The Thing Itself
Dec 2015 · Hachette UK
4.0star
5 reviewsreport
eBook
352
Pages
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About this eBook
Adam Roberts turns his attention to answering the Fermi Paradox with a taut and claustrophobic tale that echoes John Carpenters' The Thing.
Two men while away the days in an Antarctic research station. Tensions between them build as they argue over a love-letter one of them has received. One is practical and open. The other surly, superior and obsessed with reading one book - by the philosopher Kant.
As a storm brews and they lose contact with the outside world they debate Kant, reality and the emptiness of the universe. The come to hate each other, and they learn that they are not alone.
Two men while away the days in an Antarctic research station. Tensions between them build as they argue over a love-letter one of them has received. One is practical and open. The other surly, superior and obsessed with reading one book - by the philosopher Kant.
As a storm brews and they lose contact with the outside world they debate Kant, reality and the emptiness of the universe. The come to hate each other, and they learn that they are not alone.
Ratings and reviews
4.0
5 reviews
Fith Fath
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19 October 2023
Just finished this and my immediate thoughts are there is a good idea and threads of a story in here, but there is also a lot of guff too. The interruptions to the main story arc pull you too far out of the story and are too jarring. If the author had kept the main storyline and expanded on that with the future interlude also giving some context then this would work much better in my opinion.
lari McCauley
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29 April 2019
A background in thinking helped me to get up to speed quickly with the questions posed by the madman at the heart of the story. However, these are questions that powerful interests want answered. What they create for the job has other ideas and novel ways of communication. What follows is part chase thriller, part mediation on the nature of reality itself and an stonkingly good read. Quite unique and very entertaining indeed.
Janne Himanka
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2 May 2017
Parts are interesting, the whole is foggy and lacking a hard core.
About the author
Adam Roberts is commonly described as one of the UK's most important writers of SF. He is the author of numerous novels and literary parodies. He is Professor of 19th Century Literature at Royal Holloway, London University and has written a number of critical works on both SF and 19th Century poetry. He is a contributor to the SF ENCYCLOPEDIA.
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