Cradle of Saturn

I found this to be one of the best book's that I have ever read. Hogan puts together a great storyline with convincing scientific ideas. He challenges the reader to think for themselves and not just to accept what they are told because the "experts" have told it to them. He also points out many flaws with society and presents possibilities of a change. While any closeminded person would find this book ridiculous and very bad, anyone that is willing to think that the way it is may not be the best way will find it interesting, if not enthralling. I also have read two of the reference books that Hogan put in the back of Cradle of Saturn. I've read both Worlds in Collision and Ages in Chaos by Immanuel Velikovsky. I find he has presented his theory with very much fact behind it and those that argued against it haven't used much fact. James P. Hogan does an excellent job of mixing real life science with a fictional story line to create an awesome book.

I couldn't put the book down until it was finished. As stated by Mr. Wyman, Science Fiction is FICTION! Get a grip! If you don't have an imagination and open mind you shouldn't be reading any of this! Science Fiction isn't intended to set forth a thesis, it's here to entertain and James Hogan did exactly that!James - great writing as always! Thanks and keep it coming.

I read this book and I liked it, so I figured I should rate it. Then I read some of the reviews and felt obligated to write a review. First things first, this novel is science fiction (key word there FICTION.) Many of these reviewers are spouting off that everything put forth in this book is flat out impossible. Isn't it just as impossible for dinosaurs to be cloned, robots to be constrained by "laws" to make them like humans, people to travel through time, the souls of the dead returning to posses people in the future? Don't be so narrow minded as to think that just because an author writes about something that they are preaching about it. Hogan used Velikovsky's ideas to create an entertaining read, he is not trying to debunk popular theory and convert readers. Something else to think about, Darwin, Gallaleo, Einstein, any "founder" of some scientific belief that we readily accept today was often times decried as a heritic, a fool and a nutjob when they first put forth their ideas. Don't be so simple as to think it couldn't happen again. So if you read this book, read it as a form of entertainment and put your biases behind you. If you spend all your life trying to find wrong everywhere you look you just look stupid.

Some of the reviews have compared this to the Bruce Willis movie "Armageddon." I have to admit I didn't see the movie, but I think the comparisons are very superficial. If I had to compare it to a movie, it would probably be "When Worlds Collide." Speaking of movies, I doubt that Hollywood will make one of this book, and if they did they would probably butcher it, but it might be worth it just for the special-effects spectacular that would be needed for the ending. The basic idea of a large object colliding with Earth is not new, but it was handled very well in this book. There were also some echoes of the first Hogan novel, "Inherit the Stars." Hogan doesn't do as many sequels as some writers, but it would be interesting to see what he could follow this up with. It sure wouldn't be set on Earth, unless it was much further in the future. I made the mistake of picking this up to read a little bit before going to sleep, when I was about 150 pages from the end. I ended up finishing it, and was really dragging the next day. As I said above, the way it ends is not too big a surprise, except perhaps for the extent of the disaster, and you knew the hero would survive, but it still keeps you going. I have read a lot of science fiction that was exciting, and a lot that was intellectually stimulating, especially by James Hogan. This book combines both and does it very well.

Fantastic book, incredible premise. Neatly ties together many "loose ends" of the Earth's history, as well as raising questions for the reader's consciousness about our birthplace. It did so much for me that I actually researched the validity online of some of the claims.... and they were convincingly close to reality.