Rainbows End: A Novel with One Foot in the Future Mass Market Paperback – April 3, 2007

Ok, I'm a member of the `geek' family - my daily job involves working with computers, both at the programming and the hardware design level. As such, this book should have been great, but I found I was disappointed in it for some rather strange reasons.First is the world Vinge envisions, where almost everyone is plugged into the net on a constant basis via wearable computers with contact lenses for output display, and the world at large has so many contact points and monitors that you can be almost anywhere and still be totally immersed in virtual reality. My problem with this is that it doesn't go far enough! Computers small enough to weave into your clothes are an almost reality now, along with displays that can be part of normal glasses. So there is no great leap here - and in fact, the interface to the computer, how the person can give it commands, I found to be quite clunky, depending on virtual keyboards or interpretations of various body gestures (which apparently involve a fairly steep learning curve on the user's part to get right). Why not computers embedded in the body, with direct connection to the neural system, or at least allow for voice commands?Second is the envisioned response to the dangers of having everything wired to the net and the influence generated data can have on people. I found it difficult to believe that in the time span given, a short twenty years from now, that the U.S. would have put in place a military force with the authority to not only monitor all net traffic and dragoon intelligence analysts from any organization at any time it was felt they were needed, but to take action on a moments notice, without recourse to any high civilian authority, up to and including a nuclear strike against any data source seen to be inimical.Third is the level of software development envisaged. Software has always been the tortoise in speed of improvement, but here Vinge sees it having progressed to where it can compute and display, in real time, a complete visual overlay on the `real' world, and much of its high level programming capable of being done by almost anyone, allowing the user to effectively `live' in whatever fantasy world he desires.The above objections are from the `geek' side of me, all technical. But what of the artistic side? Here Vinge does much better, wrapping a pretty solid story of intrigue and suspense around this future society. The threat is "YGBM" (You Gotta Believe Me), software so insidious it can make the recipient believe whatever the originator wants him to, the ultimate in mind control. When evidence surfaces that someone has actually perfected a form of this, the search is on for who and where. Most of the search is done by a character known only as `Rabbit', a very enigmatic being with obvious echoes from a certain cartoon character, intertwined with the story of Robert Gu, former world class poet who has been rescued from the ills of Alzheimer's by modern medicine, although along the way he seems to have lost that `genius' touch to writing poetryThe main characters are pretty well fleshed out, where their motivations and actions make good sense, and allow the reader to become emotionally involved with them. There are multiple plot twists and threads, all intertwined in such a fashion as to maintain a pretty high level of suspense. In fact, this book might be called a `Future Thriller' - even down to the `will the heroes save the day with the detonation clock ticking down to its last seconds?' scenario.A mixed bag. A good, engaging story; people whose reactions to the envisioned world are plausible and realistic; but some odd technical lapses in the envisioned future that hurts its believability.---Reviewed by Patrick Shepherd (hyperpat)

Perhaps I came to this novel with expectations set too high. I recently discovered Vernor Vinge and devoured a Deepness in the Sky and A Fire Upon the Deep, both of which I highly recommend and will probably read again several times. So learning that Vinge had written something dealing with events closer to our time intrigued me, and I launched into Rainbows End ready to be amazed.This is a good book in many ways, but in comparison with Vinge's other work I found myself disappointed. It is set in the near future and concerns the efforts of an aged poet whose Alzheimer's has just been cured to reintegrate himself into this brave new world. Along the way he becomes an unwitting pawn in a plot by malevolent forces attempting to manipulate public opinion by means of technology.Some of this works on the level of a dramatized extrapolation of where computing might go in the next few decades. Robert Gu, however, is an unlikeable character, spiteful, manipulalative, and bitter at the world. He is a well drawn and I found the sections of the book exploring him and his eventual "redemption" interesting if unpleasant.My problem with the book is that it seemed to try to be several different novels at once and that the parts did not fit together terribly well. As I said earlier one aspect of the book is a look at where the information age is going. Vinge taught computer science near where I live for many years and I found the "prediction" aspect intriguing. The super thriller spy plot involving mind control technology could have been interesting if it had been better explored, and if the other aspects of the book hadn't gotten in the way. However, we get very little information to whet our dread as to what might happen should our hero's fail.But I suppose in a way my biggest disappointment involves the villain. The "bad guy" Alfred Vaz is trying to control the world in order to protect us all. Yet we never really find out anything about him. This struck me as a tremendous missed story opportunity. Most "evil" people believe or have convinced themselves they are acting for the greater good. A story about a good man committing evil acts for what he believes are valid reasons might have been interesting. Especially if we had gotten to know some of the events that shaped him and how he thinks. Instead he is a complete non-entity as far as the story is concerned. In comparison with the Machiavellian manipulations of a Thomas Nau or Lord Steel this aspect of the story is weak.Overall I liked this book, but found it disappointing in comparison with Vinge's other work.

In summary, it's a rich world you can really sink your teeth into with solid character arcs, a sensible if somewhat grandiose plot and it tied off quite nicely at the end.I'd never read Vernor Vinge prior to getting this book so I wasn't sure what to expect but the near-future high-tech world it's set in is fascinating. I loved the idea of the wearable tech projecting an augmented reality straight onto your eyeballs, and little machines providing haptics to make that 'augmented reality' all the more real. That being said the world is not without its holes to pick if you search for them and if you're not familiar with computers you might see a word or concept which is unfamiliar but none of that is vital to the story.Robert starts out as a pretty loathsome character, but I enjoyed exploring the world with him and thought overall he had a fairly solid character arc. All in all, the story is tight and it comes together well.

Much as I have loved Vinge's epics of the past, covering vast swathes of time and/or space, I still enjoyed Rainbows End, a novel set in a credible near future that feels like it might be just around the corner.Vinge builds his world on current concepts, developing them far enough to be interesting, yet remain credible. This sets a grounded stage upon which he tells a story that's really about how there's always a gap between how different generations relate to the technology of the time.The only thing that annoyed me about the novel is that two of the main characters, a father and son, were called Bob and Robert. It took a while for me to get used to which one was which, but maybe that's just me.Worth a read.

I found this book hard to get into at first, but I'm thoroughly enjoying it and will get round to finishing it eventually. It's a very scary thought to think that books may become obsolete in this increasingly technological age, as we should be encouraging people to enjoy the written word in as many formats as possible.

This is the sort of trying to be clever book in the post-hippie era and it didn't work for me at all. Maybe you could see it as a dip into the history of science fiction but even there I think it is a bit marginal.

Some cool concepts but poorly written. I had no idea what was going on past halfway, and I'm speaking as a big fan of science fiction books in general.