anteriores libros. La historia transcurre casi tres siglos estándar después de lo ocurriendo en hyperion y con el Alcaudon, los personajes principales vienen a ser el mismo Endymion, quien al parecer siempre ha querido ser un héroe, aunque de momento sus objetivos no me parecieron muy claros, tal vez se involucro en todo esto por gratitud o solo porque no tenía nada más que hacer, en fin. El otro personaje es Aenea, la que enseña, ella es un misterio, si bien se responden muchas preguntas a lo largo del libro, siguen quedando muchas preguntas sin respuesta.
El libro en si es bueno, es el típico estilo de simmons que conocemos, pero esta vez pareciera que la historia es completamente lineal, lo que hace que sea más fácil la lectura, pero no por ello deja de ser algo denso, como todos sus libros sobre ciencia ficcion futurista. Si quieren empezar a leer a simmons o ciencia ficción, tal vez estos libros no sean la mejor primera opción, quizás después de unos cuantos libros de ficción autoconclusivos podrían animarse con esta saga.
Lo único que reparo de este libro es que me pareció que la historia no avanzo lo suficientemente rápido a mi gusto. Creo que se pudieron haber acortado capítulos y páginas si no hubiésemos dado tantas vueltas en lo mismo. Aún así lo recomiendo para los amantes de la ciencia ficción y quienes ya hayan leído los dos libros anteriores. Se que les gustará. Lo recomiendo al 100%.

Wow-I have a new favorite!

I truly loved this book all the way through. Have you ever read a book where right away you just knew you were going to love it, and tried to read it real slow so you could savor it? that was me with Endymion....

Here we follow the story of Aenea, the child of Hyperion characters John Keats and Brawnia...who we learn is destined to be a major prophet.

This is the story of how she managed to be 3 centuries into the future after the events of Fall of Hyperion, and her pilgrimage to Old Earth, as told by Raul Endymion, who will someday be her true love.

Although this is all a precursor to whatever destiny she will fulfill (I assume that is the story in Endymion Rising), this story bring new clues to some of the events and happenings of the first two Hyperion books, creates some beautiful new characters, and resolves the fates of some of the old ones.

Highly recommended!

And now for something completely different!

heee, I've just noticed book's cover art - Shrike is standing all casual on the makeshift raft and Endymion is all casual, rowing wit a stick at leisure.
SHIRE WEIGHTS SEVERAL TONS, YOU LOONIES. There is no possible way for Shrike to go rafting or kayaking, or I don't know, windsurfing.

But I digress.

This is a completely different book that first two in the series. Plot takes us several hundreds years forward, yet some old characters still are rollin a steam.

What we get - a road trip, catch me if you can, assassin-murder-thriller drama and some weird bablings about lions and tigers and bears. A complete zoo if you ask me. This is probably a spoiler, but there you go.

It's a really good sci-fi book, Dan Simmons excels at world building. I liked the multilayered storytelling, with constant action and unpredictable plot twist, strong likable and well... hate-able? characters. As some characters seem to be created just to hate them and I hated them immensely. Dialogues though... Still good. Could be better, but good. At least there's very little talk about poetry.

The main heroine is twelve (12), yet ramblings about carnivorous mammals of Felidae and Ursidae families remain the single display of immaturity. And no pedo vibes, thank you cruciform (a parabole of religion being a parasite), author writes a child and we see her growing up. I liked tigers in my teens too.

My favorite character - the diligent Father Captain, Frederico de Soya, of the Pax, going after runaways, with no regard to any human and material loss. He dies a lot. I liked that. A lot.
Multilayered storytelling, as I said.

Completely different done good. Very very good.

Pretty epic scifi adventure that’s elevated by Simmons’s prose as well as his exploration of themes through characters and world-building that have a bit more depth than many others within the genre

3 Stars

Unfortunately not as good as Hyperion. This was still entertaining but somehow I didn't really care for the characters, they felt flat and uninteressting. Also some parts were just boring (and I mean really boring). I just missed the endless tension and mysteries I was used to in this series.

How do I know what I think until I see what I say? wrote some pre-Hegira writer. Precisely. I must see these things in order to know what to think of them.

Endymion begins with its POV character Raul Endymion, stuck in a prison that is to be where he dies, writing the events on this book in order to understand. His writings follow his rescue of the child Aenea, hunted by the church and accompanying her on a quest along with the android A. Bettik that has the trio following the river Tethys through farcaster portals and strange new worlds as they try to reach their destination.

I feel like this book had less action than the others focusing on the new worlds that the characters find themselves in, which was fine with me. There is such diversity in the worlds that Dan Simmons imagines and combined with his beautiful prose, it creates multiple stunning worlds I can visualize.

A thing of beauty is a joy forever;
Its loveliness increases, it will never
Pass into nothingness

Endymion had two POV characters, Raul and de Soya, the man the church has sent to capture the child. I found myself liking both characters, even though de Soya is considered "the bad guy". While he made some morally questionable decisions, Simmons has created such an extensive background for his characters that you can see why they act the way they do.

However I think the best part is that as the book progresses, de Soya begins to change as a result of his new experiences. Simmons did a great job creating a believable character, and de Soya quickly become a favorite.

There are a number of ethical gray areas tackled in this book, but it is done in a way that isn't off putting. It forces you to think, rather than forcing you what to think.

Looking forward to the last book in this series.

Cross posted at Kaora's Corner.

It is a good and more focused story compared to the previous two. However it definitely drags throughout the middle with little to no advancement. Until the last 100 pages where Simmons decides to plough through the explanations and setup the final book in the series.