Alternate Realities

Alternate Realities (2000) is an omnibus edition of older novels by this author, including Port Eternity, Voyager in Night, and Wave Without a Shore. All three novels are standalone stories within the Alliance-Union Universe. In Port Eternity (1982), the story is set on the planet Brahman, where the rich are rejuvenated and their servants are genetically designed humans -- the azi -- grown in artificial wombs and indoctrinated by sleep learning. The azi are normally terminated when they reach forty, but some few are rejuved and live as long as their masters. In this novel, Lady Dela Kirn is a descendent of a founder of Brahman and is very rich. She owns many azi, but only a few are allowed aboard the Maid of Astolat, her starfaring yacht. Four are the crew and the other three are her staff. All are named for characters in a drama tape about King Arthur. The narrator of this story is Elaine, named for the original Maid of Astolat. Elaine is probably the most independent of the azi. Her household function is personal companion and she performs a variety of personal services for Lady Dela. Lance is the steady lover of Lady Dela, available for times that she lacks other lovers. He has been with her for twenty years and is coming up on the age limit. Lance is Elaine's best friend, but he has been conditioned to only love Lady Dela. Vivian is Lady Dela's accountant and estate manager. She is the most narrow of the azi, focused on her job and obtaining rejuv. She treats the other azi as if she was a born-man and too important to do menial work. Gawain, Percivale, Lynette and Modred are the crew. They are closely focused on their jobs whenever the ship is activated. Modred is the most narrowly focused, operating by reason only and insensitive to his own and other's emotions. Modred is named such for his dangerous appearance; even born-men step aside when Modred approaches. Griffin is Lady Dela's current born-man lover. He is young, having never been rejuved, and is full of energy. He and Lady Dela are in love, which is unusual for Dela. Even Lance is convinced that they will be married. In Voyager in Night (1984), Trishanamarandu-kepta is very old, 100,000 years in ship time, but it has spent so much duration in jumpspace that it is much older in terms of normal spacetime. It is also very large, with the mass of a starstation. In this novel, the Company Wars are over and Alliance trade routes are expanding. Endeavor Station is being constructed and ships are converging on the system to provide needed raw materials and products. One of these ships is the Lindy, a very small mining ship, jury rigged from scraps and salvaged parts, with a crew of three. Rafe Murray is the Old Man of the Lindy and his sister Jillian and her husband Paul Gaines are the crew. The Murrays are Merchant brats who were orphaned during the Company Wars and Paul was a stationer on Forgone. The trio has put everything they have into the Lindy. Havi

I really loved this volume. It was a combination of three books having a common theme. In each book, human beings find themselves in an alien or sci-fi environment that has a profound effect on their thinking, making them alien, too. The author is excellent at helping you enter the minds of these strange, altered people.These are profoundly intellectual books, examining thought processes in great detail. Sometimes not too much happens, except an examination of what the characters are thinking, perhaps a tiny bit reminiscent of "Waiting for Godot". I found this fascinating, but I wouldn't expect that it would be very interesting for children, for instance.In the first book, two sets of people are trapped together on a space ship. One set are normal, born people. The other set were made in a lab and conditioned to serve the first group. Most of the book takes place inside the head of one of these lab born servants and looks at how she experiences people and events around her.In the second book, a group of people end up in the clutches of an alien computer, who plays strange games with them, copying and combining them. In the third book, a group of human colonists lives on a planet with an alien race, but somehow convinces themselves that they don't see the aliens right in front of their faces. The story examines the bizarre thought patterns they go through in rationalizing their denial of the aliens.It's hard in summarizing these books to capture a feeling of what the stories are really like. They all move at a good clip and keep up suspense, so you keep wanting to read on, despite the fact that the approach is so intellectual.Cherryh is an incredibly creative writer. Her work is totally different from any other science fiction that I have read. It is true science fiction from the old school (rather than fantasy) and yet also has an approach somewhat like a romance novel in the detailed look at people's internal lives. I am definitely getting more books by this author.

Port Eternity is a well written book, (they are not androids, they are 'Made' people, clones) and brings out some very intresting concepts. Voyager In Night is the weirdest of the three, dealing with life and death in a very intresting way. This is the only book I have read where one the main characters askes 'Am I dead?' The conflicts are also unique, as are the names. Wave Without a Shore was my favorite of the three, for it deals with the most intelegent man on the planet, an artist powerfull enough to capture change in stone. Only in the end does he realize that reality is not just what he makes it.

An Execelent combination of 3 Sci-fi books by an execelent author. Great for those who like to read something that they can think about.

This is a compilation of three of Cherryh's older and stranger books. Port Eternity is Arthurian in space, but is much better than that would normally imply. Wave without a Shore is philosophical, concept-driven SF which reminds me somewhat of LeGuin in a similar mode, though perhaps less self-righteous. I enjoyed it a great deal but readers who are put off by heavy philosophy may be bored. Voyager in Night is the weirdest of the bunch -- it reminds me of an SRL video. It's nominally an Alliance/Union story about a ship which gets kidnapped by an unknown alien; it's also about identity both personal and species. Overall, this is a compilation which makes sense and I'd highly recommend it.