u/dexdeckers

I was thinking the other day, if humanity ever wants to travel to another star or galaxy, we would be bored out of our skulls along the way. So cryosleep is often presented as an option for these travels, but then again, imagine arriving there and the conditions are so extreme, life there is boring as hell again, living in domes, space suits etc. Not being able to actually live in a decent way. So what if we ditch the idea that we should remain human to become a space faring civilisation? I know I’m not the first one to come up with this, so my question is: are there any books, series or movies, that go deeper on this approach? I know the Hyperion cantos has the Ousters, but I’m looking for something with more focus and detail on this. Like, it’s the main thread in the story. Thanks.

Had a good week of letting it all sink in and one of the first things I thought was “I should have bought the books so I can reread them right away, or at least look up things, now everything is still fresh”.

First I was a bit divided on the ending. I was expecting/hoping an ending like FoH - super epic, with an insanely deep impact ( >!Blowing up the farcaster network changed the entire way everyone lived!< ) - but later on I realised >!Aenea’s death!< really did change everything, just on a longer timescale.

Lots of people here are a bit turned off by the love story between Raul and Aenea, but it didn’t affect me. But I should say I read it in Dutch and seeing here that in the English version the term “kiddo” is used a lot, I get it. In Dutch, they use “meid” and that has a less juvenile sound to it. Was it “meisje”, then it would have had the same vibe. But generally it was made clear in the story a few times, once things got more “intense”, Aenea was 21. So yeah, ok.

I love how the >!cruciform!< got a central role later on in the story.

The story line about Moneta and Kassad didn’t have that big of an impact as I expected, but it was a good time bending side story.

There was a lot of poetry which, I must admit, I mostly skimmed over quite rapidly.

The metaphysical angle about Empathy was a lot to take in the first half, because it felt quite vague. Glad to see that got more context in the later half.

How did Raul suddenly realise >!A. Bettik!< was >!an Observer!< after he said something seemingly random during their goodbye? It felt a bit bolted on there to close a loop, but maybe I missed some subtleties.

Curious to hear your ideas, fellow pilgrims.
See you later, alligator.