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• Moyen bof

  OK, on retrouve l'ambiance de Spin State. mais que d'imbroglios pour ne mener à rien. Et pourqoi ce parti pris de siteur l'action en Israël. Ca sonne tellement comme une arrière pensée politique actuelle qu'on en vient à ne plus s'intéresser à l'histoire du bouquin, pour ne plus voir que les allusions et les mots d'auteur à grosse ficelle. A la moitié du livre, il m'est tombé des mains.

• Anders als der Vorgänger Spin State, genauso gut

  In Spin Control kommt im Gegensatz zu "Spin State" nicht mehr nur Li's Perspektive zum Einsatz, sondern auch noch die von Arkady und der KI Cohen. Dabei verschaffen besonders Arkady's Parts des Buches einen extrem interessanten Einblick in die Denkvorgänge von jemandem, der von einer Gesellschaft geprägt wurde, in der Homosexualität die Norm und Heterosexualität Abart ist. Das gesamte Konzept der "Syndcates"-Gesellschaft ist sehr modern ausgearbeitet und denkanregend. Aber auch der Plot ist für ein SciFi-Buch mit so dominanten Ideen wie dieses herausragend spannend und treibend. Das Setting in Israel schafft dichte Atmosphäre indem es das uns heute bekannte Lebensgefühl Israels mit einer "kommende Eiszeit Zukunft" verschmilzt. In jeglicher Hinsicht empfehlenswert ist dieses Buch zusammen mit "Spin State" ein sträflich übersehener Genreroman, der einfach abgerundeter ist als der absolute Großteil der Konkurrenz.

• A complex, multi-layered book

  Spin Control is a fascinating and multi-layered novel, set in a time of emergence and change. I've returned to Chris Moriarty's books after almost a decade and I find them even better the second time. Authors like Alistair Reynolds ( Revelation Space ) or Hannu Rajaniemi ( The Fractal Prince ) have deep academic backgrounds in science and mathematics. Chris Moriarty's writing has equal depth in science and scientific ideas, but in her case it seems to be all research for her books. Her plots do not simply parrot the ideas in the articles and books she reads, but reflect thought and synthesis about the ideas and their implications. The plot of the previous book, Spin State, mainly revolved around Catherine Li, a Major in the UN Peacekeeping force, and Cohen, an artificial intelligence (AI) whose foundation was a long dead man named Hyacinth Cohen. As Cohen remarks in Spin State, we cannot always choose who we love, and Cohen loves Catherine Li, whose background makes loving her like embracing a porcupine. As they say, however, porcupines do manage to make love and in Spin Control Catherine Li and Cohen are married, although the union of a large scale distributed intelligence and a human is unusual. Although Catherine Li and Cohen play a part in the plot of Spin Control, the major character is Arkady, who is a post human from the Syndicates, a human offshoot that engineer gene lines of creche raised humanity. The plot is interwoven with flashbacks to a Syndicate expedition to a terraformed planet named Novalis. What is actually found on novalis unfolds throughout the story. Spin State was heavily leavened by quantum physics. Spin Control is more influenced by complexity theory and its reflections in biological systems, like ants. The only plot line that I struggled with in both Spin State and in Spin Control was the implication of AI. AI can expand by adding new capacity and can evolve by reprogramming itself. In David Zindel's Neverness the AIs become silicon gods. But in the Spin books, Cohen is constrained. The emergence of full sentience is a complex and rare thing and, somehow, it can't be expanded into a vast intelligence. At least not in these books. An all powerful "ghost in the machine" would probably create a simplistic plot and this may be the reason that Chris Moriarty has danced around the issue of AI evolution. At one point, Cohen's power is limited and he is unable to control events as I would have expected him to do. But this allows the other human and post human characters to work the issues out. So far Chris Moriarty has written one more science fiction book, Spin Ghost, which I have not read yet, but will read soon. Her most recent books are young adult books ( The Inquisitor's Apprentice and The Watcher in the Shadows ). As someone who loves Chris Moriarty's edgy hard science fiction books, I am somewhat sad that her life may have moved on to another stage. The Spin books are remarkable. But then we can't be hard edged forever. Although William Gibson did produce The Peripheral , which is a pretty edge book, later in life. So I will hope for future adult books by Chris Moriarty.

• Four Stars

  excellent trilogy

• Not for everyone

  This series is not for someone who is at least familiar with the science of using technology to modify our bodies. This book takes it a step farther along. I enjoyed it very much.

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