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Vernor Vinge

A Fire Upon The Deep (Zones of Thought, 1) Paperback – May 5, 2020

by Vernor Vinge (Author)

1,351 ratings

Book 1 of 3: Zones of Thought (Qeng Ho)

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Now in a new trade paperback edition for the Tor Essentials line, A Fire Upon the Deep is sure to bring a new generation of SF fans to Vinge's award-winning works.

A Hugo Award-winning Novel!

“Vinge is one of the best visionary writers of SF today.”-David Brin

Thousands of years in the future, humanity is no longer alone in a universe where a mind's potential is determined by its location in space, from superintelligent entities in the Transcend, to the limited minds of the Unthinking Depths, where only simple creatures, and technology, can function. Nobody knows what strange force partitioned space into these "regions of thought," but when the warring Straumli realm use an ancient Transcendent artifact as a weapon, they unwittingly unleash an awesome power that destroys thousands of worlds and enslaves all natural and artificial intelligence.

Fleeing this galactic threat, Ravna crash lands on a strange world with a ship-hold full of cryogenically frozen children, the only survivors from a destroyed space-lab. They are taken captive by the Tines, an alien race with a harsh medieval culture, and used as pawns in a ruthless power struggle.

Tor books by Vernor Vinge

Zones of Thought Series
A Fire Upon The Deep
A Deepness In The Sky
The Children of The Sky

Realtime/Bobble Series
The Peace War
Marooned in Realtime

Other Novels
The Witling
Tatja Grimm's World
Rainbows End

Collections
Collected Stories of Vernor Vinge
True Names

Print length

448 pages
Language

English
Publisher

Tor Books
Publication date

May 5, 2020
Dimensions

6.21 x 1.25 x 9.34 inches
ISBN-10

1250237750
ISBN-13

978-1250237750
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Editorial Reviews

Review

“Against a background depicting a space-time continuum stratified into 'zones of thought,' the author has created a rarity―a unique blend of hard science, high drama, and superb storytelling.” ―Library Journal

“A tale that burns with the brazen energy of the best space operas of the golden age. Vinge has created a galaxy for the readers of the '90s to believe in...immense, ancient, athrum with data webs, dotted with wonders.” ―John Clute, Interzone

“Vast, riveting, far-future saga...The overall concept astonishes; the aliens are developed with memorable skill and insight, the plot twists and turns with unputdownable tension. A masterpiece of universe building.” ―Kirkus Reviews

“Fiercely original...Compelling ideas in the book include problems and advantages of group mind, galactic communications turbidity, and the prospect of civilizations aspiring to godhood.” ―Stewart Brand, founder of the Whole Earth Catalog

About the Author

Vernor Vinge is the multi Hugo Award-winning author of A Fire Upon the Deep, A Deepness in the Sky, and Rainbow’s End. Known for his rigorous hard-science approach to his science fiction, he became an iconic figure among cybernetic scientists with the publication in 1981 of his novella "True Names," which is considered a seminal, visionary work of Internet fiction. His many books also include Marooned in Realtime and The Peace War.

Born in Waukesha, Wisconsin and raised in Central Michigan, Vinge is the son of geographers. Fascinated by science and particularly computers from an early age, he has a Ph.D. in computer science, and taught mathematics and computer science at San Diego State University for thirty years. He has gained a great deal of attention both here and abroad for his theory of the coming machine intelligence Singularity. Sought widely as a speaker to both business and scientific groups, he lives in San Diego, California.

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Product details

Publisher ‏ : ‎ Tor Books (May 5, 2020)
Language ‏ : ‎ English
Paperback ‏ : ‎ 448 pages
ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 1250237750
ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-1250237750
Item Weight ‏ : ‎ 1 pounds
Dimensions ‏ : ‎ 6.21 x 1.25 x 9.34 inches

Best Sellers Rank: #320,811 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
- #1,807 in Hard Science Fiction (Books)
- #2,586 in Exploration Science Fiction
- #3,916 in First Contact Science Fiction (Books)

Customer Reviews:
1,351 ratings

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Vernor Vinge

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Vernor Steffen Vinge (Listeni/ˈvɜːrnər ˈvɪndʒiː/; born October 2, 1944) is a retired San Diego State University (SDSU) Professor of Mathematics, computer scientist, and science fiction author. He is best known for his Hugo Award-winning novels and novellas A Fire Upon the Deep (1992), A Deepness in the Sky (1999), Rainbows End (2006), Fast Times at Fairmont High (2002), and The Cookie Monster (2004), as well as for his 1984 novel The Peace War and his 1993 essay "The Coming Technological Singularity", in which he argues that the creation of superhuman artificial intelligence will mark the point at which "the human era will be ended", such that no current models of reality are sufficient to predict beyond it.

Bio from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia. Photo by Raul654, Maarten1980, Zanaq (Eigen werk Self-made, Image:Vernor Vinge.jpg) [GFDL (http://www.gnu.org/copyleft/fdl.html) or CC-BY-SA-3.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/)], via Wikimedia Commons.

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science writer

THIS won a Hugo?

Reviewed in the United States on November 8, 2018

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A science fiction story has to hang together–not in every detail or plot point, but enough to create a convincing scenario. This book fails that test.

1. The main "alien" world in this book is medieval England–with dogs. It's divided into city-states replete with castles, dungeons, balconies, scrolls, tables, cabinets, bows and arrows. (Uh, don't bows and arrows require...fingers?) There are spies, assassins, artists apprentices–even a Queen, a council, and a Lord Chamberlain. This is Earth 2.0. I was hoping for something more inventive.

2. When I say dogs, I don't mean German Shepherds. These aliens are tiny--some are menacing and villainous. Others are as cute and cuddly as teddy bears. There are vicious wolves that the author compares to gerbils. The cute and ominous work against each other.

3. And the cute little dogs aren't the only silly aliens. We also have villainous butterflies. Then there are the Skroderiders, who seem to be intelligent potted plants on wheels. The author came up with gimmicky names for the hive-mind dogs–so we end up with Peregrine Wickwrackrun, and other polysyllabic monstrosities. I feel sorry for the poor soul who had to read this for the audio version.

4. Speaking of the language...What's a sophont? What's an agrav? My eyes glazed over. Too much excessive jargon, too few orienting details, and often insufficient explanation to help the reader visualize the action. Here are a couple of examples:

"Cricketsong is a synthetic race created as a jape/experiment/instrument by the High Willow upon its Transcendence."

Or...

"Saint Rihndell had a small harbor about sixteen million klicks around the RIP system. The move was even plausible, for it happened that there was a Skroderider terrane in the Harmonious Repose system–and currently it was just a few hundred kilometers from Rihndell's second harbor.They would rendezvous with the tusk-legs, exchanging repairs for two hundred seventeen flamed trellises. And if the trellises were perfectly matched, Rihndell promised to throw in an agrav refit."

You can sort of, kinda get what the author means–but trying to wade through page after page of this is worse than reading a manual on tractor hyperdrive repair.

5. And we also have missteps with characterization:

"After a long period of normal progress, Jefri had come back with a counterplan. It consisted of a complete reworking of the tables for the accoustic interface."

Who is Jefri?

This kid Jefri is eight years old (though his canine sidekick is a budding Stephen Hawking). But do you know any eight-year-old kid who thinks like that?

6. I'll just add that there are better stories out there. For an example of an outlandish, but somehow believable, sci-fi novel read CHILDREN OF TIME. If you like dogs with your sci-fi, I also recommend CITY by Clifford D. Simak and David W. Wixon--an older book but nicely written.

92 people found this helpful

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Darrel D Felty

This Guy Is a Genius!

Reviewed in the United States on January 4, 2019

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I loved everything about this book! The originality of ideas is so welcome. It has been a long time since reading such a well-paced story. All the characters are unique and continued to draw me in. The plot is extremely well crafted, every page leads us deeper into an exciting story. The details are vibrant, making you feel like you are there!
One detail is special- most authors fall over themselves when it comes to a rational description of time. How long is a day in space when humanity has filled the galaxy? How long is a week? A month? A year? All relate to the time it takes Earth to orbit the sun. Vinge solves this problem by having a base of seconds- Ksecs is 1000 secs, Msecs is a million secs, etc. A second is constant, based on oscillations of a certain element, which is the same everywhere, in space or on any planet. Ingenious! (I do not know if he created the idea, but this is the first book I have seen to use the definition. Bravo!)
The plot involves a grand sweep of history, covering many thousands of human years, and billions of years for the villian. The future-descriptions are seamless and easily understandable. I was at home with this story!

I TOTALLY recommend that you read this, it is an awesome read!

13 people found this helpful

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Jon S. Woodson

Adventures in a Truly Vast Cosmos

Reviewed in the United States on May 9, 2016

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This unusual tale is highly entertaining and intellectually challenging. I greatly enjoyed the degree to which I was thrown off base by the authentic strangeness of the aliens and the immeasurable scale of the cosmic background. The universe of "A Fire Upon the Deep" is complex and is developed in good detail. Instead of a lot of exposition, the reader finds out how the universe works by virtue of the rules that the characters have to face up to through exciting action. As they get into more and more difficulties, the reader comes to understand why things are happening; it's also as though the reader is experiencing the complexities of the strange and inhuman cosmos at first hand: much more effective than just being told that this is the way it is. Lots of good lyrical passages, clear description, and a story that moves along but still manages to engage the emotions.

9 people found this helpful

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oniony

Adventurous work of sci-fi

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on April 4, 2019

Verified Purchase

It took me a while to get into this book as I'm not a fan of fantasy and it felt more fantasy than sci-fi to begin with, though this changed as I persisted. I also struggle a lot with authors that use a bunch of book- (or world-) specific words that have not been well defined, as this author does. Finally I also struggle to follow when there are more than a handful of characters and this book had a ton of characters.

But I'm glad I persisted as the world described has a huge amount of variety and is truly immersive in a way I've not really come across before. You really do feel like you start to understand this huge universe of different cultures, people and aliens that are all existing, trading and fighting their way through the millienia even as more powerful intelligences carry on in planes of existence beyond our level of intelligence. And then you're whipped down to specific worlds where you follow individual characters as they live their more mundane lives and fight their own microscopic battles amongst their own people. And then it all somehow all comes together as the story reaches its climax and conclusion. It's truly an impressive work.

I've now started the prequel which describes some events earlier in the history of this universe.

5 people found this helpful

sft

A smoulder in the middle

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on December 29, 2021

Verified Purchase

3/5 • There’s no question that this book contains some remarkable ideas; that’s where its strengths lie. The Zones of Thought concept is fascinating and the creation of the Tines is a notable feat. I was looking forward to these ideas being fleshed out in an interesting way, but this is where Vinge only partially delivers. This is “space opera”, which is traditionally grand in scale, and the story arc that relates to our heroes’ quest to save the galaxy is big and brassy and full of daring-do. The parallel arc that takes place on the Tines’ world is less expansive and full of murky characters bent on misdeeds. So far so good. However, I found the mid-third of this novel to be quite heavy-going. The events taking place on the Tines’ world were far less engaging than those taking place out amongst the stars and much of this mid-section felt drawn-out and padded. I found the behaviour of the “two-legs” to be unconvincing and had difficulty sympathizing with them. Some of this may be due to Vinge’s writing style, which is reminiscent of space operas written 50 years earlier. Frankly, his prose is quite crude and it actually made me cringe at times. Unfortunately this influenced the way I feel about this book – Vinge’s writing doesn’t do justice to his ideas, which is a shame.

Matt

An impressive piece of writing

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on December 5, 2021

Verified Purchase

This is a large book and I was a bit apprehensive about reading it. I was worried that there would be too much going on, too many characters and I'd just get a bit lost. Thankfully this wasn't the case. The plot is actually quite straightforward and and the majority of the book focuses on just a few sets of characters. I think the main thing that will divide readers is the pace. Whilst there are a number of epic, well thought out and exciting set pieces there's also a fair amount of exposition which slows things down quite considerably. About two thirds of the way through I began to worry that the ending might be a bit underwhelming and that I'd be disappointed after putting in so much time reading the story. Thankfully the ending is very satisfying. I understand that there's a prequel and a sequel and whilst I've got a stack of books to get through beforehand, I wouldn't rule out checking them out in the not too distant future.

Adam

Brilliant

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on February 9, 2021

Verified Purchase

This was written in 1992, how is it possible that I have never discovered it before.
I love Peter F Hamilton books and I struggle to find anything as good but I enjoyed this as much as those.
I struggled to get my head around the main race (the Tines) and once I understood the concept, I reread some chapters again, so that they made more sense.
Great characters, great story. I'm going to find another book by Vernor Vinge
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4 people found this helpful

Mattoshi

Amazing story but this version needs proofing.

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on May 16, 2021

Verified Purchase

A genuine classic that I’ve already read twice. I’m not so impressed with this print of it though - What immediately stood out was a typo - on the back cover! Clearly no one ran a spell checker before doing the layout. Bad boy sci-fi Masterworks, BAD boy..!

Aside from the basic errors made by the publisher this book is great, galaxy spanning space opera at its very best and unlike most of the novels released these days it tells a complete self contained story without being split into 6 or more parts.

One person found this helpful

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