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The Color Of Distance (1999)

The Color of Distance (1999)

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Genre
Rating
4.22 of 5 Votes: 1
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ISBN
0441006329 (ISBN13: 9780441006328)
Language
English
Publisher
ace

About book The Color Of Distance (1999)

See also my blog review: http://examinedworlds.blogspot.com/20...The depth of world-building and character development in this book is amazing. The style of world-building is different than what you get in Herbert's Dune universe or Tolkien's Middle-Earth. Maybe it would have been nice to get more of a sense of the whole planet or what happened on Earth in the last few hundred years, but the world-building here is more tightly-focused on the main characters and their immediate environment. And it works. I feel almost as if I lived this book rather than read it. There's only one major human character, Juna, and the reader comes to know her well. Most impressively, though, are that you also get to know several alien characters, each with her or his own distinct personality. The first half or so of the book switches POV chapters between the human and the aliens so that the same event is often described from both POVs. This device could have worn thin, but in Thomson's skilled hands it works well right up until the human character becomes more a part of the alien way of life, at which time she, appropriately and artistically enough, intertwines the POVs more. All this world-building and character development take time, however; the only criticism I have is that the book starts to drag a little bit in the middle, but it's still well worth the effort.Philosophically, there's a lot to think about concerning the best way to attain knowledge and to live ethically. Should we abide by abstract rules and sanitized observation (represented here by the Alien Contact rules for engaging with alien life) or should we rely more on lived experience, particular judgments, and direct interaction (represented mainly by the main character, Juna -also a big issue in feminist ethics and philosophy of science)? Along the way, there's plenty of ecology, linguistics, and sociology to consider, not to mention the classic big science fiction theme of encountering the other. On that front, these aliens are plenty different, but still somewhat understandable - they're somewhere between the familiarity of Star Trek aliens and the sheer otherness of Lem's Solaris. All of this makes this book comparable with some of my favorites, especially Octavia Butler and Ursula LeGuin. In the end, this book isn't quite on the same plane as the genius of Butler and LeGuin, but it's definitely in the same direction.

This novel breaks some interesting new ground in the interpretation of how humans will deal with the exploration of other planets. It sets the stage for our not being able to cope with the environments of other worlds, and the issues this would bring - a very different view than the Star Trek concept of "exploring strange new worlds" with no problems or issues. Ms. Thomson also choses to hold the state of the current human condition constant, which adds a tension to the story as well as a realism to the human characters and their situation. She also manages to do so without giving huge amount s of expository detail, leaving the reader imagining what is going on with humanity. Finally, she creates a fascinating alien species that we get to discover and explore all through the lens of a human who to survive must be radically altered by these aliens and in the process discovers much about them and herself. All in all a VERY interesting combination of characters and situations that make for a great Sci-Fi read. The only good/bad (depending on how you view it) thing about the book is that is solely about this human encounter with this species so there is no broad, philosophic theme that gets postulated and resolved. This is just fine as the book sits very well on it own as a fascinating read on the human condition and our view of interacting with each other and world, but if you like Sci-Fi with that big problem that is resolved through the telling of the tale, this book might not be for you.

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One of my pet peeves is a sterotypical first contact story in which the aliens vaguely resemble anthromorpic Earth animals, have limited technology, and are protrayed as 'noble savages'. I tend to dislike any of those things and think that they somewhat harm the story, especially when they come together.This story has all those 'problems', and yet I enjoyed it alot because, quite honestly, it is the single best story of the type I've read in that well travelled path. This is the one by which I think all the others should be judged.Amy Thompson writes very well, manages to keep you engaged in the exploration of the imaginary territory, and pushes alot of the right buttons for me with her invention. In particular, I was readily able to forgive the anthromorpic animal characteristics of the alien species because the tight winding of a very different biology to the ethics of a particular species was so well done. I was readily able to forgive the noble-savages-teaching-the-ethically-challenged civilization-a-lesson-or-two because all the characters, human and alien, were rendered so sympathetically, completely, and unclumsily. The story never veered off for me into angsty preachiness, momentary politics, or bitter rants which you might expect in stories of this sort.Serious sci-fi fans might appreciate comparing and contrasting the Tendu with the Venusians in Heinlein's 'Space Cadet'.
—Matt

I really enjoyed this story. Usually the aliens visit us, this is a story where we visit them. Trapped on an alien planet the heroine must learn and adapt to alien ways. Juna was transformed by the Tendu so she could survive on this distant world. As Juna transforms how much of her humanity remains. Will she make it back to her home? I love books that allows me to picture the world created by the author, to see it in my mind's eye. I enjoyed the strong and memorable characters. I heartily recommend this book.
—Susan

Let me get the negative stuff out of the way first:This book is very episodic in nature, though each episode moves the characters forward in important ways; it moves at a leisurely, almost languid pace. This, in and of itself, is not automatically a negative, but if you're looking for a tightly constructed nail-biter of a plot, you won't find it here.What you WILL find:-- a rich immersion in another world, with both landscape and culture minutely detailed;-- a good mix of characters, alien and h
—Kelley Ceccato

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