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Title: Cauldron Author: Jack McDevitt Rating: Not available Avg. Score: 3 Submit Comment Hits: 26

Review of Cauldron

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Comments for Cauldron

• Posted on 2008-06-12
  Is this all there is?? What a disappointing end (?) to the series.
  
  Through five books in the saga of Priscilla Hutchins and the Academy of Science, Jack McDevitt has created an interesting view of man's exploration of the near galaxy and its discovery that it is nearly alone and all civilizations seem ultimately doomed.
  
  The first book, The Engines of God, was a near flawless piece of archaeological space opera that took a lowly superluminal captain and thrust her into the discovery of a lifetime in regards to why civilization throughout the galactic region fail. Couple this book with the next two in the series, Deepsix and Omega, and McDevitt had delivered a well crafted trilogy that ultimately presented a fresh idea to the creation galaxy wide constructs that destroyed civilization: galactic-sized art.
  
  Then the series went on. Though Chindi was received with mixed reactions, I personally liked it and found it an interesting story that expanded the mystery this universe. Even Odyssey wasn't half bad of an idea about a enigmatic and advanced species saving us from our selves if poorly executed and mostly boring.
  
  But, if Cauldron is the conclusion to this series, then it might be evidence that science fiction is doomed. Cauldron is basically a rip off of Star Trek V: The Should-Have Been Forgotten Frontier! The promise of a new, faster superluminal propulsion system promises to open up the galaxy to humans and possible answer a few unanswered questions in the series along the way: two of which are prominent in the series - the origin of the Omega Clouds and where did the Chindi come from.
  
  Where to start on why this book fails at everything? (some spoilers ahead, but since you shouldn't read this book, I am actually helping) First, and foremost, is that it is BORING. The testing of the new engines provides no real hard science payoff; and the makers of the Chindi? Let's just call them Mr. Potato Heads with NO purpose whatsoever in this story as they are a stagnant, boring, "lifeless" civilization that can't travel in space and barely remembers launching the thing. Then so what?
  
  And then there is a stop at a planet that was the first radio source found by Hutchins' father at the SETI program. Has this ever been mentioned before? I can't remember it and it feels like something hastily made up to give them one more (short and pointless) stop on the way to the center the galaxy and the source of the Omega Clouds.
  
  The most interesting stop is at a black hole theorized to exist, but without observable evidence from Earth. But even this interlude is not enough to even carry a portion of the book.
  
  And finally, in the last 60 pages of the book (series!), we finally confront the creator of the Omega Clouds. Let's just repeat: This book is ultimately a knock off of Star Trek V. The final explanation? I won't spoil this, but if you choose not to read the book, then remember: STAR TREK V!!!
  
  Cauldron has turned a once great series deserving of the shelf space in my library into whatever I can get for in trade at the local used bookshop.
  
  >>>>>>><<<<<<<
  
  A Guide to my Book Rating System:
  
  1 star = The wood pulp would have been better utilized as toilet paper.
  2 stars = Don't bother, clean your bathroom instead.
  3 stars = Wasn't a waste of time, but it was time wasted.
  4 stars = Good book, but not life altering.
  5 stars = This book changed my world in at least some small way.
  Score: 2
• Posted on 2008-05-23
  you are no arthur clarke
  
  i got this book from the library because on the cover, there was a plaudit that this author has taken the mantle of sir arthur clarke. nonsense. this book is boring. the charachters ridiculous. the story is well there is no story.
  Score: 1
• Posted on 2008-04-07
  Jack -- HOW COULD YOU?
  
  As the finale of the "Engines of God" series, this book is the anti-climax to end all anti-climaxes. "The Engines of God" was just about perfect: excitingly paced, with a wonderful, complex mystery at its heart. Huge, brilliant ideas were presented in an extremely readable way. It was so good, I read the entire thing out loud to my spouse.
  
  Warning: spoilers ahead... not that it really matters.
  
  As the series continued in later books, we got a few side trips and red herrings, but the galaxy-spanning mystery was still magnificent and seemed to only grow deeper and richer the more we learned. When at last, Hutch offers her theory for the mystery's origin -- objects d'art from a hyper-advanced race -- I was blown away. I loved this idea and it had my imagination buzzing for weeks. THE SERIES SHOULD HAVE ENDED HERE.
  
  But... then we got an utterly pointless rip-off of Rendezvous With Rama ("Chindi") and an equally pointless detour to visit the Moonriders, which went nowhere.
  
  And now... Cauldron. What a turkey, and what a massively bungled way to end the series.
  
  Where to even begin?
  * The first two-thirds of the book are excruciatingly boring. Hutch is old, and space travel is on the ropes. Got it. Why wasn't this dealt with in a single chapter, instead of hundreds of pages?
  * Despite all this time for character drawing, by the end of the book, I realized all of the non-Hutch characters shared roughly the same face in my mind's eye. The only thing that distinguishes one character from another is their name. Also, it's 500 years in the future and everybody is still named Jon and Rudy and so on?
  * The serial mysteries that are described in the final third of the book are just silly. There's a race of cartoon creatures who act like Keystone Cops and live forever. There's an abandoned planet that has the remains of a civilization -- normally fertile ground for Mr. McDevitt's tales -- that turns out to be pointless and one of the characters dies there. Whatever. The "lighthouse" near a black hole is interesting, but takes up only a few pages. What's up with throwing a great idea away like that?
  * The mystery of the omega clouds is revealed to be... drumroll please... THE MONSTER FROM STAR TREK V???? What???? Let me get this straight: this thing can breathe vacuum, it can generate hyper-advanced nanotech at will, it can instantly communicate with an alien species, it has lived for millions of years, but it can't pull itself out of a ditch? Why not? If it's simply the gravity of the galactic center holding it in place, why can the human ships navigate it so easily?
  * Why does the animal have eyes? If it can build the clouds and a replica of a human ship in an instant, what use would it have with the visual spectrum?
  * Why is it so stupid?
  * It already had its hands on their ship -- what more did it need to copy their design?
  * At first, they can only communicate with it through sign language, which sets up all sorts of interesting challenges, but then it speaks to them in English. Cop-out! And what's up with these alien races being able to speak perfect English, like the Moonriders? This is lazy!
  * How is it possible the monster is unaware of other life forms in the galaxy? From this series alone, we've learned of about a dozen or so in a relatively small volume of space.
  * Most important of all: what happened to the sense of awe and wonder? I got the sense that Mr. McDevitt just couldn't care less about this book, and that is devastating to me. Why put love into a pointless knock-off like "Chindi" and leave just a handful of pages here for resolving one of the great mysteries in the last few decades of speculative fiction?
  
  Why? Why?
  Score: 1
• Posted on 2008-03-27
  For McDevitt fans and those who can't get enough space exploration adventure
  
  Jack McDevitt finally reveals the origins of the mysterious Omega Clouds, first introduced in "The Engines of God and explored further in "Omega." "Omega" promised answers, but all it really told the reader was what the Omega Clouds did, a little about their technology, and some further exploration of past races wiped out by encounters with the right-angle hating storms.
  
  McDevitt fulfills the promise of explanations in "Cauldron," although like most of the great mysteries that McDevitt likes to pepper into his sci-fi novels, the answer is not as intriguing as the question. The real meat of the story here is his tale of a future human race that has the ability to navigate among the stars, but is quickly losing the interest. Much like the modern day space program the technology is amazing, but it has little practical use. At the opening of the novel the only people still interested in traversing the stars are tour groups to Alpha Centauri.
  
  Unfortunately, McDevitt never really explores the implications or the solutions to such a state. He provides a miracle technology which allows the human race to go farther and faster than the previous hyperspace technology, but at the end of the novel they've explored deeper into the cosmos than anyone in his sci-fi universe and still haven't found anyone worth talking to.
  
  That's not to say it's a bad novel. McDevitt's strength is at writing adventures in the shadow of a great mystery, and the adventures here are thrilling and memorable. He has more of his trademarked alien ruins and derelict space ships, and the story is gripping as long as danger is looming. Even the finale, while lacking in what I think should be a considerable amount of awe, is exciting. This feels like the last of McDevitt's Hutchins books, and it does have a conclusion to her story. It's been fun to watch Hutch age over the course of these novels in a way that few fictional characters are allowed to, and McDevitt allows her to go out with any melodramatic indignities.
  
  McDevitt never does well when it comes time to shine a light into the dark corners he creates in his narratives. In Eternity Road he tossed off the explanation in a single sentance, without any further comment. Here, he gives it a bit more heft, but it still left me with a feeling of "that's it?" The mystery of the Omega Clouds was drawn out over 3 novels, and referenced in the background of at least 2 others, but the final revelation just seems a let down. Frustratingly, McDevitt also feels the need to tie up a couple other mysteries from his Hutchins series, and these again were more interesting as mysteries than as solutions.
  
  I don't want to spoil it, but I will say that McDevitt seems to have attempted to answer not only his own mystery, but one of the great rhetorical questions of Star Trek history. He does have an answer, but it boggles my mind much more upon contemplation than it did when reading it.
  
  However, aside from the unsatisfying mystery, the novel has plenty of adventure and space opera-esque thrills. Like all McDevitt books, as long as the biggest mystery answered is how to escape from the monster, it more than delivers.
  Score: 3
• Posted on 2008-03-01
  Voyage to the Core
  
  Cauldron (2007) is the sixth SF novel in the Hutch series, following Odyssey. In the previous volume, the Moonriders destroyed the Origins project. After the incident, Priscilla Hutchins forced her boss to resign and then retired from the Academy.
  
  In this novel, Hutch returned to the Academy when her children were grown, but retired again just before the Department of Technological Development absorbed its remains. The Department is gradually winding down the government space effort. The only ongoing spatial exploration is being conducted by the Prometheus Foundation.
  
  Hutch still lectures on her experiences as well as the history of space exploration. Although many believe that space investigations should be left to the next generation, there is still enough interest to keep her busy giving presentations.
  
  The Prometheus Foundation currently has only two ships. The Jenkins is investigating an Omega cloud when it finds a 1.2 billion years old derelict. The cloud has veered aside to destroy the object, so two of the scientists on the Jenkins board the derelict to discover as much as possible. But they stay too long in the artifact.
  
  The scientists return from the derelict at the last minute and the Jenkins barely gets away before the cloud destroys the artifact. The main engines of the ship fail during the escape and are beyond repair. The crew and passengers have to be rescued by another vessel.
  
  Now the only remaining ship owned by the Foundation is the Phyllis Preston. Prometheus is raising funds to buy another ship, but interest in space exploration is waning. Hutch attends the fundraiser and has an unusual encounter with Jon Silvestri, a physicist who worked with Henry Barber on the Locarno drive.
  
  The current Hazeltine stardrive has limits that preclude exploration of the galactic center and other far off features. The Locarno drive seems to promise much greater range, but it hasn't yet worked properly. Since the death of Barber, Silvestri has continued to tinker with the drive and believes that it is ready for further space trials.
  
  In this story, Hutch continues to be involved with the Locarno space trials. Although the initial test is unsuccessful, subsequent efforts show the feasibility of this approach. Eventually, the Prometheus Foundation funds a two ship voyage to the galactic core.
  
  Matt Darwin is a former Academy starpilot who is now selling real estate. While he is very successful in his sales, Matt just can't shake the desire to return to space. He is instrumental in the first successful tests of the Locarno stardrive and is chosen as a pilot for the trip to the galactic core. Hutch becomes the starpilot of the second ship.
  
  The galactic core is selected as the ultimate destination of the voyage because of the omega clouds. Backtracking the paths of many clouds point to the Mordecai Zone as the origin of these civilization killing objects. Since the drive transitions have limits, the planners also select several intermediate destinations.
  
  This story takes the expedition to several features that have puzzled astronomers for some time. One of the intermediate visits is to Sigma 2711, the origin of the only SETI transmission received on Earth. The director of the project then -- Jason Hutchins -- was Hutch's father.
  
  One plot element in this series has been overdone. Once again, Hutch gives in to a fervent request to explore the planet and someone dies in the field. Although the explorers are willing to take their chances, only Hutch realizes the risks they will face. She alone knows that the unexpected is most likely to kill them, but she lets them go anyway.
  
  Recommended for McDevitt fans and for anyone else who enjoys tales of galactic exploration, extraterrestrial planets, and intrepid explorers.
  
  -Arthur W. Jordin
  Score: 4