Rolling Thunder

I was looking forward to reading this title after having enjoyed the previous two titles in the series so much. Unfortunately I was somewhat disapointed with the whole book. I found it difficult to get into the viewpoint of a young woman telling the story and basically whining and complaining through the first half. The book undulates, rather than rolls and there is very little thunder. Maybe in the crash scene but that is about it. So many great ideas, from the black spheres, to compressors, even the creatures on the Jovian moon are not fleshed out. There are too many long passages giving mind numbing details about minor aspects of Jovian moons and other solar bodies. The action and adventure that made the first two such a rollicking ride are missing. The new character is far less interesting and even the original ones are played down. Its obvious that there is a fourth book planned but I will probably not be along for the ride.

This third book in the series continues the saga of an intertwined martian family. The story moves quickly between Earth, Mars, and the moons of Jupiter. John Varley spins a tale that makes this book hard to set down. One can only hope that the story will continue rolling on.

Kinda slow through much of the book with character development - then non-stop action. Stick with it for a good read.

The Good: The writing style is terrific. It feels human, it adds to characters, and is brilliant in its direction of the point of view. The Bad: Lazy story craft and characterization. Its a major turn off in a science fiction series to be presented with characters in the future that continually refer to present day themes and seem to identify with an age far before when the story takes place. Its a character driven novel, and Varley handles characters very well; I just found the continual references to anything and everything 20th century to be distracting to the point of pulling me out of the story. Takes a bit too much pleasure in its references to 20th century popular culture and other works of that time period to be a serious piece of science fiction, and suffers mightily for it.

had other books from this series

Loved the book and the series. Wish there were more books in the series.

I used to be a big John Varley fan, but am now pretty disappointed. Some of the older books are very good, and its obvious he greatly amires Heinlein. Personally, I dont understand the infatuation with RH, as the guy writes the same stories over and over, but what the heck, Im sure there are some good reasons, and the guy is practically a god in the sci-fi pantheon. The protagnist is an 18 year old cadet in the Martian Navy. Only shes 18 going on about 40 in her understanding of the world. Seriously, if human 18 year olds were this worldly and understanding that would be truly amzing. So while this is hard sci-fi, and that by definition stretches the bounds of practicality, it seems that only the Garcia-Strickland and Broussard clans are born of such stock, and the remainder of humanity is much more average (or worse - there are some good parts like when Poddy discourages a vapid Earthie from emmigrating to Mars). There are also some parts, especially towards the end of the book where it looks like Varley just got tired of writing or something. There are several plot lines or story arcs that end more or less abruptly, and he just sums up what happened. This is the kind of stuff I expect in excessively complicated stories (Robert Jordan), or very long movies. But an average length paperback? What happened there? Did he run into some kind of deadline from an advance or contract? Varleys books are definitely written for adults, complete with adult language, themes, sex, violence, and all the details you can imagine. For the most part I regards this as a good thing because so much of life and civilization is not rated PG-13. I wouldnt call this the worst ever or even a waste of money, but John Varley has written some *much* better novels and short stories than Rolling Thunder.

Not finished reading it, but am looking forward to returning to it.

Varley is perhaps not at his strongest here, given his virtuosity in the Titan series, but he nevertheless provides an entertaining space romp with some unusual and truly engaging characters. There are enough plot kinks to keep you interested in our heroines fate (with the unlikely name of Podkayne), and the end run heads us off to a feel-good launch ramp for the next novel (surely theres another in the writing as we speak....) After a long hiatus between this and his Titan series, Im delighted to see Mr. Varley is back in the saddle. I give it 4 stars for decent characterization, continued use of ingenious gadgetry developed in a prior novel, a reasonably complex plot, and for not taking itself too seriously. All in all, a worthy, happy read.

I have now finished reading the story of the Garcia-Strickland family. And it was pretty good. Not great, however. I liked the twist abouth how this generation of Garcias ended up in a space career, but I sometimes wonder at the likelihood of such a person being able to accomplish so much in such a major crisis. IOW, this book stamped finished to the storyline, but left me somewhat unsatisfied. Red Thunder was the kind of book which grabbed the reader by the throat and refused to let go until the reader reached the last page. Red Lightning, while less aggressive, carried on the storyline and clearly was a logical extension of what happened in RT. Rolling Thunder, however... Dont get me wrong. John Varley is an excellent writer. And his ability to create believable characters and realistic dialog are well-honed. By and large, his plot carried itself well. Its just that things were proceeding along right up until... And its that until which, in my opinion, doomed Rolling Thunder to decent and adequate status rather than superb and excellent conclusion. He chose at one point to have a character - if you can call an alien life form which no one can communicate with character - do something which totally changes the tone of the book from space adventure to end-of-humanity suspense. It would be fine if there were a Bruce Willis character, who, with his team of plucky oil-rig workers, came out and put paid to the threat, but Varley let the E-O-H crisis continue unabated. Im not saying that all crises in real life end on a happy note, but given the general upbeat, we can solve this if we put our minds to it, approach of books one and two, the were gonna slink off with our tails between our legs finish simply didnt end the series right.