Metaplanetary: A Novel of Interplanetary Civil War

An excellent story with some novel (no pun intended) approaches to the space opera genre. Tony Daniel had combined human elements with some fun and interesting scientific principles. This story kicks off a solar-system-wide civil war in a universe where the planets are physically linked together into the "Met". The entire Met, including the connecting "cables" is populated with multiple billions of people whose lives are in turn interconnected through the nano-quantum material called "grist". Humanity has branched out into various forms including Free Converts - Virtual bodiless people, LAP's - Large Array of Personalities, Cloudships - living comets (for lack of better word) and of course biological humans who are fully integrated with their own convert (virtual) copies as well as the assisting grist pellicle that connects them to the physical and virtual world that dominates the Met. With characters spread around the solar system, Tony Daniel brings to life a world of intelligent ferrets, mystics, dictators and lovers. Reminiscent of Peter Hamilton and Robert Heinlein, Mr. Daniel brings us a strange new world with fascinating characters and an interesting and plausible storyline. I fully enjoyed this book and recommend it.

I knew I was in for a treat with this book after my dad, who has consumed two or three sci-fi novels a week for the past 30 years, handed it to me and said, "You know, just when you think you've read it all, someone comes out with something like this with stuff you've never even dreamed of." Sure enough, Daniel has spun an incredible tale stuffed with mind-bending technology and ideas. It is surely one of the best sci-fi books I've read lately.While some SF authors often base a story around one central idea, this work has enough conceits to fill the dressing room at the Victoria Secret fashion show. He gives us the ubiquitous nanobots known as "grist", and "pellicles", nano-based prosthetics that can acquire their own legal status and civil rights. There is a bizarre if not entirely believeable interplanetary subway system of interlocking organic tubes. And there are the massive thinking spacecraft that have become the bodies holding the minds of their centuries-old human pilots.Daniel also gives us a good old-fashioned epic tale to chew on, with an ambitious dictator pitted against believers in individual liberty. I sense Daniel has a lot to say on this issue and I hope it is fleshed out in the upcoming sequel, "Superluminal".One other thing I liked was Daniel's attention to finance and economics through one of the main characters, who is the far future equivalent of a high-powered Wall Street trader, though he deals in things like meson futures rather than the familiar commodities of today. This is a refreshing change from many other sci-fi tales, which tend to paint future economies as mercantilist empires or hyperdemonic capitalism with evil corporations crushing the little guys.Daniel's skill isn't limited to dreaming up fantastic settings and technology. He is adept at painting his characters in rich colors, and in using them to raise interesting questions of ethics and identity. He manages to elicit empathy for even the oddest of the bunch, such as the financial wheeler-dealer's wife, who is a disembodied AI with no physical features or expressions to describe. Yet Daniel succeeds in making us anxious for her fate as she is ensnared in a move to strip AIs of their civil rights and press them into virtual concentration camps.Metaplanetary is a worthy investment of time and money, and I have high hopes the sequel will prove just as enjoyable, intriguing and thoughtful.

I bought this book last July. I've read it six times since then. Frankly, I'm fascinated with it. After reading the other reviews here, I see a few points that are salient: First, that the novel abruptly terminates without wrapping up any loose ends. Unfortunately, it does, but this book was intended to have a companion piece--think Metaplanetary, parts I and II. And a novel on this scale naturally takes a while to write--on the order of three or four years, at least. Second, the lengthy and haphazardly-placed explanations of several fundamental aspects of this society (i.e., the origins of grist, the founding of the society of cloudships, etc.). A few people said that because of this, the novel gives one the impression of being thrown into society with vernacular that's more or less incomprehensible by modern standards. Perhaps so, but if one simply reads the reviews or blurb on the back of the book, it actually mentions the nanotechnological artificial intelligences on which the whole struggle is based. Starting the book with that context in mind may help. Third, the hard-to-follow dissemination of characters. I agree on this point--sometimes, it's difficult to tell who's speaking at what point, but when you contemplate a novel that has a conceptual framework spanning the solar system, a single character is extraordinarily limited. And fourth, the one-dimensionality of the villain. I do agree on this point, but it's only because Ames is a true psychopath--singleminded, relatively emotionless, ambitious, and goal-oriented to the exclusion of everything else. How do you show the "good" side of a villain that doesn't have one?More or less to wrap up: read the book yourself. Whether or not you're confused or irritated, at least you're not bored.

I have read a lot of good science fiction lately (see my recent reviews) and this is another fine example. It would make a great movie if done true to this work. The premise of this novel is 'what constitutes a human being' and it is present throughout this book. A civil war erupts in the solar system, and much of this war concerns itself about whether or not intelligent algorithms, that is, conscious computers and/or programs, should be allowed full human rights, or are they just property. And what constitutes human status in the first place, do they have to look like us, and think like us, can they be faster, better, and more rational, than original humans? This novel is set one thousand years into the future with a despot attempting to rule the solar system and impose his will on all. Tony Daniel illustrates how we come to rely on our technology, and take it for granted, and are at a loss when we lose it. He has a multitude of interesting characters here, all with superb character development, in a complex well written plot, very imaginative in the 'hard' science fiction tradition, and it was hilarious at times. Nanotechnology, which is called grist in this novel, allows many things to become possible, and would seem to be near magic to us here in the early 21st century. My only criticism for this book is that Daniel has these characters living 1000 years from now in a world where immortality is not quite here yet, give me a break, nanotech should give immortality to us well before then, I do not take a star off my review for this, my opinion. And there is a sequel coming to this novel, called "Superluminal", I look forward to it.

One millennium earth time from now, humanity has colonized much of the solar system. However, a social schism of major magnitude has occurred during the post settlement stages. The inner planets are totally ruled by Ames, the great dictator, who decides what is human and what is fodder especially with the growth of technology such as grist to host an individual's consciousness. On the outer ring, control is totally decentralized as diversity in human form is cherished as it is considered a basic freedom.As the outer ring begins to head towards other stars, Ames sees an opportunity to gain control of the solar system. With his totalitarian ability to raise troops fast, Ames seems to have a major advantage over the apparently scattered opponent. However, led by Colonel Sherman, the outer ring knows they have everything to lose and draw their line in the sand, ready to risk their lives for freedom.Though the year is not even half over, METAPLANETARY may be the best science fiction novel of 2001 and will appear on most people's short lists. The story line is fast-paced and filled with action while describing an extremely complex and extraordinary solar system that is actually two competing cosmos. The differences between the inner and outer rings seem like a futuristic Cold War or World War II with totalitarianism vs. freedom on a grander scale. In his third science fiction, Tony Daniel has written a novel that is so exemplary that the author will earn a place among the genre's stars, a rarity based on one book (though the other two are very good too).Harriet Klausner