Gregory Benford is an accomplished, seasoned writer and as
usual, he offers a treasure trove of fascinating ideas. In this novel, set two
centuries from now, humans have set up a base on the Moon to house a SETI
library whose mission is to decipher and comprehend the many Messages received
from space. As Benford points out, the immense distances involved would almost
certainly mean that these civilizations are now long since extinct. So why
would they broadcast Messages for a future intelligent race to receive? As a
record for posterity, a boast of their prowess, a plea for help? What about the
alien AIs, who have aggressive agendas of their own? Fascinating possibilities
abound!
The story begins when Ruth, a trainee Librarian, is accepted
into the program, her work is to analyze Message texts and eventually converse
with the AIs. She finds her feet in the byzantine hierarchy of the library,
makes friends and discovers romance, and embarks on studying the Messages and
interacting with the alien AIs.
After Ruth’s initial integration into the Library culture
and her first few AI encounters, the book loses much of its forward momentum
and takes on an episodic quality. To be sure, there are occasional references
to earlier events—for example, a present-day alien race seeks her out because
of her role in deflecting an existential threat to Earth, a result of her
bargain with one of those AIs. I kept looking for a sense of rising tension,
the inexorable progression of one crisis building to an even greater one, and not
finding it.
Eventually, I gave up. The book is really long, and I kept
having the experience of beginning again. Information that is usually presented
near the beginning of a novel appeared a third or a half through. This circling
back to “Go” reminded me of television programs of the 1950s and early 1960s,
where episodes could be shown in any order because no matter what happened, all
the characters and pieces ended up right where they started. (In contrast,
programs of the 1970s and later tended to have story arcs that lasted several
episodes, and then Babylon 5 blew them all out of the water with a five
year story arc.) Upon reflection, if the book had been presented as, “These
are the ongoing adventures of Ruth, Librarian to Alien Cultures,” my expectations
would have been more in line with my experience.
All that said, Benford is a highly skilled writer, and many
readers will relish the length and slow build of this novel, as well as the
richness of the ideas.
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