Customer Reviews
A flawed masterpiece - but still a masterpiece - By: John N. L. Morrison, 23 Apr 2003 
Both the previous reviews are right - SITGM is endlessly recomplicated, with a cast of what seems like thousands (a list of characters would help no end), lots of coincidences to keep the plot going & more need of a map than any book I can recall (imagine The Lord of the Rings without one...).
But... It's an absolutely gripping read which I was saving for a long-distance air flight but found I had half-finished before taking off. McMullen knows his science (the "calculor" is an inspired concept) & the questionable bits such as "the call" are well enough integrated to suspend disbelief. Unlike many books, the characters actually change & develop over time, though the abrupt switch of one key player from goody to baddy is never explained - if, like Charles Sheffield, McMullen were to rewrite his books for later editions, this should be a top priority.
But enough of the carping. Compared to the over-hyped Alistair McLeod, SITGM shows McMullen to be capable of developing a good old-style hard SF saga setin an area he knows & loves. It would be churlish to give it anything less than 5 stars.
Oh, by the way, if you see thisin a bookstore, read the page-and-a-half prologue to provide a taste of the book. If that grabs you, buy it from wherever. I'm getting the two sequels right now.
Great Ideas and Worldbuilding, Weak Plotting and Characters - By: A. Ross, 09 Oct 2002 
Almost every problem I have with science fiction is representedin this sprawling book—a ton of really interesting ideas poorly served by a rambling & disjointed plot populated by too many hastily drawn characters. I had greatly enjoyed McMullen's earlier book, The Centurion's Empire & was hoping he'd be able to exercise the same control he showedin that book, but this was a bit of a disappointment.
The worldbuilding is quite impressive. Set almost two millennia from now, the world is still recovering from a nuclear winter. In Australia a low-tech civilization putters along, with power restingin the hands of librarians. A new head overlibrarian is elected & brings change, as she ruthlessly builds "The Calculator", a primitive computer using imprisoned people as circuits, & extends a series of communication towers across the various fiefdoms & emirates. The initial exploration of this is quite interesting, but as the overlibrarian's power grows, McMullen starts adding more & more storylines to the mix.
It seems that an ancient sunshade being formed by nanotechnology is threatening to block out the sun & initiate a new Ice Age, unless the overlibrarian can do something. Then there's the barbarian horde being mustered by one of her former protégés—for reasons that are never really clear to me, other than the need to have a big warin the book. Then there's the mysterious force that sweeps across the land intermittently, causing all who aren't tied down to walk due south forever. Then there's a whole genetics subplot. Not to mention an awfully confusing series of romances & affairs, you really do need a scorecard to keep track of everyone.
The ideas are all individually really interesting, it's just that there are too many of them at once & the characters are too flimsy to carry them. Coincidence comes into play all too often, as characters are constantly running into each other, & too many of them are cast from the same obsessive mold & act altogether arbitrarily. It doesn't help that there are abrupt leaps of timein the middle of chapters, out of nowhere will pop up the declaration that five years has passed, for example. Also, the book is badlyin need of a map. Geography is an integral part of the plot, & without a map to clarify things, the reader is often literally lost.
I salute the McMullen's imagination for ideas, but this book is just too long & haphazard to properly enjoy. I doubt I'll be seeking out it's sequels, The Miocene Arrow & Eyes of the Calculor.
a top notch story with appealing characters - By: , 18 Aug 1999 This book grabs you right away & keeps on going. The combination of excellent storyline & character developement is all too uncommon. What really amazed me was the way Mcmullen was able to switch from one main character to another. The last fourth of the book seemed to lose direction a little bit & did not live up the the rest of the book. Nontheless, this is really not a major flaw. McMullen has joined the very short list of authors whose books I will continue to buyin hardback>
