Peter F. Hamilton

I was introduced to Peter F. Hamilton by the Science Fiction Book Club. Which is to say that one of his books was the selection of the month and I forgot to decline the selection of the month. Well, as it turns out, this particular selection of the month was a good one. I really enjoyed the book, and decided to keep the next Peter F. Hamilton SFBC Selection of the Month, as well. Now that I have a little more experience with his writing, I can say that he does an incredible job of writing from multiple sides of a conflict in a way that has me routing for almost everybody. I can't wait to read another of his books.

Books I've Read by Peter F. Hamilton

By the twenty-fifth century, the brilliant notion of a star-trading civilization linking Earth to its interstellar colonies has petered out--the victim of stock market manipulation and cost-benefit analysis. Trade has been replaced by a busines-friendly policy of "asset realization" . . . which some might call piracy. Corporate starships of the Zantui-Braun 3rd Fleet deploy to colonies, disgorging hordes of invulnerable soldiers called Skins. Enforcing their dictates with both orbital weapons and civilian hostages, the Skins loot whole planets, leaving only poverty, misery, and an industrial infrastructure--so that a few years later, Z-B can harvest again. But on the bucolic world of Thallspring, Z-B's plans are about to go badly awry, all because of: Sgt. Lawrence Newton: In his teens, Lawrence abandoned a life of privelege and love to pursue a dream of seeing the stars. twenty years of violence as a Skin have destroyed all his hopes and desires, except for one . . . Denise Ebourne: An energetic, dedicated young scoolteacher with a penchant for spinning fables of wondrous lost worlds, Denise is also a guerrilla resistance leader whose tactics would put Che Guevara, Ho Chi Minh, or even George Washington to shame. But then, they were only human . . . Simon Roderick: Z-B's Director of Internal Security serves management with a transcendent dedication that nobody, perhaps not even he himself, can hope to understand . . . Now, Lawrence just wants to buy his way out of Z-B by stealing a treasure he believes is stashed in a backwater province on Thallspring. Yet his "score" is also the one thing that Denise will protect at all costs, and that Roderick must possess at any price. And even as the players' machinations unfold, none of them suspect that their private war will explode into unimaginable quests for personal grace . . . or galactic domination. (book description)

The Commonwealth Saga

1. (I haven't read this book, yet) Misspent Youth (Paperback edition) or (Hardcover edition)

   It is forty years into the future and, following decades of research and trillions of euros spent on genetics, Europe is finally in a position to rejuvenate a human being. The first subject chosen for the treatment is Jeff Baker, the father of the datasphere (which replaced the Internet) and philantropist extraordinaire. After eighteen months in a German medical facility, the seventy-eight-year-old patient returns home looking like a healthy twenty-year-old. Misspent Youth follows the effect his reappearance has on his family and friends - his young ex-model wife Sue, his teenage son Tim, and his long-term pals, themselves all pensioners, who are starting to resent what Jeff has become. (book description from the official Peter F. Hamilton website.)

2. Pandora's Star (Mass Market Paperback) or (Hardcover edition)

   The year is 2380. The Intersolar Commonwealth, a sphere of stars some four hundred light-years in diameter, contains more than six hundred worlds, interconnected by a web of transport "tunnels" known as wormholes. At the farthest edge of the Commonwealth, astronomer Dudley Bose observes the impossible: Over one thousand light-years away, a star . . . vanishes. It does not go supernova. It does not collapse into a black hole. It simply disappears. Since the location is too distant to reach by wormhole, a faster-than-light starship, the Second Chance, is dispatched to learn what has occurred and whether it represents a threat. In command is Wilson Kime, a five-time rejuvenated ex-NASA pilot whose glory days are centuries behind him. Opposed to the mission are the Guardians of Selfhood, a cult that believes the human race is being manipulated by an alien entity they call the Starflyer. Bradley Johansson, leader of the Guardians, warns of sabotage, fearing the Starflyer means to use the starship's mission for its own ends. Pursued by a Commonwealth special agent convinced the Guardians are crazy but dangerous, Johansson flees. But the danger is not averted. Aboard the Second Chance, Kime wonders if his crew has been infiltrated. Soon enough, he will have other worries. A thousand light-years away, something truly incredible is waiting: a deadly discovery whose unleashing will threaten to destroy the Commonwealth . . . and humanity itself. Could it be that Johansson was right? (book description)

3. (I haven't read this book, yet) Judas Unchained (Hardcover edition)

   After hundreds of years secretly manipulating the human race, the Starflyer alien has succeeded in engineering a war which should result in the destruction of the Intersolar Commonwealth. Now, thanks to Chief Investigator Paula Myo, the Commonwealth's political elite finally acknowledge the Starflyer's existence, and put together an unlikely partnership to track down this enegmatic and terrifying alien before it can cause any more damage. The invasion from Dyson Alpha continues with dozens of Commonwealth worlds falling to the enemy. The Commonwealth navy fights back with what it believes to be war-winning superweapons, only to find that the alien fleet has been given equally powerful weapons. How the aliens got them and why the weapons are so similar is the question which haunts Admiral Kime. Could it be that the Commonwealth's top-secret defence project has been compromised by the Starflyer's agents, or is the truth even worse? For Mark Vernon, mechanic and general repairman extraordinaire, it appears he's landed on his feet when he finds the perfect job on the most secure world in the Commonwealth. He and his family will never be in danger again now he's helping to build the starships that will evacuate the ultra-rich should the war be lost. Until one day when Nigel Sheldon arrives to ask him a small favour. You don't say no to the man who created the Commonwealth. But the problem with small favours is the way they tend to grow . . . With the war going badly and the Starflyer's treachery threatening the very heart of the Commonwealth, only the alien's destruction can turn the tide. As Paula Myo finally begins to close in on her prey the operation is sabotaged from within. If the nemesis is ever to be beaten Paula will have to work out which of her colleagues is plotting to betray the entire human race. (book description from the official Peter F. Hamilton website.)

The Confederation Universe

• The Night's Dawn
  1. (I haven't read this book, yet) The Reality Dysfunction Part 1: Emergence (Paperback) or (Hardcover edition)

     CURSE OF THE BLESSED Joshua Calvert, owner of the Lady Macbeth, is cursed by his good luck; Ione Saldana, Lord of Ruin, is cursed by her royal birth; colonists trapped on the stinking jungle world Lalonde are cursed by their faith; entire planets are simply cursed . . . And a data chip from a long-extinct alien race, the Laymil, holds the only clue to what the phenomenon is--a force unknown to science, an invasion unknown to history. The Laymil called it "the Reality Dysfunction." But they might have called it Hell . . . (book description)

  2. (I haven't read this book, yet) The Reality Dysfunction Part 2: Expansion (Paperback)

     DOMINOES OF THE DAMNED A bizarre horror leapfrogs across the inhabitid galaxy: an invading force that is part horde, part plague, part nightmare--and part prophecy. A deluge of entities able to possess minds, mutate flesh, warp matter, disrupt energy, and mock both science and faith. But the invaders aren't aliens. The Reality Dysfunction has opened a gate beyond life. And the Damned are pouring through, to conquer space and time. (book description)

  3. (I haven't read this book, yet) The Neutronium Alchemist Part 1: Consolidation (Mass Market Paperback)

     PALACES OF THE POSSESSED War between the living and the dead consumes the Confederation as desperate souls in stolen bodies abduct entire worlds. While Adamists and Edenists ally, a 20th-century crime lord masterminds a conquering army; a seductress lays siege to a sentient habitat as she lures children to their doom; and a satanist's path of horror heads inexorably toward Earth. But amid the devastation, some of the Possessed battle their own kind to save lives. For not all of the damned are evil . . . and heroes, too, are returning from the Beyond. (book description)

  4. (I haven't read this book, yet) The Neutronium Alchemist Part 2: Conflict (Mass Market Paperback) or (Hardcover edition)

     THE ALCHEMY OF REVENGE Seeking vengeance for her people's genocide, Dr. Alkad Mzu escapes Tranquillity to recover her invention, an ultimate weapon called the Alchemist. But why seek revenge if the dead come back? The war of the Possessed has proved that souls are real, eternally suffering in the Beyond, desperate to escape. Across the galaxy, trauma-shocked humans ask, "Why fight an enemy you will become? Why live, die, exist at all?" Alien species have destroyed themselves when faced with the truth of the Reality Dysfunction--and the human race may be next . . . (book description)

  5. (I haven't read this book, yet) The Naked God Part 1: Flight (Paperback) or (Hardcover edition)

     RETREAT OF THE RESURRECTION Faced with an interstellar war in which the only weapon is exorcism, the Confederation dissolves into anarchy. For in a desperate act of triage, a few wealthy worlds prepare to sacrifice the mass of humankind to the risen dead souls from the Beyond. Meanwhile, the Possessed are destroying whole planets as they flee the universe in a transdimensional quest to find Heaven. But there are far worse things than death--or resurrection. And the Possessed are about to discover that chasing paradise is the most horrific, irrevocable mistake they could make . . . (book description)

  6. (I haven't read this book, yet) The Naked God Part 2: Faith (Mass Market Paperback)

     DEUS EX MACHINA On Earth, satanist Quinn Dexter possesses a new army of the damned, using them to initiate The Night's Dawn, the entropic annihilation of all Creation. At the same time Joshua Calvert, master of the Lady Macbeth, seeks a miracle in a haystack: the truth behind a legend that 15,000 years ago the alien Tyrathca intercepted a single message from unexplored space beyond Orion: "IT SEES THE UNIVERSE. IT CONTROLS EVERYTHING. OUR ARRIVAL WOKE IT." Could a God be sleeping somewhere between the stars? And can Joshua possibly find this unknown Deity before The Night's Dawn devours the cosmos? (book description)

• (I haven't read this book, yet) A Second Chance at Eden (Mass Market Paperback)

  (A book of short stories set in the Confederation Universe) Sonnie's Edge The popular sport of 'beastie-baiting' involves contests to the death between artificial monsters controlled through human affinity bonds. Sonnie's team is particularly succesful . . . but then her monster, 'Khanivore', has one special advantage. A Second Chance At Eden Eden is a bitek habitat which orbits Jupiter. Mining the fusion fuel on which Earth is dependant, it is a mini-nation of radical politics--and even more radical technology. Then its creator is murdered in full view of the whole population. But nobody can identify the perpetrator--or the motive. New Days Old Times Settlers came to the planet Nyvan hoping for a lifestyle free from Earthbound hatreds. Alas, environments may change, but not human nature. Candy Buds The crime-lord Laurus rules Kariwak with an iron fist, jealously guarding control of the bitek trade. But when an astonishing new substance appears on the streets, virtual reality takes on an entirely new dimension. Deathday On a desolate planet, a man wages an obsessive campaign of retribution against the last survivor of an alien race. But vengeance can cut both ways. The Lives And Loves Of Tiarella Rosa A passion that spans two generations of women . . . and endures beyond. Escape Route The starship Lady Macbeth encounters a long-abandoned alien spacecraft, with its escape route still intact--but leading where? If the crew claims salvage rights, the technology inside could make them wealthy enough to buy planets. But first they need to make sure it's as empty as it seems . . . (book description)

Greg Mandel

1. (I haven't read this book, yet) Mindstar Rising (Mass Market Paperback) or (Hardcover edition)

   Greg Mandel, late of the Mindstar Battalion, has been many things in his life. Commando. Freedom fighter. Assassin. Now he's a freelance operative with a very special edge: telepathy. In the high-tech, hard-edged world of computer crime, zero-gravity smuggling, and artificial intelligence, Greg Mandel is the man to call when things get rough. But when an elusive saboteur plagues a powerful organization known as Event Horizon, Mandel must cut his way through a maze of corporate intrigue and startling new scientific discoveries. And nothing less than the future is at stake. (book description)

2. (I haven't read this book, yet) A Quantum Murder (Mass Market Paperback) or (Hardcover edition)

   Peter F. Hamilton returns to the future world of Mindstar Rising with an engrossing new adventure of Greg Mandel, a freelance operative whose telepathic abilities give him a crucial edge in the high-tech world of the twenty-first century. Professor Edward Kitchener, a double Nobel laureate researching quantum cosmology for the powerful Event Horizon conglomerate, has been savagely murdered. But was he the victim of industrial espionage, personal revenge, or a crime of passion by one of his handpicked team of live-wire students? Event Horizon needs to know, and fast, so Greg Mandel, PSI-boosted veteran of the infamous Mindstar Battalion, must embark on an urgent investigation that ultimately leads him to an astounding confrontation with a past, which, according to the dead man's theories, might never have happened. (book description)

3. (I haven't read this book, yet) The Nano Flower (Mass Market Paperback) or (Hardcover edition)

   Peter F. Hamilton is one the rising stars of science fiction in the nineties. His epic space adventure, The Reality Dysfunction, was a major international bestseller, while his near future thrillers, Mindstar Rising and A Quantum Murder, introduced an intriguing new hero in the character of Greg Mandel, a freelance operative whose telepathic abilities give him a crucial edge in the high tech world of the twenty-first century. Now Mandel returns in a spectacular new adventure that blows open the possibilities of the next century. Julia Evans: billionairess, owner of Event Horizon, for fifteen years the undisputed power behind the world's economic renaissance. And in trouble. With her computer-genius husband missing and rival companies suddenly claiming to have acquired a technology impossibly superior to anything on Earth, Julia has no time to notice an anonymously delivered flower. But this flower has genes millions of years in advance of terrestrial DNA. Is it a cryptic alien message or a poignant farewell from her husband? Only Greg Mandel can discover its origin, but he is not alone in his desperate search. A vicious mercenary killer, a jade merchant, and a high-priced courtesan all have a part to play. It was never going to be easy, but as Greg and Julia discover, simply being first in the race isn't nearly good enough as the Nano Flower starts to bloom . . . . (book description)