Rendezvous with Rama

Arthur C. Clarke seems to write stories about things, rather than stories about people. He'll throw in a few dramatic moments, but the narrative viewpoint never stays still, and sometimes goes entirely objective.

The seventies was clearly the decade of the Giant Alien Artifact, with Gateway, Ringworld, Orbitsville, and the rest. Rama is Clarke's contribution. It's a huge and mysterious object that appears in the solar system, plummeting inwards towards the sun, and the book is about humanity's response, and attempts to investigate.

The revelations make sense, and pace of them keeps the story moving along despite the lack of any real connection with the characters. Rama itself is the star, and perhaps that's right, but it does make the book a bit of a patchy read. The human drama seems to be just dropped in, almost at random.

I liked it, though. More, I think, than Fountains of Paradise, which suffered the same problems, and to less of an end. I don't think I'm ever likely to become a huge of Clarke's writing, though. He just doesn't seem to write the kinds of stories I want to hear. I love his ideas, but I'm not so keen on the stories used to display them.

I should also mention that my edition of this book, from the Gollancz Space Opera Collection, has quite possibly my favourite cover of any book I've seen. It's just a simple black-and-white image of cylinder, but I think it looks great.