Who is aaron evolutionary void

There was no solid answer in his mind other than it was the right place for him to be; he wanted to see who was elected. And the memories. It ought to bother him, he knew—memories were the fundamental core of human identity—yet even that emotion was lacking. But he could live with that; something deep inside him was sure he would solve the mystery of himself eventually. There was no hurry. Toward late afternoon the crowd began to thin out as the announcement remained obstinately unforthcoming.

Aaron could see disappointment on the faces moving past him, a sentiment echoed by the whispers of emotion within the local gaiafield. He opened his mind to the surrounding thoughts, allowing them to wash in through the gateway that the gaiamotes had germinated inside his cerebellum. It was like walking through a fine mist of specters, bestowing the plaza with flickers of unreal color, images of times long gone yet remembered fondly; sounds were muffled, as if experienced through fog.

Gaiafield was for adolescents who considered the multisharing of dreams and emotions to be deep and profound or fanatics like Living Dream. But he was proficient enough with the concept of voluntarily shared thoughts and memories to grasp a coherent sensation from his exposure to the raw minds in the plaza.

To the faithful, the gaiafield was almost identical to the genuine telepathy the citizens of the real Makkathran possessed. Aaron felt their sorrow firsthand as the day began to wind down, with several stronger undercurrents of anger directed at the Cleric Council.

In a society where one shared thoughts and feelings, so the consensus went, an election really should not be so difficult. He also perceived their subliminal wish slithering through the gaiafield: Pilgrimage, the one true hope of the whole movement. Despite the regret gusting around him, Aaron stayed where he was. The sun had fallen almost to the horizon when there was some movement on the broad balcony along the front of the Orchard Palace.

All across the plaza, people suddenly smiled and pointed. There was a gentle yet urgent movement toward the Outer Circle Canal. Security force fields along the side of the water expanded, cushioning those shoved up against the railings as the pressure of bodies increased behind them.

Various news company camera pods zoomed through the air like glitter-black festival balloons, adding to the thrill. Within seconds the mood in the plaza had lifted to fiery anticipation; the gaiafield suddenly crackled with excitement, its intensity rising until Aaron had to withdraw slightly to avoid being deluged by the clashing storms of color and ethereal shouts. The Cleric Council marched solemnly out onto the balcony, fifteen figures wearing full-length scarlet-and-black robes.

In their center was a lone figure whose robe was a dazzling white edged in gold, the hood pulled forward to obscure the face inside.

The dying sun glowed against the soft cloth, creating a nimbus around him. A huge cheer went up from the crowd. Camera pods edged in as close to the balcony as their operators dared; palace force fields rippled in warning, keeping them back. As one, the Cleric Council reached out into the gaiafield with their minds; unisphere access followed swiftly, making the grand announcement available across the Greater Commonwealth to followers and nullifidians alike.

In the middle of the balcony, the white-robed figure reached up and slowly pushed back the hood. Ethan smiled beatifically out across the city and its adulating faithful. There was a kindness about his thin solemn face that suggested he was attuned to all their fears; he sympathized and understood.

Everyone could see the dark bags under his eyes that could come only from the burden of accepting such a terribly high office, of carrying the expectations of every Dreamer. As his face was exposed to the rich sunlight, the cheering down in the plaza increased. Now the other members of the Cleric Council turned toward the new Cleric Conservator and applauded contentedly. He scanned along the faces of the Cleric Council, designating each image with an integral code as the ancillary routines slotted them into macrocellular storage lacunae ready for instant recall.

Later he would study them for any betraying emotion, an indicator of how they had argued and voted. He had not known he had the zoom function, which piqued his curiosity. At his request the secondary thought routines ran a systems check through the macrocellular clusters enriching his nervous system. Exoimages and mental icons unfolded from neutral status to standby in his peripheral vision, lines of shifting iridescence bracketing his natural sight.

The exoimages were all default symbols generated by his u-shadow, the personal interface with the unisphere that instantly would connect him to any of its massive data, communication, entertainment, and commerce functions. All standard stuff. However, the mental icons he examined represented a great deal more than the standard physiological enrichments that Advancer DNA had placed at the disposal of a human body; if he was reading their summaries correctly, he was enriched with some extremely lethal biononic field function weaponry.

I know something else about me, he thought. I have an Advancer heritage. It was hardly a revelation; eighty percent of Greater Commonwealth citizens had had similar modifications sequenced into their DNA thanks to the long-ago genetic visionaries on Far Away. But having biononics as well narrowed the scope fractionally, putting Aaron closer to his true origin. Ethan raised his hands in an appeal for silence. The plaza fell quiet as the faithful held their breath.

Even the babble from the media pack was stilled. A sensation of serenity coupled with steely resolution issued out of the new Cleric Conservator into the gaiafield. Ethan was a man who was sure of his purpose. He showed us the way—nobody can deny that. He showed us where life can be lived and changed until it is perfect, however you choose to define that as an individual.

I believe he showed us this for a reason. This city he built. The devotion he engendered. It was for one purpose: to live the Dream. That is what we will now do.

We have known it in our hearts. You have known it. I have known it. How about that? Your real following is down to one: me. Be a shame to waste them. A couple, the Bodlian white and the Guxley Mountain green, were reputed to have aphrodisiac properties.

Definitely a shame. Especially as there was nothing else to do on board ship. Satisfied the end product was suitably naughty, she stripped off and stepped into the ablution alcove. While she was in the shower the bot also remade a thick wool sweater into a long robe — which was scratchy on her arms, but what the Honious.

Now he hurried to their cabin when she called him, saying something important had happened. Then he stopped, surprised then intrigued by the low lighting and three candles flickering on nearly horizontal surfaces.

The culinary unit might be rubbish at food, but it could still manage wax easily enough. Corrie-Lyn gave him a sultry look, and ordered the door to close behind him. He saw the bottle of Bodlian and two long-stem glasses she was holding in one hand. He smiled and pressed himself up against her while she toned up the mood her gaiamotes were leaking out. Together they undid the belt of the crude robe. Corrie-Lyn kissed him again, the tip of her tongue licking playfully. His finger hooked round it, pulling lightly to measure the strain.

Two hours later Aaron fired a disruptor pulse into their locked cabin door. The malmetal shattered instantly, flinging a cloud of glittering dust into the confined space. Corrie-Lyn and Inigo were having a respite, sprawled over the quilts on the floor.

Secondary routines in his macrocellular clusters activated his integral force field instantly. Corrie-Lyn screamed, crabbing her way back along the floor until she backed into a bulkhead. His cheeks were flushed as he sucked down air, jaw muscles worked hard, clamping his teeth together.

Inigo rose to his feet, standing in front of Corrie-Lyn. He expanded the force field to protect her from direct energy shots, knowing it would ultimately be futile against Aaron. Weird unpleasant sensations surged out of his gaiamotes, making Inigo flinch. It was a torrent of recall from the strange cathedral with the crystal arches, terrified faces flashing past, weapons fire impossibly loud.

Each memory burst triggered a devastating bout of emotion. Even Inigo felt tears trickling down his cheeks as he swung between fright and revulsion and defiance and guilt. What is this? I can feel your mind. Enhancements rippled below his skin, squat black nozzles slid out of the flesh.

Ridiculously he felt exhilarated, this was living, the antithesis of the last few decades. He cursed himself for hiding away rather than facing up to everything the universe could throw at him.

Which was stupid. Somewhere close by dark wings flapped in pursuit. The edge of the cabin began to shimmer away as if the darkness was claiming it molecule by molecule. Aaron flung his head back. He could see her smile now, predatory teeth bared. If not, the whole of this paragraph is going to be a bit of a spoiler. At the end of that second volume, Edeard — the water-walker, prophet character who dominates these books — discovers the ability to turn back time to save himself and his friends.

Rather than a glib power, it becomes a curse. So was this a frustrating experience? After all I have read all these pages and all these words and been disappointed with the result. Surely I'd like my money back actually I got the books from the library, but you take my point. It's true that I wish the ending was stronger and some of the strands of plot more compulsive, but in the main this was smart and interesting science fiction.

Dec 03, Erik rated it liked it Shelves: detailed-review , scififantasy. I really wanted to like this series more than I did. After all, I spent pages or so of my reading time working my way through it! I pondered the exhaustive world-building, all the human types and the political factions, pieces which did ostensibly seem to fit in together. No small feat considering just how BIG the human commonwealth is.

While the answers to these mysteries were lackluster, I still recognize their effectiveness in creating a thrilling plot. In a way, this situation reminds me of being in a relationship and finding myself not loving my partner as much as I used to. I ask myself. Is it the simple fading of novelty? Am I that shallow?

Is that even shallow? Or perhaps something has changed. The universe? All of us? Sometimes this why question can be answered easily. The conscious manifestation of love is just the tiny tip of a giant iceberg of thoughts, chemicals, and societal mechanisms. We see and only understand a minuscule amount of it. Evolutionary Void itself is dramatically back-loaded, which is itself a reflection of the micro structure of the chapters.

They tend to start out rather boring. They then always end with something dramatic, sometimes with a little cliffhanger of a mystery. And of course this little spur of mystery reminds me of all the other mysteries I want to find out about and so I keep reading.

Those storylines are individually dramatic with their own arcs, and characters whose desires are character-centric. Arya wants revenge. Jon Snow loves a wildling woman.

Cersei wants her children to be safe. And so on. Whereas in The Evolutionary Void, each individual storyline really only serves to contribute to the whole. The combined result of this artificial structure and these plot-gear characters is a story whose imagination is undeniable but whose underlying emotional structure proved to be rather hollow.

I find myself thinking that this story could really have had some romance. Which is a strange thought because there IS a lot of romance in it. That really is the best summary I could possibly hope for to describe this trilogy: Sex without romance.

Soulless, passionless sex. A certain sort of pleasure, no doubt about it, but ultimately lacking lasting depth or humanity. I couldn't hold myself back and read the whole thing in nearly a day.

It was so satisfying to see everything fall in place. So many twists and overall great storytelling kept me glued to the book and I hardly could put it down. Peter F. Hamilton is truly a master of the scfi genre and I absolutely love his writing and his ideas. His style is definitely not for everyone, most of the people I read reviews of gave up because the story builds up very slowly. But if you have enough stamina to get thro I couldn't hold myself back and read the whole thing in nearly a day.

But if you have enough stamina to get through these parts a truly epic story awaits you. I'm so happy Peter F. Hamilton decided to return to this universe with yet another trilogy,which will explore Nigel Sheldon's fait,after his departure to another galaxy. The release is a long way away he started writing it early , so in the meantime I will explore more of his books, starting with the Night's Dawn Trilogy, which should even be better than the Commonwealth?

He definitely rekindled my love for scifi! Nov 09, David Rubenstein rated it liked it Shelves: science-fiction. This book is the last of the Void trilogy by Peter Hamilton. The Living Dream movement is sending pilgrimage to the Void, in a fleet of twelve enormous spacecraft.

They intend to enter the Void, and live on the planet Querencia. They learned about the planet from the dreamer, Inigo, who broadcast dreams about Edeard to the whole galaxy.

The problem is that if the Living Dream enters the Void, it will expand and destroy the galaxy. So, a few desperate allies are trying to find a way to prevent th This book is the last of the Void trilogy by Peter Hamilton. So, a few desperate allies are trying to find a way to prevent the pilgrimage from entering the Void.

While the book is exciting, there is just no end to the technology and the craziness. It's as if Hamilton has imagined a galaxy where there are no rules, no limits to the technology and near-fantasy elements. He throws in so many elements that it is very difficult--maybe impossible--to suspend one's disbelief. For example, if you die, you can get a re-life; you can live more than a thousand years.

You can have your own personal spacecraft that can travel many times faster than light. You can have incredible weapons systems at your command--and you can have personal biononics that act as a personal shield and weapons system all wrapped in one. Communications among star systems are instantaneous. Worm holes can move people and entire worlds from one end of the galaxy to the other instantaneously.

And--that's just if you are a human living in our galaxy. If you are an alien, you have other incredible abilities. And, if you live in the void, you might have far-sight, telekinesis, a "third hand", talk to a skylord, walk on water, and reset the flow of time so you can have a "re-do" on your life.

It's just much too much. Where there are no limits, there is no belief. And there is way too much melodrama and too many "drama queens".

View 1 comment. Nov 07, Lee rated it liked it Shelves: science-fiction , epic-science-fiction. I am not going to review this one individually as i didn't write reviews for the other two.

Needless to say, I am still a Hamilton fan. Somewhat, I must admit that Reynolds has moved above Hamilton in my mind for better stories. It has taken me months to listen to this trilogy, there were times where i couldn't wait to listen to moe as I was completely engaged, then there was times where I was drifting off thinking about maybe taking the high street way home instead of the freeway and realising I am not going to review this one individually as i didn't write reviews for the other two.

It has taken me months to listen to this trilogy, there were times where i couldn't wait to listen to moe as I was completely engaged, then there was times where I was drifting off thinking about maybe taking the high street way home instead of the freeway and realising I just missed a big chunk of? Story I guess. This got bogged down a lot in places. Running two different genres in one story was interesting, but at times my brain didn't want to go back to the hard scifi bit, because I sometimes felt I wasn't sure what was actually going on.

The second half of this book really ramped up the story and the excitement, a big convergence, an exciting build up and whoosh, out came the air and the ballon went flat. I was left with "oh, right, that it? Hmmmm, ok Am I glad I read it? YES, will I read it again? NO is it Hamiltons best work? NO, not really.

Jun 05, Sarah rated it it was amazing Shelves: favorites , scifi , read-in It is impossible not to enjoy a series this sprawling, complex, tightly woven and incredibly written. I really don't see any way Peter F. Hamilton can top the Void Trilogy.

This was an absolutely riveting series and I'm kind of sad it's over, and I'm not the kind of reader who gets into really huge, complicated series.

I really liked how well Hamilton tied up all the plot lines. It was quite an achievement. In a way, it's refreshing to see something wrapped up so well in three volumes. Feb 19, Kaila rated it really liked it Shelves: science-fiction , i-own-this , wibbly-wobbly-timey-wimey , buildings-are-people-too , I was gearing up for this book to be 5 stars.

As it went on, though, it became a solid 4 star book with leanings towards 3. The entire galaxy is at stake in this series but it never feels scary. Our heroes start down a path to save everyone, and they never fuck up. Somehow, they keep doing exactly the right thing. Everyone says exactly what they should when they need to sway someone to their side. I mean, one of the main characters was a straight up program, put there in case of doomsday - he I was gearing up for this book to be 5 stars.

I mean, one of the main characters was a straight up program, put there in case of doomsday - he had every contingency in his head already. There were no questions , everything went exactly or almost exactly as planned. I could've done without Gore ex machina. Not to mention, of course, that it is hard to reach a True Death in this universe. Shit goes wrong and your body will be relifed, NBD. That made it hard to truly care. It made for a pat ending that belied the epic scale of the story.

I enjoyed the cast of characters that we know and love from the first two books about the Prime war. Especially Paula Myo - of all the characters, she actually seemed to evolve, and I became quite fond of her. I surprised myself at becoming emotional a few times, such as the scene where view spoiler [the Edeard crew, Macsen, Kanseen, and Dinlay, as well as Kristabel, all went with the Skylord. Growing old with your friends sob.

I also really enjoyed Cat's death and its comparison to Tiger Pansy hide spoiler ]. I loved finally finding out what the hell the Raiel have been up to this whole time, too. High Angel has a purpose, and we know what it is! The first thing I did, though, was go check what other books are set in the Commonwealth Universe.

I really like the place. And lo, there are more! A very satisfying end to an epic page trilogy. Proper review to come later. Everything comes together into the grand finale - and here there should be no more complaints about weak endings, deus-ex-machina and all - and there are enough twists and turns to make one realize what a master storyteller PFH is to get all that done and I do not want to list from the stuff you will find out even in the vaguest detail just not to spoil some of the extraordinary revelations there Most action is Commonwealth oriented though Edeard is still important and we see how he uses the ultimate Void capability revealed in Void 2 to achieve "fulfillment" and why indeed billions want to go there to be "fulfilled" in a relative primitive non-tech society despite virtual immortality and all the goodies of the Commonwealth.

As a small spoiler we meet almost everyone of importance from the Commonwealth saga I really, really do not want to spoil more since this is a book to savor and explore and it raises the Void trilogy and the overall Commonwealth Saga one notch above - I need some time to settle and while I still think Night's dawn would remain my top all time finished sf series because of the characters which are just awesome there, this one will probably become 2 and is just mind-blowing sf at its best and a prime example of why sf is alive and kicking Again it's early but The Evolutionary Void just catapulted into my top sf of the year by far and it will be a top 3 overall novel, possibly overall 1 too.

While I have read the earlier volumes at least 2 times each, I have not reread them in almost a year and a half, but I remembered easily the most important stuff and I had no problem getting immersed in this one Executive Summary: A good, but not great conclusion to a good, but not great trilogy.

Audio book: I really like John Lee, especially for these Commonwealth books. Another excellent job here. Full Review I think this book wraps things up pretty nicely, but I didn't quite enjoy this one as much as The Temporal Void.

That book heavily revolved around Edeard's story, which is really more fantasy than sci-fi and I found very enjoyable. But I guess I grew tired of it, because those parts s Executive Summary: A good, but not great conclusion to a good, but not great trilogy. But I guess I grew tired of it, because those parts seemed to drag a lot more in this one. It could be that once Mr. Hamilton tied all the stories together in the last book, I just wanted things to move ahead to a conclusion, and it felt like it was taking too long to get there.

There is a bit more convergence in this one, and characters like the delivery man, who felt completely extraneous in the first two books finally mattered. Sort of. Most of the other characters are great, and especially like the ones from the original series. I thought Gore Burnelli was especially great.

His snark is excellent. And of course Paula is one of my favorites as well. Overall I enjoyed this book, though I didn't enjoy this series nearly as much as I did the Commonwealth Duology.

That said, I'm looking forward to checking out his newest Commonwealth book in the near future. Jan 20, Zaphoddent rated it did not like it. I finished this only because I'd already invested so much time in the earlier books. Edeard's story just gets more tiresome and mundane the deeper you get. In fact it becomes positively idiotic.

It feels like a complete regression into some archaic world where people have 'evolved' into some medieval culture complete with inane conversations. Worse still, is the fact that there is no character development for anyone except Edeard in the void. They are just a bunch of appendages without any opini I finished this only because I'd already invested so much time in the earlier books.

They are just a bunch of appendages without any opinions of there own. They sound like 3 year olds and that's quite a feat for folks in their twenties. Plus, the imbecility of time travel becomes apparent here. As soon as he meets any kind of adversary he resets time.