Children of Ruin

Children of Time was a difficult act to follow, for its originality in both story and structure, but this one manages to pull it off. Highly recommended, can't wait for the final installment.

If you liked the first one, you’ll love this one even more

Not as good as the original, but still very good!

I loved the first book so much, and this one was also great. It’s a lot to take in at times, but I couldn’t put it down. The ending seemed just a bit rushed, but I can sort of understand why. Definitely worth the time investment.

A great read. Tchaikovsky is a master story craftsman. I look forward to the next installment and more of the same

Octopodes

Very "techncal" with a lot of bouncing between factions and story lines.I loved "Chrildren of Time". So I'll read more of Adrian's work.

It really goes beyond "ordinary" imagination. Who can immagine all these races...and write a readable story from this bad at all.

There's nothing wrong with the story, it's handling of the truly 'alien mind set' is interesting and the action pieces are well handled. It's steady if somewhat predictable sequel. My issues are in the writing and structure of the novel - the editor needed to be firmer with the writer. It's verbose, there's way too much meandering and character self introspection and there a complete section of the book, some 60 pages of social backstory leading to an event that could have been dealt with in 10 pages. These issues brought a tedium to reading which I had to fight in order to finish the novel. Not a patch on the first book in the series.

I'll try not to rant on too long with this one, but this sequel irritated me so much I feel compelled to write a review in the hope that it puts off at least one person from reading this drawn out exercise in frustration!So, I loved the first one, yes it was a little slow in parts and the ending was over too quickly, but overall it was a fun book to read, and I liked the effort the author went to with the descriptions of Portiid society including the spider-centric figures of speech etc. I enjoyed the first book so much I immediately downloaded the sequel and started reading. Okay, what do we have here, another human ship just before the disaster, good start (there's a huge range of great books which could be written from this starting point). What's that, the main character is experimenting with octopuses, octopii, squid things, and and also the uplift virus from the first book.... good, I can see where this is going. But then it quickly starts to suck, it's just far too drawn out, and infuriatingly it keeps jumping back and forth in time for no reason except to draw it out as much as possible. There are just whole chapters full of nothing but filler - you can tell where the plot is going and you are almost shouting at the book trying to get it to hurry up and get there but it just meanders on with irrelevant detail and skipping back in forth in time and perspective. There are some interesting ideas surrounding water dwelling creatures making spacecraft, but apart from that this this book is an underwhelming sequel. Avoid.

Some of you may know that Children of Time is one of my absolute favourite novels. I love the incredible scope, storytelling, and world that Tchaikovsky captures on the page. Children of Ruin is a fantastic sequel that expands on everything that made the first book great, all while serving a compelling and gorgeous story.Children of Ruin expands well on the story initially told in Children of Time, but still manages to hold onto the things I loved from the first book. I can go on and on about how brilliant the storytelling in Children of Time is, as well as the incredibly intricate way he manages to show an entire culture evolving from primal hunters to a space-faring society. I absolutely loved the way that the spiders were presented and how they evolved in the first book, and was so worried that we wouldn’t get anything as interesting in Children of Ruin. However, he manages to show a similar evolution of a non-human society that doesn’t feel like a rehashing of the Portiid society. I loved the way life was explored, expanded on, and evolved on both Nod and Damascus. I loved that this book had so many horror elements to it. I loved the way the Portiids and humans interacted not only among themselves, but toward a new species. I loved the backstory of the terraformers. Basically, I just loved this book.We get a good mix of our favourite Portiid descendants — Fabian, Portia, and Bianca — as well as human descendants of the Gilgamesh’s crew. It was so interesting to see how humans and Portiids are still getting to know each other and adjusting to each other’s customs, despite the generations between first contact and their present situation. Seeing them, particularly Helena and Portia, attempt to communicate with each other and with the the new species was just fabulous.If you liked Children of Time, I really think you’ll enjoy Children of Ruin. Although it feels a lot like the first book in terms of general plot and story structure, Children of Ruin introduces so many new elements and continues to expand and explore familiar themes. Children of ruin combines elements of creeping horror with some of my favourite science fiction tropes — space exploration and first contact. Throw in a healthy dose of linguistics, and you have this absolutely brilliant book.

Gloriously imagined, intricately plotted, relatable characters on a breathtaking scale. Children of Ruin goes on a similar thousand-plus-year journey to Children of Time with some of the familiar characters from the first book, and a couple of newcomers.The story unrolls like a tide, flicking back and forth between two time periods, mixing classic horror/sci fi, linguistics tropes in the vein of Arrival, more insight into the twisted mind of Dr Avrana Kern from the first book, and a unique take on a whole new species. It weaves together four different perspectives seamlessly, but that split focus means it doesn't quite have the same impact as Children of Time, or as devastating an ending, but nothing ever will. It doesn't matter - Children of Ruin is a masterpiece. I read it over a weekend and immediately went back to read Children of Time again.

What a great sequel. I absolutely loved it. The depth of this authors imagination is impressive and the worldbuilding is exceptional. I was completely taken aback by the mollusc civilisation and how it reflected its culture. Wonderful character development of all the main characters of the book. Considering you had the humans, spiders, octopus and the new cellular level memory virus with the newly emerging AI's working together, keeping them all independent and their goals and aspirations clear was remarkable.I also enjoyed the subtle nod to the ship naming in the Culture novels. When the ship names first appeared the smile that spread across my face was like greeting an old friend. I miss Iain M. Banks so much!I have a sneaky feeling that Adrian Tchaikovsky is slowly fulfilling my Culture novel hunger.