n the first manned mission to Mars, pilot Wilson Klime irks the mission commander by overriding the automatic computer programs and taking over the controls to land the spacecraft on his own. Upon touchdown, Klime smirks to himself, "And I made it happen, not some goddamn machine." But even more irksome is that amidst all the NASA pomp and circumstance of the landing ceremony, the crew learns that they aren't the first humans on the planet after all. In fact, they're being laughed at by a cocky long-haired dude in a cheap space suit that looks like something out of a 1950s movie.
Nigel Sheldon and his partner Ozzie Isaac have invented a wormhole technology that allows instant planet jumping, thereby taking all the drudgery and expense, if not the romance, out of space travel. In one stroke, they've eliminated the need for the NASA bureaucracy. And their invention sets them up to head a family-based oligarchy that will rule commercial and political transactions for years to come and that, thanks to life-extension technologies that provide virtual immortality, they will also be able to head for aeons to come.
By the 24th century, humanity has expanded extensively through the cosmos, making planet jumps through a trainlike system that passes through one wormhole to the next. Though a few alien species are encountered, notably the elflike and enigmatic Silfen, for the most part humanity continues to expand into the cosmos unhindered. But then astronomer Dudley Bose (whose first name reflects his personality) witnesses a seemingly impossible envelopment of the Dyson Alpha planetary system by some kind of artificial shielding system, an event repeated at the sister star Dyson Beta. This anomaly, requiring a civilization of immense technical advancement far beyond human capability to power up such a containment, not only launches Bose out of a mediocre academic career, but launches an interstellar spaceship piloted by none other than Wilson Klime to investigate.
In wanting to know whether this unknown civilization represents threat or opportunity, the mission unwittingly unleashes, as the title suggests, a catastrophic series of events. The only question remaining is, who is responsible?
An epic journey with a considerable cast
This summation, however, doesn't begin to do justice to the multiple plotlines, characters and complications that underpin this massive narrative. It takes some 200 pages before a single character reappears. Almost 700 pages later, yet another new character is still being added (in this case, Carys Panther, an author of "long slightly fantastical sagas" that fulfill the public appetite for escapist entertainment; along with the opening chapter, this represents one of the too-few successful stabs at humor).
Hamilton's gigantic yarn also includes a detective genetically bred to solve crimes who is constitutionally incapable of telling a lie or letting a lawbreaker off (which includes turning in her own parents), frustrated in a centuries-long hunt to break up a terrorist ring; The Guardians of Selfhood, a cult devoted to resisting an alien intelligence that most doubt actually exists; an aspiring journalist who uses her feminine gifts to acquire information and dupe subjects into embarrassing interviews; a love affair between the daughter of a powerful ruling family and a naive Guardian adherent that threatens both their positions; a world settled by people seeking a simpler life away from dependence on dehumanizing and ecologically harmful technologies that becomes the first beachhead for military action; and a stealthy murderer with uncertain agenda and loyalties. To name just a few details.
The larger themes here encompass human existence in thrall to technology and business interests, the power of dynastic families and corporations behind a seeming democracy that actually dictates the course of political decisions, the expansion of a military-industrial complex, the threat of terrorism arising among people who feel repressed for their way of life or ideologies and how government can best deal with that threat, and whether humankind has any real business sticking its nose out into the universe.
In other words, the 24th century isn't all that much different than the current one.
All of this is just the setup for Judas Unleashed, due out some time in 2005. Here's hoping someone thinks to provide a comprehensive summary in that book, which itself might run 100 pages, because it's going to be hard to remember everything that was going on. Still, it's a fun read.
