BOOK REVIEW: Vortex by Robert Charles Wilson

Robert Charles Wilson's Spin is one of the great science-fiction reads of the past decade. It is the first book in a trilogy of books with similarly succinct titles such as Axis and Vortex. Unfortunately, the latter books of the trilogy were unable to match the brilliant heights reached by the first book in the series, though they are above average reads and I am glad that I read them.

The world of  Spin is one in which mysterious aliens, dubbed The Hypotheticals, have placed some kind of membrane around the entire planet Earth which causes the stars to disappear from the sky. eventually we discover that time outside of the membrane is passing by at orders of magnitude faster than time on Earth, and that the membrane is also protesting the Earth from the Sun's increased radiation as it accelerates its lifecycle as a star. Spin resonates with the reader because of its amazing premise: One night the stars disappear. How would humanity react? The various characters respond differently but happen to be intimately involved in finding out the cause of the phenomenon (which happens decades after the event).

More amazing events happen,  but the most significant result is the creation of gateways which allow humanity to move from Earth to other planets (which also have Spin membranes surrounding them). Axis, the sequel to Spin takes place primarily on one of these new planets, with characters related to the ones introduced in Spin. Wilson primarily organizes his books around these characters and how they react to the incredible events and circumstances.

One of the main problems is that the characters get progressively less interesting in the later books. For example, in Vortex the main characters are a psychiatrist named Sandra Cole, a police officer named Bose and a mysterious drifter (and patient of Sandra's) named Orrin Mather. These characters are interestingly set in the same time period that the events of Spin occurred in, while simultaneously there is a another storyline which is set more than 10,000 years in the future which involves Turk Findley (a character which appeared in Axis) and another new character named Allison Pearl who may or may not be a figment of the imagination of a character named Freya.

Other people had a more positive reaction to Wilson's characterizations but I think there is universal agreement that neither of the sequels to Spin do not match the unvarnished brilliance of that masterwork. Vortex is probably worth reading if you have already Spin, but if you haven't I would say you could just read Spin and save yourself the disappointment of a lack of a satisfying resolution of all the many issues raised in Spin.

Title: Vortex.
Author: Robert Charles Wilson.
Paperback: 336 pages.
Publisher: Tor.
Date: July 5. 2011.

OVERALL GRADE: B+ (3.33/4.0).


PLOT: B+.
IMAGERY: B+.
IMPACT: B.
WRITING: A-.