Dedication: "For Poul and Karen with much appreciation and love."
(According to Greg Bear's Introduction to Multiverse, Poul Anderson helped with astronomical orbits; Karen Anderson helped with history and Greek.)
In the Gollancz SF Masterworks edition (London, 2002), the text of the novel extends from p. 1 to the top of p. 502. There are no blank pages between chapters or even blank spaces at the ends of chapters, except for a third of a page at the end of the Prolog. Solid.
The four-part Prolog begins in New York on Christmas Eve, 2000. However, the novel was first published, in New York, in 1985 so 2000 is the future. We soon learn that there was a global war called "the Little Death," in the 1990's and that there is regular space travel with lunar bases.
Prolog part one (pp. 1-6) is a conversation between Judith Hoffman and Garry Lanier. The point of view (POV) shifts because p. 1 recounts Hoffman's perception of Lanier whereas p. 2 gives us Lanier's perception of Hoffman.
Is this a compliment? So far, it reads like a work by Poul Anderson.
1 comment:
Hi, Paul!
I have four or five of the works of Greg Bear, and liked them well enough, esp. QUANTICO. I would say, from what you wrote above, that Greg Bear learned a lot from his father in law how to write or organize a novel.
Sean
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