2061 - Arthur C. Clarke

Having read the previous two books in the odyssey series I was expecting more of the same... that is something slightly different and advanced from the previous outing. 2061 Doesn't disapoint in this respect. Clarke has a knack for retaining the same thrilling and mysterious atmosphere and premise of 2001 and 2010 whilst shifting the focus of the story to new characters and new aspects of space travel.

It always amazes me how Clarke makes his narrative so accecable, readable and believable, and his attempts at predicting the advances in communications and technology through his narrative are impressive.

Also what I like about the odyssey series is that each novel is not too long. It seems that since clarke helped make the benchmark for hard sci-fi fiction, novels have been increasing in size to gastronomic proportions, just look at peter f hamilton, kevin j anderson, alistair reynolds and co. Not that these authors don't create masterpieces of their own, but it is nice to read a book that doesnt take too long to read and still deiverse a satisfying, deep and profound story.

Those who enjoyed the first two in the series should enjoy this book. the main themes are as usual with Clarke: humanities stumblings into the solar system, the social and philosophical impact of the presence of other life forms in our universe & human relationships.

Some might argue that the same themes and ideas are being covered in this text, and to a degree this is true, but also we see individual characters, humanity and Clarke's own synthesis of modern scientific thinking develop into an intriguing continuation of the odyssey.