Baxter Stephen 02

Reviews & Overviews by Rod Cameron

Space : Manifold 2 by Stephen Baxter

The second book of the Manifold trilogy, Space also stars Reid Malenfant, together with a female Japanese researcher called Nemoto. She discovers evidence of extra-terrestial life in the Solar system. Namely robot aliens called Gaijin who seem to be e-mailing themselves from star to star. The book considers the Fermi Paradox which states "If aliens existed they would be here already". And sets out to question, why now. Suddenly, inexplicably, wherever they look aliens are destroying worlds. Malenfant sets out in a salvaged antique spacecraft to find out why. In a magnificent travelogue that covers nearly 2000 years, we are shown the galaxy. And ultimately an explanation for the alien destruction.
Again, this book is stuffed full of ideas. It reminded me a bit of Olaf Stapledon's First & Last Men. Well worth reading.

Publisher: Voyager (Harper Collins)
Date: 2000
Pages: 455 pp
Price: £6.99
Format: Paperback
Reviewed by: Rod Cameron
Date Reviewed:October 2001