Scan barcode
apryde6226's review against another edition
4.0
This is one of those unsung stories that I discovered by accident. The covers come across as "cartoonish" but they story is bigger than that. Imagine if you break the speed of light, you're brought the the "Arena." A place so vast that "Spheres" that are thousands of kilometers represent solar systems and each of these likely has a population of aliens. The Arena provides instantaneous translation, so it becomes a place where Challenges become the currency.
pjonsson's review
5.0
This was a pleasant surprise indeed. This is one of those books that left me with a WOW that was great feeling after the last page.
I had never really heard about this author nor about this book before. I stumbled on it because one of my favorite authors that I follow posted an image of a space ship on Facecrap with a suggestion that if you hadn’t read Grand Central Arena you should do so.
I’m really glad that I did.
This books is a mix of old grandiose science fiction from the 30’s and 40’s (and I mean that in a good way) where worlds, stars and galaxies collide, hard science fiction and a bit of fantasy. I would say it is really difficult to pull off such a mix but in this book it works.
As the blurb states humanity is about to undertake their first faster than light voyage. Already when the author describes the world of humanity it is a world quite far from present day. Then things go … weird. From there on the world building is nothing less than amazing, bordering on the insane.
Luckily Ariane Austin and the rest of the crew is up to the challenge. This book is a lot of exploration where the crew explores their new and strange environment and make a shitload of first contacts. There are a lot of mysteries to solve and they have to learn as they go. Friends are not always what they seem (heck, some of the humans are not what they seem) and this huge new world have strange rules both in terms of physics and in terms of how to interact with other races in it.
The biggest mystery is of course what is the arena really and who built it? The construct is so amazingly huge that some believe it is built by Gods, some do not seem to care and others… well read the book to find out.
I said that the story was a mix of several things like science as well as fantasy. That is how it felt while reading the book but it is not really clear cut. I could also argue that the fantasy elements falls in the realm of the famous “any sufficiently advanced technology will appear like magic” statement. I’m quite interested in seing where the author goes with all of this.
As the book cover implies there’s of course action in the story as well. It’s not called Grand Central Arena for nothing. Not to spoil things too much but let’s just say that the humans upstarts do pull some surprises out of their hats.
I really liked this book. It is very well written. The characters are very good, on both sides of the good versus bad divider although on which side of that divider someone resides is not at all obvious a lot of the time. The framing of the story and the world in which it takes place is nothing short of amazing.
It is a big book as well, weighing in a close to 700 pages. It is not the most fast paced book I have read but it never felt slow either.
Needless to say the second book in the series is already in my pipeline.
I had never really heard about this author nor about this book before. I stumbled on it because one of my favorite authors that I follow posted an image of a space ship on Facecrap with a suggestion that if you hadn’t read Grand Central Arena you should do so.
I’m really glad that I did.
This books is a mix of old grandiose science fiction from the 30’s and 40’s (and I mean that in a good way) where worlds, stars and galaxies collide, hard science fiction and a bit of fantasy. I would say it is really difficult to pull off such a mix but in this book it works.
As the blurb states humanity is about to undertake their first faster than light voyage. Already when the author describes the world of humanity it is a world quite far from present day. Then things go … weird. From there on the world building is nothing less than amazing, bordering on the insane.
Luckily Ariane Austin and the rest of the crew is up to the challenge. This book is a lot of exploration where the crew explores their new and strange environment and make a shitload of first contacts. There are a lot of mysteries to solve and they have to learn as they go. Friends are not always what they seem (heck, some of the humans are not what they seem) and this huge new world have strange rules both in terms of physics and in terms of how to interact with other races in it.
The biggest mystery is of course what is the arena really and who built it? The construct is so amazingly huge that some believe it is built by Gods, some do not seem to care and others… well read the book to find out.
I said that the story was a mix of several things like science as well as fantasy. That is how it felt while reading the book but it is not really clear cut. I could also argue that the fantasy elements falls in the realm of the famous “any sufficiently advanced technology will appear like magic” statement. I’m quite interested in seing where the author goes with all of this.
As the book cover implies there’s of course action in the story as well. It’s not called Grand Central Arena for nothing. Not to spoil things too much but let’s just say that the humans upstarts do pull some surprises out of their hats.
I really liked this book. It is very well written. The characters are very good, on both sides of the good versus bad divider although on which side of that divider someone resides is not at all obvious a lot of the time. The framing of the story and the world in which it takes place is nothing short of amazing.
It is a big book as well, weighing in a close to 700 pages. It is not the most fast paced book I have read but it never felt slow either.
Needless to say the second book in the series is already in my pipeline.
mugsandpugs's review
4.0
- Where I first heard of it: Sursum Ursa's Review
- Where I (legally) downloaded it (for free): Baen Books
"My survival is not my body, Amas-Garao. My survival is my freedom. I do what I will, because I will it."
Golly, this one took me a long, long time to finish. I've been working on it in fits and starts since last year.
When I first tried to read this, it barely held my attention. That's at least partially my bad: in a world where you can speed youtube videos and audiobooks up, my attention span grows shorter by the day. I just didn't have it in me to tolerate page upon page of tech description and elaborate world-building.
I put it away as a 'did-not-finish', until I saw how cheap it was to add an audio-reader and gave it another chance. When I was between audiobooks, I'd listen to it while driving. Eventually, EVENTUALLY the story started to interest me, but it took a good long while.
I didn't find the characters memorable: I would now have a hard time naming them or telling you many distinct traits about them. Normally I'd see that as a Big Problem. After all, good characters can carry a bad story, but a good story can't carry bad characters.
However, in this one circumstance, I think that worked in the story’s favor. These were not BAD characters; just bland. And that's fine, because they serve as a tiny percentage of the world who literally represent humanity as a whole. They CAN be painted in such broad strokes for that reason alone.
To quote my good friend, "the quality of sci-fi is directly proportional to the number of different alien species depicted."
(And not just 'slap some paint on humans and call them aliens', but truly ALIEN aliens; with their own cultures and ecosystems and biologies that actually make sense based on the context of their planets… I can forgive some flat human characters for being our doorways into this world, because I was honestly fascinated to learn more and more about the alien characters. The tech didn’t really much interest me (sorry; I’m just not into that stuff), but that was alright.
I haven’t decided whether or not to continue the series yet.
- Where I (legally) downloaded it (for free): Baen Books
"My survival is not my body, Amas-Garao. My survival is my freedom. I do what I will, because I will it."
Golly, this one took me a long, long time to finish. I've been working on it in fits and starts since last year.
When I first tried to read this, it barely held my attention. That's at least partially my bad: in a world where you can speed youtube videos and audiobooks up, my attention span grows shorter by the day. I just didn't have it in me to tolerate page upon page of tech description and elaborate world-building.
I put it away as a 'did-not-finish', until I saw how cheap it was to add an audio-reader and gave it another chance. When I was between audiobooks, I'd listen to it while driving. Eventually, EVENTUALLY the story started to interest me, but it took a good long while.
I didn't find the characters memorable: I would now have a hard time naming them or telling you many distinct traits about them. Normally I'd see that as a Big Problem. After all, good characters can carry a bad story, but a good story can't carry bad characters.
However, in this one circumstance, I think that worked in the story’s favor. These were not BAD characters; just bland. And that's fine, because they serve as a tiny percentage of the world who literally represent humanity as a whole. They CAN be painted in such broad strokes for that reason alone.
To quote my good friend, "the quality of sci-fi is directly proportional to the number of different alien species depicted."
(And not just 'slap some paint on humans and call them aliens', but truly ALIEN aliens; with their own cultures and ecosystems and biologies that actually make sense based on the context of their planets… I can forgive some flat human characters for being our doorways into this world, because I was honestly fascinated to learn more and more about the alien characters. The tech didn’t really much interest me (sorry; I’m just not into that stuff), but that was alright.
I haven’t decided whether or not to continue the series yet.
kejadlen's review
4.0
A pulpy, fun read. Really wish more of the bigger questions were answered, though. Was also hoping that humanity had evolved to be 'lucky', like Teela Brown in the Ringworld series.
windchime79's review against another edition
4.0
A grand sci-fi adventure in the spirit of the 'golden age' of sci fi to which it pays homage. I especially encourage any fans of E.E. 'Doc' Smith to give it a try. A very fun read with plenty of thrills and spills. I'm a big fan of Ryk Spoor's novels, and this latest was no exception.
depressedlaughter's review
I made it this far into the book with eight characters I don't care about and whose dialogue is more stilted than a reality tv show about a circus troupe. The writing style is infuriatingly neglectful of actual important details
kil3yp's review
4.0
Why did this book take me so long to finish? I mean yes, it's a little on the long side, but it was unique, very good, and immensely enjoyable while throwing in some challenges to the thought process (I absolutely cannot wrap my head around how the Arena is laid out, but I think that might be the point).
Really looking forward to continuing in this series, although it does stand alone quite well. Fantastic cast of characters, well recommended!
Really looking forward to continuing in this series, although it does stand alone quite well. Fantastic cast of characters, well recommended!
More...