Note: Many US readers haven’t finished reading The Quiet War as it came out internationally in 2008 but only debuted in the US this year. Some spoilers for The Quiet War may appear in this article.

Paul McAuley‘s new book Gardens of the Sun has started to garner positive reviews as readers approve of the conclusion to the 2008 novel The Quiet War by the British science fiction writer.

The Quiet War focused on the war between different branches of humans who live separately on Earth and on the moons of Jupiter and Saturn, with the latter having genetically modified themselves and moved away from the Earth norm.

According to its blurb, however, that war is over in Gardens of the Sun:

The Quiet War is over. The city states of the moons of Jupiter and Saturn have fallen to the Three Powers Alliance of Greater Brazil, the European Union and the Pacific Community. A century of enlightenment, rational utopianism and exploration of new ways of being human has fallen dark.

Outers are herded into prison camps and forced to collaborate in the systematic plundering of their great archives of scientific and technical knowledge, while Earth’s forces loot their cities, settlements and ships, and plan a final solution to the ‘Outer problem’.

I won’t post the full blurb here as it is a bit spoileriffic. But you can find out more from the website of publisher Pyr, which has also this week posted the new cover for Gardens of the Sun (see above right).

On his blog PunkaDiddle, respected reviewer Adam Roberts praised Gardens of the Sun in late October, although with caveats:

“To be clear: my sense is that The Quiet War/Gardens of the Sun, taken together, is a very major work of contemporary science fiction, amongst the great genre achievements of the noughties, a long novel that will still be being read and remembered fifty years from now.”

And on Amazon.com, A. J. Poulter similarly added positive comments about the book:

“While there is no FTL drive in sight, and robots are just clever, but not intelligent, workers, this novel re-invents optimism in space exploration. It sidesteps the dead end of building another Earth by terraforming Mars, and instead proposes a new goal of colonisation of the entire solar system, and hints at a new type of ‘generation starship’, built around Outer closed eco-system designs.”

Commentary
One thing I must firstly say about Gardens of the Sun is to wonder whether McAuley is aware of Steven Erikson’s heralded fantasy novel Gardens of the Moon, the first book in the Malazan Book of the Fallen series?

I’m currently reading Gardens of the Moon. It would be a very strange event indeed if I happened to be reading both books at the same time, although they have nothing to do with each other :)

Anyway, enough with the silliness.

I was pretty harsh on The Quiet War‘s few chapters when I had a chance to check them out a while back, although I haven’t read the full book yet (although a lot of people have, it was the first book featured by Io9′s book club).

However Roberts’ review in particular made me feel as though it would be a shame to miss out on The Quiet War and Gardens of the Sun, and that the second book does much to correct shortcomings of the first – in fact, he suggests they should be published as one. Perhaps it is time to give The Quiet War a try.

Publisher Pyr Books has released the first three chapters in science fiction writer Paul McAuley‘s new space opera The Quiet War for free on its site.

The book has received mixed reviews since it was first published internationally in late 2008; it appears to be in the throes of being published in the US this month with a new and significantly more interesting cover.

Its blurb states that it is set in the twenty-third century, where Earth has been ravaged by climate change and the moons of Jupiter and Saturn are inhabited by the Outers, descendants of refugees who have escaped from Earth and genertically modified themselves. And of course, the two branches of the human race are edging towards war.

Strange Horizons writes:

“… between the flatness of its narrative and the predictability of its characters, there’s not much to feel passionate about in The Quiet War, and for the first part in a series this may be a fatal flaw … ince the story itself is not much more than enjoyable, I for one don’t feel any compulsion to read the next chapter. I’m not sorry to have read The Quiet War — in fact, on the whole, I’m quite pleased to have done so—but neither will I make an extra effort to seek out its conclusion.”

However, The SF Site praised the book, stating it breaks much of the rules of war novels and is a “vivid” read. UK newspaper The Guardian wrote: “After a slow start, the novel picks up pace to present a future that is wondrous yet marred by human frailty.”

54-year-old McAuley has written quite a few books since his debut, Four Hundred Billion Stars, won the Phillip K. Dick Award in 1988. Since that time, he has picked up several other major science fiction and fantasy awards. Science fiction and futurist site io9 has also picked The Quiet War as the first book in its sci-fi book club.

Commentary
I read the first three chapters of The Quiet War on Pyr’s site and I can’t say I was that impressed.

The first thing that I thought about the book’s opening sections was how much they reminded me of Joe Haldeman‘s military work, found in such books as The Forever War and Forever Peace. You get much of the same attention to detail, strung through with a slightly satirical commentary from the author about the military structures and training he is describing.

But perhaps two things struck me as different.

Firstly, it didn’t seem to me as though McAuley understood the youthful naivity and enthusiasm for war; and it’s associated demons, sex and money, as much as Haldeman does. There’s an honesty and naivity to Haldeman’s characters; thus far it seems as though McAuley’s characters are just pawns in his hands.

Secondly I think Haldeman’s underlying commentary is much more subtle. Anyone could pick up the between-the-lines points that McAuley made in these first three chapters, and in many ways they were just the obvious points to be made about the military.

Can I judge the book after only reading three chapters? Of course not, and you should go and read them for yourselves, as well as the complete reviews, before you make a decision about The Quiet War. But personally I suspect there is a reason the book is being issued in the US with a new, much sexier cover a year after it first came out.

Its reception may have been a little too … quiet.