Greg Egan complains about sloppy reviews of his latest novel:
About half the reviews of Incandescence made at least one of the following false assertions:
- The Splinter orbits a neutron star.
- Rakesh visits the Splinter.
- The relationship between the novel’s two threads is never revealed.
- The reader learns nothing about the Aloof.
The first two errors result from failing to notice that Egan violates a common pattern of First Contact stories: chapters alternate between two sets of characters who would conventionally meet in the end. Odd-numbered chapters of Incandescence are about Rakesh, a human who learns of evidence of DNA life in an unexpected place and follows the trail; even-numbered chapters are about the discovery of general relativity by the inhabitants of the Splinter, an artificial worldlet orbiting a black hole. Rakesh never finds the Splinter; he arrives at another artificial worldlet, with the same origin as the Splinter but orbiting a neutron star. So there is a clear link between the two threads, but it’s at the wrong end.
And unless I missed something the Aloof remain as mysterious as ever, though slightly less aloof than they seemed before.
Two stories in the same universe as Incandescence are online: Riding the Crocodile and Glory (pdf).
The story may not ever mention the term ‘black hole’ (obviously the Splinterites don’t know it). A reader who knows even less about GR than I do might not understand the evidence that it is a BH rather than a neutron star.
I also was left confused by Incandescence and only realized they were two separate worlds when I read Egans review complaints. However I do believe I have the answer for you regarding the Aloof…
SPOILERS AHOY!
The Splinterites ARE the Aloof, in hindsight it’s spelled out at the end of the book, Rakesh makes it pretty clear here:
Page: 290 (hardcover)
‘I think they might be sleepwalking,’ he said. ‘Like your team-mates. I think they’ve done many things, learnt many things, seen many things, but now they’ve had to find a way to live without needing what the world can no longer provide for them’…..’Maybe there are one or two among them who are a bit like you, but a lot less restless.
So basically the same boredom avoidance mechanic the Splinterites have shown. Of course the clearest indication is the comment Haf made regarding a “Wall around the Hub” in the last page. Doesn’t make too much sense until you realize that the Hub is actually the super massive black hole at the center of the galaxy. This is hinted to slightly by Rakesh mentioning it in passing at various points.
Once I clicked on this the book became a lot more satisfying (even if I did skim over 90% of the technical descriptions).
The Aloof are at least descendants of the Splinterites.
But while the Aloof were building the ‘wall’, why didn’t they absorb all their kin, including those Rakesh meets, into their star-spanning culture? Leading Rakesh there might accomplish that, but in a strangely roundabout way.
(I painted the spoilers white for you.) Duh, how did I miss/forget that?
The passage you quote (end of chapter 27) is on page 242 of the Night Shade edition.
Uh oh, white text on white background makes google a sad panda. It thinks that you’re trying to show it one thing (keyword stuffed junk) and your site visitors another (the actual content).
Lowfi solution is to simply move the spoiler into a text file and link to it, hifi solution is to work some jquery magic (http://www.frinity.com/posts/javascript/toggle-div-html-element-using-jquery).
Finally you could simply leave it, hope google forgives you and rue the day I posted my spoiler 😉