The (first) Uplift Trilogy
Just finished the first Uplift Trilogy by David Brin. This was a re-read, but it’s been many years. These books are very addicting and haven’t aged badly at all (they were all written in the 80s, although I didn’t read them until after the 90s, pretty sure).
The central theme is that species (alien or human) ‘uplift’ one another into sentience – often through the help of genetic manipulation. In the humans’s case, we were already doing this with chimpanzees and dolphins when our first starships ran into the far greater (and far, far older) Galactic society. Besides becoming immediately controversial (after all, who was Man’s ‘patron’ species? – all the books speculate on this but never provide any answers) and at risk for invasion/takeover (most of the larger Galactic species had been around for thousands if not millions of years), we did gain a few friends along the way, who are revealed over the span of the three books (Sundiver, Startide Rising and The Uplift War). The uniting principle amongst an otherwise uncertain and often dangerous Five Galaxies galactic society is the Library, which serves as an essential repository of nearly all galactic knowledge over time. Each member race has Branch Libraries on their homeworld and colony planets, where they can both learn from and contribute to the knowledge therein over time.
While there are a few quibbles i’d have with the stories now (for example, the books make a big deal about how the humans disdain using the Library while other Galactics rely far, far too heavily on it – If these societies were really thousands-plus years old, I find it hard to believe it would be quite that simplistic) – for the most part they are an entertaining read, with interesting characters and solid attempts at seeing things from other species’ perspective (especially in the latter two books in the case of dolphins and chimps).
It’s off to the second Uplift ‘Storm’ Trilogy for me now! If you are looking for a great way to read a David Brin book without having to commit to an entire series – his Kiln People (2002) book is a very entertaining, one-book-only read? Enjoy!
candybowl
Tags: 80s, books, malevolence, mythology, sci-fi