Name: The Reality Dysfunction
Rating: 4.116666666666666 (30 reviews)
ISBN: 9780330340328

Peter F. Hamilton

In the 26th century the human race is finally beginning to realize its full potential. But on a primitive colony planet a renegade criminal's chance encounter with an alien entity unleashes the most primal of fears - "the reality dysfunction"

The Reality Dysfunction

Tim Pendry

This blockbuster comes in at 1,225 pages and is only the first part of a trilogy. It is a space opera that morphs into cosmic horror with a religious tinge by way of some passages of soft porn and even an excursion into something damn close to Mills and Boon-style romance. It certainly gets marks for exuberance. Its strength lies in the intensely cinematic writing which manages to be both dense and readable with very plausible accounts of alien worlds, alien species (where Hamilton shows restraint in restricting his canvas) and, so long as one does suspend disbelief somewhat, futurist biotech and hardware. The weakness lies not so much in it being too long (the langours are few and largely limited to the dull almost repetitive sexual athletics of young spacers) but in some of the core assumptions of his universe. Above all, the sheer scale of the proposed human colonisation of space requires a lot more time than his 600 or so years. Similarly the assumptions that Christianity (let alone Islam) will survive as a unified central force for humanity and that planetary colonisation will largely be based on earth ethnicities threaten to turn the novel into fantasy rather than science fiction. It just does not work. The Chinese get a bare mention which is absurd even in 1996. The planetary cultures too show a peculiar conservatism as if humanity, having gone through the traumas of massive technological shift, is going to stabilise into societies that are partial throwbacks to earlier ages in human history - benign monarchies or a 'British' planet run on county set lines or settler pioneers. Part of the plot depends on an evil force exploiting the discontent of the masses so that, on two different planets, we see the most lowly elements in society presented as criminal mobs when it is clear that, in at least one case, the originating mob was made up of ordinary workers fighting for trades union rights and democracy. Hamilton's heroes and heroines are Hamilton's wet dream of an elite of young beautiful people (perhaps he could have called them Thielians today) who pilot space ships through impossible situations, engage in endless free love, trade exotic goods between fellow elites and rule by something like divine right. Of course, their perfect little world of derring-do, privilege and achievement, with a cast of largely benign corporate entities, space pirates and outlaws, sentient lovable space ships and kindly or at least not threatening aliens is challenged by that evil force where everything is done to make it appear extreme and unstoppable. A good versus evil horror story ensues where, sadly, there is too much evidence, despite the author's intention, that this noble perfect elite is perhaps not quite as impressive as it thinks it is when viewed from below. Having said that, Hamilton's 'evil dead' thesis works. It is genuinely disturbing if you give yourself time to think on it. Still, moralism aside, the bulk of the tale is undeniably exciting with all the tropes of space opera thrown in - the docking ships, the bars where the spacers hang out, dog fights between the stars, the bodily strains of flight beyond light speed and hunter and hunted mercenary battles on the planet of Lalonde. If you want to while away the time with a space fantasy and don't bridle at religious themes (which are not over-played despite the prominent role of another literary trope, the whisky priest), then you will should find it enjoyable and it stops with enough loose ends to intrigue us as to how it will play out for another 2,500 pages.

Matthew Royal

** spoiler alert **
           This book initially reminded me of fan-fiction or erotica in its screenplay-like narrative simplicity, and how every scene pushes toward a specific payoff: the protagonist experiencing success. Business success, sexual success, chance successes, validation of his success by rivals, and his hunches always being right on the money and paying off. 


The writing is entirely superficial. No beautiful prose, no thoughtful descriptions, no world that lives on in your mind long after you’ve put away the pages. It’s almost a storyboard for a television miniseries, complete with notes on lighting. Very little of your imagination will be engaged here, except for how much SUCCESS the protagonist is likely to have next.


The male gaze weighs heavily, categorizing every female on the sexiness continuum, and providing a bevy of barely legal girls who “aren’t looking for anything serious” and think middle-age men are extremely attractive. Big subplot conflict: how will protagonist SUCCEED at resolving his pregnancy of conservative client’s unmarried daughter and maintain SUCCESS of business monopoly? The worldview of the author is that people descended from “European stock” are demonstrably superior to all others, demons are real and are responsible for destroying powerful civilizations, and thus Christianity has the ultimate answer to SUCCESS.


The science fiction isn’t great either. It’s not space opera, because there’s no sense of vastness or improving technology. Everything is categorized in simple taxonomies, and cycles of development have all been seen before; there really isn’t anything unknown to the inhabitants of this universe. Hamilton presents no novel technology or concepts.


Would have added this to my DNF shelf except I wanted to see how Hamilton resolved the obvious contradiction of his heavy-handed “God’s Not Dead” and graphic sexual themes. Answer: the protagonist is just a lovable scoundrel.

Cindy Lieberman

A massive book that starts out as a space adventure and becomes a disturbing horror show. But it’s also quite a feat of world building and of tackling the really alien aliens

In a future world where humanity is divided into two radically different groups, the genetically engineered Edenists and the pioneering Adamists, both groups clash on the primitive world of Lalonde. Reprint.

Emergence

Carlo Zottmann

It failed to grip me… it failed to grip me _hard_.

I love PFH's Commonwealth works, but Night's Dawn just doesn't do it for me.

Garren

This is a monster of a book to get through. But it's worth it. It is a great story built in a really interesting world.

The Reality Dysfunction is a modern classic of science fiction, an extraordinary feat of storytelling on a truly epic scale. Space is not the only void. . . In AD 2600 the human race is finally beginning to realize its full potential. Hundreds of colonized planets scattered across the galaxy host a multitude of prosperous and wildly diverse cultures. Genetic engineering has pushed evolution far beyond nature's boundaries, defeating disease and producing extraordinary spaceborn creatures. Huge fleets of sentient trader starships thrive on the wealth created by the industrialization of entire star systems. And throughout inhabited space the Confederation Navy keeps the peace. A true golden age is within our grasp. But now something has gone catastrophically wrong. On a primitive colony planet a renegade criminal's chance encounter with an utterly alien entity unleashes the most primal of all our fears. An extinct race which inhabited the galaxy aeons ago called it "The Reality Dysfunction." It is the nightmare which has prowled beside us since the beginning of history.

The Reality Dysfunction

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