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is now the middle of the 21st century and, although the original
Earth has all but been destroyed, mankind pushes out into
the farther step worlds. Lobsang has diedor has he? Can an
AI ever really die anyway? In a new form and calling himself,
George, he decides to become a pioneer with a wife, the equally
artificial and rebooted Sister Agnes. They even adopt a child,
but all is not well on the world they settle down on. Other
creatures are out there,?and how do the Next fit into all
this?
As with all the books in this series, there are some cracking
good ideas in here, and not a lot of space to explore all
of them fully. The idea of millions of parallel worlds is
a great idea, food for thought for many, many books or a long
TV series. As with all big ideas condensed down into four
not very long novels, you are going to end up with something
that is rather bitty. As usual, I felt as though I had been
given a nibble of several courses but not allowed to fill
up. Still, this is still a very entertaining novel where we
get to tie up some loose ends, gasp at a hurried conclusion
(presumably this is the final book), and read about Joshua’s
Victorian ancestors. This alone would have filled an enjoyable
series of books, but is merely there to explain about Joshua’s
natural stepping ability. I enjoyed this novel as much as
I did the others, more so in fact than the two middle books,
but ended up wishing there had been more time to explore all
the interesting themes and ideas raised. Maybe it will all
get made into a long TV series., I cannot think of any series
of books more suited to this.
Reviews of other titles in this series
The
Long Earth
The
Long War
The
Long Mars
The
Long Utopia
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