SFF

Echopraxia

by Peter Watts
Tor. Aug. 2014. 384p. ISBN 9780765328021. $24.99; ebk. ISBN 9781429948067. SF
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In the wrong place at the wrong time, Dan Brüks ends up on a spaceship bound for the stars, in the company of a band of posthuman monks and a resurrected vampire. The crew is hoping to follow the path of the Theseus, the ship last seen in Watts's Hugo-nominated Blindsight. They will encounter alien matter that will change how people view consciousness forever. Watts welds philosophy and science in original ways. His novels are interested in not only the possibilities of technology but the nature of sentience and humanity. This is not an easy read, but just as you think it will be another discussion of religion and postsingularity intelligences in the ship's galley, action breaks out.
VERDICT The danger of hard sf is that the writing can sometimes seem clinical and dry, but Watts manages to keep his prose lush even when serving high-concept science. This book is quite an achievement and should appeal to those who enjoy the works of Ian MacDonald and Hannu Rajaniemi.
Reviewed by Megan M. McArdle , Jul 01, 2014
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