Character Interactions

By the end of The Technic Civilization Saga, Volume I, The Van Rijn Method:

Nicholas van Rijn has appeared four times, David Falkayn twice and Adzel once;

Falkayn has begun to work for van Rijn's company but has not yet met van Rijn;

four other stories have not mentioned any of these characters.

That is how long the character interactions take to get off the ground and how much solid foundation Poul Anderson has put into this future history series.

Falkayn will be intimidated in his first meeting with van Rijn in Volume II but will defy him at the end of that volume. He will be married to van Rijn's granddaughter, and will even become acting CEO of SSL, in Volume III but at last history will move away from these characters. We will see Falkayn's grandson/van Rijn's great-great-grandson, and a remoter descendant of Falkayn before the end of Volume III. Then we go on to read Volumes IV-VII about completely different characters. OK. I can't get over how good a future history series this is.