Remarkable! This is truly my new favorite science fiction series of all time. The moment I started reading it, I was completely hooked. The storyline is so captivating and unique, filled with mind-blowing concepts and thrilling adventures. The characters are well-developed and relatable, each with their own distinct personalities and motives. The world-building is simply outstanding, creating a vivid and immersive universe that I can't get enough of. Every page turn brings new surprises and keeps me on the edge of my seat. I highly recommend this series to all science fiction enthusiasts out there. It's a must-read that will transport you to a whole new world of imagination and excitement.

I really hoped that allowing this book to sit for a while would make me realize that perhaps there are actually things I like about it.

But as time passes, the angrier I become. I must face the truth: I hate this book.

In this 700-page tome, there isn't a single scene that I enjoy. It truly baffles me that this book is in the same series and by the same author as Hypersion and The Fall Of Hyperion, which I rated four and five stars respectively. Endymion and The Rise Of Endymion read like very bad fanfiction for the first two books.

Personally, I only give one star to books that elicit a very strong negative reaction from me. This book made me groan out loud, insult the characters aloud, and angrily read passages to my boyfriend, so it definitely qualifies. Quite frankly, I'm furious with this book. Because of this, this review might be very messy, but I just need to get this out of my head.

1.) The Structure

The pacing of this book is completely off. The most interesting thing that occurs in the first 250-300 pages is the main character having a kidney stone and eventually passing it.

There are unnecessary descriptions galore, while scenes that I would have actually liked to see are withheld from the reader and only mentioned in passing.

2.) The Narration

This and the previous book Endymion are narrated by our main character, Raul Endymion. I couldn't for the life of me come up with a single reason why. Raul is the least interesting character in this entire series. Maybe Dan Simmons was trying to do something by telling the story from a side character's POV, but it really didn't come across that way. Raul is probably the main reason why I hated this book so much. He is insufferable. He is annoying, whiny, and makes everything about himself as if the universe wasn't at stake. He constantly says and does stupid things but then suddenly comes up with super profound plans that always work. His character isn't even consistent.

Dan Simmons did nothing interesting with the concept of having a single character tell a story, like acknowledging that people are unreliable narrators or having them miss crucial pieces of information.

Also, the female main character Aenea in this is literally the messiah and has special abilities, but it's written through the eyes of her boyfriend who doesn't understand half of what she's saying and only treats her as the object of his affection. This makes her uninteresting and, in my opinion, is also a female agency problem; not even female Jesus gets to tell her own story, but her creepy love interest does.

3.) Characters

I've already discussed all the reasons why I dislike Raul so much, but the rest of the cast of characters isn't much better. Every single character in this is barely one-dimensional, with absolutely no personality. They're not even cardboard cutouts; they're maybe macaroni portraits made by a 3-year-old. The few interesting characters in this, like Father De Soya, we see very little of and they aren't developed any further from Endymion. Generally speaking, if you're looking for character development, likeability, or depth, look elsewhere.

4.) Dialogue

No one in this book talks like a real person. It's especially bad between the main couple because they never even have a conversation. Everything is about demanding information and receiving half-truths in return.

5.) The Romance

Oh boy, hold on tight because it's about to get intense.

Raul takes on an almost parental role for 12-year-old Aenea in the previous book. For some reason, Dan Simmons really wanted us to know that they were going to end up together when she was 12 and even had her, as a child, allude to her knowledge of this (for example: at one point in Endymion she mentions that she and Raul will shower together in the future). At the beginning of Rise Of Endymion, Raul is still in the role of the father figure/big brother to Aenea.

And then everything goes wrong.

They have to say goodbye early in the book and 16-year-old Aenea kisses 32-year-old Raul. He is conflicted about this for literally one sentence and then just ignores it? Is okay with it? Forgets about it??? I really, really hated how Dan Simmons wants you as the reader to understand that Aenea initiates everything that happens between them, as if that makes it any less creepy. I'm 100% sure he did this on purpose so it's harder to argue that Raul is a predator. It's still incredibly creepy and it pisses me off that the author shifted the responsibility onto Aenea. If you're a 32-year-old man and a 16-year-old girl kisses you, you tell her no. If you're a 27-year-old man and a 12-year-old girl alludes to you showering together, you sit her down and talk to her about what boundaries you have in your relationship.

When they meet again, Aenea is 21 (barely legal, anyone?). They start their romantic relationship very quickly and again, Dan Simmons really needs you to know that Aenea initiates everything. He has her crawl naked towards Raul because she wants his dick so badly. How is Raul supposed to say no to the child he helped raise?!?!? Raul slips into the role of her lover with no personal conflict or even reflection about this situation. Also, he keeps calling her "kiddo" after they become a couple, and that's nauseating.

The romance in this is just plain creepy. This isn't the first time this has happened in this same series either. In the first book, there's a romance between a 15-year-old girl and a 19-year-old man. Here, the girl is constantly referred to as "almost 16" instead of 15 because again, it sounds less creepy. Both Aenea and Siri are written to be extremely intelligent and even as children don't act like children, which also feels like a device to make their respective relationships seem less inappropriate. It reads like a 25-year-old man telling his 15-year-old girlfriend that she's "just so mature for her age and totally not like other teens and that he usually isn't even attracted to teenagers."

Besides that, the relationship between Raul and Aenea was completely unfounded. I've already mentioned that they never even talk. We're told about all the deep conversations they supposedly have, but we never get to see one of them. Which makes no sense because nothing else is left out. Why do we get to see them have sex on multiple occasions but never have a real conversation? The one time they get close to having a serious talk, 32/33-year-old Raul storms out because his 21-year-old girlfriend wasn't a virgin when they met and had previously been married. Read that sentence again slowly, and I won't have to explain the problem here.

The sex scenes seem to be thrown in so the reader understands that they have love and affection for each other because their relationship just has no other basis. There's constantly talk about how much they love each other but never any explanation as to why. Please, Dan, explain to me why on earth this genius 21-year-old would be madly in love with this 32-year-old man who acts like he's 15, doesn't even understand half of what she's saying, and still calls her "kiddo." And no, because it's "meant to be" is not an explanation.

6.) TROE as an Instalment in the Cantos

I'm going to be pretty brief about this, but I even hated how desperately the author tried to tie this book to the rest of the series. Forced character crossovers, a ridiculous origin story for the shrike, the shrike itself being reduced to showing up conveniently and saving the main characters, and even retconning some of the canon from the previous books.

7.) Everything Else That Pissed Me Off

- Instead of interesting villains, we get killer robots.

- Every problem was solved with some deus ex machina quick fix.

- Not even the other one-star reviews I've seen make fun of this, but there's literally a scene of the main couple 69ing in zero gravity???

- The ending was just the final straw. I hated it and it took away the small bit of agency Aenea had.

If you're interested in this series, please do yourself a favor and only read Hyperion and The Fall Of Hyperion. Don't worry, those two books alone have a satisfying conclusion.

The concluding chapter of the tale brings a long-awaited resolution to the core's attempts to rise up and dominate humanity in their pursuit of attaining the ultimate intelligence.

The story, with its biblical undertones, reaches its climax as Aenea's gift to humanity is finally disclosed. This gift serves as the ultimate redeeming message, liberating humanity from the enslaving clutches of the Cruciform. Additionally, the discovery of the true potential of the void that binds us ushers in a new era for the evolution of the human race.

I thoroughly enjoyed this book. However, there were certain parts that were overly detailed and descriptive, having minimal impact on the events. At times, I found myself laboriously plodding through the pages, determined not to skim through the chapter just to get back to the action. Nevertheless, when considering the book as a whole, it provides a satisfying conclusion to the journey, neatly tying together all the events from the previous three books.

MiM

Writing a review of this book means immediately spoiling some important moments, so it's better to share the general impression.

Endymion - if in the first part he was still somewhat similar to a 30-year-old man, then in this part he turned into a hysterical teenager who went berserk with his life and profound stupidity every 50 pages.

Enea - here everything is okay, she meets all the criteria of the messiah and Dan did not give a miss in writing her character.

Martin Silen - yes, this semi-living substance still prowls in the white world and with each year becomes even more hostile.

I won't touch the rest of the brethren because of spoilers.

In general, the author meticulously worked out his concept, but after overlapping the events in Hyperion, he still left many questions that in the final chapters he tried to explain but did it very banally (probably there was already a lack of fantasy) and frankly speaking, he failed the ending (maybe such light motives will suit someone).

As a conclusion, it is worth reading Hyperion, but it is better not to touch Endymion, there will be a lot of sadness and disappointments.

Finally, I have completed the entire Hyperion Cantos. This series, which began with the all-time sci-fi classic Hyperion, almost concluded in The Fall of Hyperion, launched a second arc in Endymion and ends here with The Rise of Endymion.

These last two books read more like a duology than the third and fourth installments of a series. The Cantos is often discussed in PrintSF, my online sci-fi books discussion community. The second half of the series tends to be quite polarizing. Some people love it, while others say it is disappointing. One reader even calls it a bad fan fiction of the first two books. However, the Goodreads average rating for these last two books indicates that they are quite well liked by the majority. In my opinion, they are well worth reading if you like Hyperion and The Fall of Hyperion, but they are not sf classics like these earlier books.

This is not one of those series that can be read out of sequence. In fact, The Rise of Endymion continues directly from the previous volume Endymion. After narrowly escaping capture by the Pax church state and their secret partner, the insidious and malevolent mega AI entity the TechnoCore, our heroes, the messianic Aenea and Raul Endymion, have settled down on “Old Earth” (just Earth to us) for a few years. That is until one day Aenea instructs Raul to go on an interminable mission to pick up their spaceship, which they left on another planet in the previous book, and bring it to her at a preprogrammed destination. After finally reuniting with great difficulty, they travel to the planet where the Pax-run Vatican is located and confront the Pax and the evil AI.

There are quite a few edge-of-the-seat thrilling scenes in this book, especially those involving the killer super cyborgs (T-1000-like) Nemes, Scylla (and the other one). The equally formidable Shrike from all the previous books is also present to challenge these whippersnapper cyborgs. However, the book is not a thrill ride all the way as Raul’s solo adventure to reclaim their “Consul’s Ship” drags at times, though he did get to meet some wonderful characters and cultures on the way. The climax is suitably epic and mystical, and the events that follow wrap up the entire Cantos nicely. I did see the twist at the end from miles away though (if you have read this book, I’d love to know if you did the same).

Dan Simmons’ prose is always great to read, slipping into a lyrical mode from time to time, with the odd (and very odd) poems. The characterization is the main strength of this book, with the protagonists and antagonists all very well drawn. The sci-fi aspect of it is not as mind-boggling now as it was mostly featured in the previous books. Some of the new sci-fi elements border on fantasy, such as FTL traveling by foot, through a sort of hyperspace shortcut. Not to mention all the “chosen one” and messianic tropes. In fact, Aenea reminds me a lot of Paul Muad'Dib from Dune. All of the mysteries from the previous books (including the origin and nature of the Shrike) are explained (to the displeasure of some fans who prefer them to be left unexplained). The book is also very romantic, optimistic, and yet kind of tragic.

I am glad I have finished the entire series, but the first two books, the classics Hyperion and The Fall of Hyperion, remain two of my all-time favorites, which I would like to reread some day. I enjoyed Endymion and The Rise of Endymion, but I am not likely to reread them.

You know, there are those moments in life when you reach the end of a book, and you find yourself just sitting there, staring blankly into space for a while. Your eyes might well up with a few tears, and a sense of confusion washes over you as you wonder what on earth you're supposed to do with your life now. Well, that's precisely what this entire series did to me.

It was truly an astonishing experience. The moment I turned the last page, I was left in a state of utter disbelief and profound emotional turmoil. The story had gripped me from the very beginning and refused to let go until the very end.

Wow. Just wow. Those two words seem so inadequate to describe the impact this series had on me. It was like a whirlwind that swept through my heart and mind, leaving me changed forever. I can't wait to share this amazing journey with others and see if they too will be as deeply affected as I was.

How do you talk about one of the most important pieces of fiction you have ever read? You simply must try.

The Rise of Endymion is the fourth and final book in Dan Simmons’ grand space opera. It's about humanity spreading across the stars and discovering what it truly means to be human. This isn't a cliché; it's the central thesis of this intelligent space-epic that also weaves in a love story. The love between Raul Endymion and Aenea is deeply moving, rivaling the great romances in literature. The larger story is about human connection set against an epic war in time and space, which has been waged since the rise of intelligent machines.

The writing is beautifully crafted. Each major setting is described in stunning detail, making you feel as if you're part of the story. The variety of planets and their wonders is as important as the characters. The rich supporting characters add depth to the universe, making me believe this is the future history of our species.

The Rise of Endymion packs in many concepts and ideas. The ambitious nature of the universe and story could have easily ended unsatisfactorily, but this series delivers. It ties everything together, reflecting the importance of a well-lived life. I was left speechless at the resolution. I learned life lessons that will stay with me forever.

The framework for the series is built in the first two books, Hyperion and The Fall of Hyperion. You can read just those two and have a clean ending, but I was never tempted to quit. I didn't know how much I needed to see it to the end until I turned the last page. I rarely guessed where the characters would end up. They're at the center of cosmic events, and the fate of humanity is linked to theirs.

Spoilers: Raul had some epic moments in this book, like a showdown with a bad guy. The Shrike machine intervened and took out two of the three Terminator-style humans. The last one had her time-shifting abilities taken, giving Raul an opening to stop her. The action was intense, and I could feel the desperation and tension. When Raul outmaneuvered the beast, I imagined it as a movie.

There were also scenes that made me want to be there, like Raul's near-freefall through a Jovian planet’s atmosphere. He experienced sunrises, sunsets, and storms. The places in this book are amazing. Aanea sacrificed everything. She knew she had to give her life to free humanity from the Technocore’s chains. Her death was tragic and heart-wrenching, parallel to Jesus’s sacrifice. The book's ending makes you think about your own purpose and happiness in life.

Overall, The Rise of Endymion is an outstanding book that combines a great story, beautiful writing, and deep themes. It's a must-read for any science fiction fan.

Let's begin with the positive aspects. This book is truly epic in its scope, as it endeavors to address profound questions. The characters are complex, and the world-building is magnificent. Take, for instance, the startree, which is an astonishing concept. The events unfold towards a generally reasonable conclusion.

However, I found it rather challenging to maintain my interest for significant portions of this volume, unlike the previous three. I believe this can mainly be attributed to the main viewpoint character, Raul Endymion. He possessed certain characteristics that simply grated on me. His persistently irritating and completely unreasonable jealousy over Aenea was exasperating. I had the urge to slap him several times. Additionally, I found myself thoroughly bored or annoyed by their sexual relationship. While I have no interest in exploring such a relationship, this is likely due to my own cynicism rather than any fault in the way it was presented. But the worst part was the way he continued to call her "Kiddo" even after their relationship transitioned from the adult/child dynamic of the previous book to the sexual relationship in this one. I understand that this is a personal pet peeve of mine, as I have never been fond of pet names, especially those that infantilize. In this case, the fact that he didn't change his nickname for her after she became an adult and was still referring to her as "Kiddo," the same as when she was actually a child, made me feel queasy every single time. I think this contributed significantly to my dislike of this book compared to the others.

Nevertheless, the core of the book remains quite good. I think it could have been improved by trimming approximately 100 pages. But what do I know?

In a galaxy far, far away, specifically the Large Magellanic Cloud which is a staggering 160,000 light years from Sol, and over 1,000 years into the future, there lived two fugitive lovers. Raul Endymion of Hyperion and the new messiah Aenea, a unique being born of human and nonhuman parents.

Strangely, they resided on Old Earth which had somehow been poached there by AI, some of which were immensely evil. Nevertheless, the couple was happy enjoying a quiet, peaceful existence after a titanic struggle for survival. But this hiatus of four years would not last as an unknown destiny awaited them.

Earthlings had long constructed stupendous spaceships that could surpass light speed and had scattered throughout the Milky Way, inhabiting hundreds of planets. The starry heavens shone down on the bright exotic structures, newly erected modern cities, roads, and oceans full of vehicles and boats. People were transforming dead worlds into lively lands, bringing animals and plants from home.

Yet human nature remained the same. Greed, the quest for power, glory, and wealth could never be completely extinguished. However, the good would always try to change this.

Raul went away alone on a puzzling mission at Aenea's request, via the Farcaster portal. With just a few detours, one being a giant gas planet that he literally fell into. Mile after mile he descended in an endless atmosphere with only his entirely unsuitable kayak and parachute. Growing hungry and thirsty, this chilling interminable drop continued. Days passed, the air becoming unbreathable, unwanted clouds were a constant companion, and curious, weird, menacing, transparent creatures appeared. No land was observed underneath.

He awoke on the mountain world of T'ien Shan, his destination, a planet resembling Tibet with Buddhist monks, pagodas, and a new Dalai Lama, an eight-year-old boy. Aenea had arrived earlier and the angry, tortured man soon calmed as his great love for Aenea would never stop. She, an amateur architect, was building a structure for the monks high above in a mountain peak while the poisonous clouds lurked below.

Still, they could never stay as the brutal Pax rulers of the galaxy pursued the two wherever they traveled. She was dangerous to them. Nemes, the machine made to destroy her, was here along with two siblings. Nobody could defeat them. But a miracle occurred as the mighty Shrike monster, a mysterious friend, came and battled these things. A short opportunity to flee arose as the tumultuous brawl went on.

Stepping off the ledge, Raul and Aenea glided in the air with their artificial wings high above the never-before-seen ground, many miles below. Any mistake would plunge them into the deadly nearby gas clouds or treacherous mountain cliffs. Yet the thrill of flying like birds, soaring and diving, seeing new sights that were indescribably beautiful, intoxicating, and pure ecstasy in my humble opinion. Maybe I should say, in fact, as long as it was possible to remain there. They needed to reach a distant village soon in order to escape as time was running out.

This is the last of the enchanting, entertaining, and electrifying series for any sci-fi fan. They will enjoy it, I did.

Like Endymion, this is a solid 3.5 stars.

The conclusion to the four-book Hyperion Cantos is quite epic. I am still trying to figure out why it just didn't wow me. I liked it okay, but I know a lot of people who love this series and periodically reread it, and I have no desire to.

As with the first duology, Hyperion and The Fall of Hyperion, the second book is actually better than the first. Endymion set up the final confrontation between the Pax, the Ousters, and the TechnoCore, and the final book resolves it. We see worlds and civilizations fall, and conspiracies hidden for centuries are revealed. We learn the truth behind all the mysteries introduced since the first book: the origin of the Shrike, the goals of the TechnoCore, and the meaning of the Cruciform.

Raul Endymion and Aenea are the main characters, and as I predicted in Endymion, they become lovers. She plays the role of a Christ-figure in this book, fated to suffer for all mankind, and the parallel is very deliberate and direct. She is a messiah for a new SF age. I have mixed feelings about the whole \\"Love is a physical force that can save the universe\\" theme. However, I will say that Dan Simmons was consistent in his worldbuilding and his plotting. Indeed, perhaps this is what impresses people the most with this series: its epic scale spanning the rise and fall of several interstellar civilizations that nonetheless remains focused on individuals and reveals careful, meticulous planning, with groundwork laid all the way back in Hyperion. It's a masterful literary feat, and proves Simmons is a top-notch genre writer. He brings literary depth to this series, from Hyperion's riff on the Canterbury Tales to The Rise of Endymion's Biblical tribulations.

But somehow, it just didn't quite stop reminding me that it was just another space opera. Perhaps because I thought Raul Endymion was kind of a schmuck, with all his whining about how Aenea had another lover before him while he was lost in time. (Simmons handles time travel really well in this book: the twists are forehead-slappingly obvious yet they take you by surprise.) And I am not all that fond of allegorical messiahs, even if Simmons does subvert it a little by making this Christ a girl. (He's not exactly the first author to have that idea, though.) This is one of the best-written space operas ever, but there are others that I enjoyed more.

Still, it's an experience, vast in scale and with a grand finale. I would recommend that anyone read Hyperion, and if you like it, it is worth reading the rest of the series.

The Great Hyperion Re-read

The Great Hyperion re-read is truly an experience like no other. You know, I actually PREFER it when I am flummoxed when I have to write a review. It usually means that there is often SO MUCH going on in the pages. In this case, all three scenarios that make for a great and complex read happened. There is so much happening within the story that it must be read in context to the full four-book cycle to make TRUE sense. And it just blew my mind.

The line "Choose Again" is great. Simple yet mysterious, and easily applicable to every single moment of our lives. We are constantly faced with choices, and this line serves as a reminder that we always have the opportunity to make a different decision. Of course, most of us never have the full scope of options available to us as the characters in this story eventually get. But in the context of the Big Creatures in the Dark Forest, we can assume that the scope reaches truly awesome epic SF scope.

If you've read Hyperion and Fall of Hyperion, you know what I mean. And if you've read Endymion, it DOES just turn into a fantastic Heroic Quest, but it also fleshes out so many worlds, ideas, and the whole fate of humanity, putting into question the events of the Crux that was Hyperion. However, this doesn't quite roll out the full blowout that is The Rise of Endymion. This book should just be considered the part 2 of the second duology in the Hyperion Cantos. In other words, don't read Endymion without reading Rise of Endymion.

So, some questions that must be asked before they are answered: Do we find out who/what the Shrike is? What happened to the Earth? How did so much of humanity fall under a religious dictatorship revolving around immortality, and did the quest to topple it come through? Just who are the big animals? Do we get to spend a lot of delicious time with the Ousters and an honest World Tree having the equivalent living space of millions of Earths? And is this love story amazingly heartbreaking? Let's just cut to the chase and say yes to all the above.

Funnily enough, I really enjoyed the opening with all the architecture and learning/teaching bits. It was nicely gentle until we got to the Dali Lama. After that, however, I was biting my nails for most of the book. Between action sequences that were some of the best I've read in ANY military SF, epic scopes and truly delicious, equally interesting resolutions that are NOT obvious in the context of any military SF, and the admonition to Choose Again, I thought this was one of the better, if not best Hard SFs I've ever read. That title would still remain with the first two books of this cycle. :) DEFINITELY worth reading it all.

Dan Simmons saves the most quintessentially Dan Simmons book for the final installment of this epic tetralogy.

You still encounter elements of the grand quest, the pursuit across countless worlds, being hounded by a horde of religious fanatics equipped with sleek spaceships and accompanied by a deranged sentient AI. However, you also receive the level of meticulous detail that only Dan Simmons is capable of providing. Page after page is filled with details about pulleys, pins, stone masonry (including its complete history), fashion, toxic clouds, the chemical composition of sand, and the entire lifecycle of the flying squid-like creature, and so on.

What this book does accomplish, though, is answering all the questions and filling in all the gaps left open by the previous three books. So, it is significant, but it can be a bit of a laborious read, especially part two, which dulled my mind to the extent that I considered giving up. You could easily trim 100 pages from this book to enhance its flow.

Overall, I rate the Hyperion Cantos series 4.5 stars, deducting half a star for the tedium of the final book. The first three books, however, are a delight. Don't be deterred.