Archform: Beauty - Hardcover

Modesitt, L. E.

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0765304333 ISBN 13: 9780765304339

Publisher: Tor Books, 2002

Synopsis

Most readers recognize L. E. Modesitt, Jr., as the author of a favorite fantasy series, be it The Magic of Recluce or The Spellsong Cycle. It's always a special treat when he turns his hand again to SF and Archform: Beauty is no exception.

Four centuries in the future, the world is rich--nanomachines watch the health of the wealthy and manufacture food and gadgets for everybody--but no Utopia, as we see in the lives of five very different people. A singing teacher suffers for her music and fights bureaucracy and apathy. A news researcher delivers the essential background details but can't help looking deeper and wondering about the real story behind the grim incidents that make the headlines. A police investigator, assigned to study trends, begins to see a truly sinister pattern behind a series of seemingly unrelated crimes and deaths. A politician aids his constituents, fights the good fight, and tries to get reelected without compromising his principles. A ruthless businessman strives to make his family powerful, wealthy, and independent.

Theirs is a society where technology takes care of everyone's basic needs but leaves most people struggling to extract a meaningful life from a world crowded with wonders but empty of commitment and human connection. Alternating the voices and experiences of these five characters in a tour de force of imaginative creation, Modesitt overlaps, combines, and builds their disparate stories into a brilliant tale of future crime and investigation, esthetic challenge and personal triumph. In the same way that he has built fantasy landscapes of surpassing fascination, Modesitt creates a believable future, one imbued with a deep understanding of the way politics works and how people act and react when their sense of themselves, of justice and truth, is exploited by others for power and control. When there's nothing left to need or want, will beauty live on in people's lives or disappear forever? L. E. Modesitt, Jr. asks difficult questions, sets himself unlikely challenges, and once again delivers an absorbing tale that enlightens, entertains, and uplifts all at once.

About this title

About the Author

L. E. Modesitt, Jr., is the best selling author of The Magic of Recluce fantasy series, as well as many other popular fantasy and SF novels. He lives in Cedar City, Utah.

Reviews

Best known for his fantasy fiction (the Saga of Recluce), Modesitt has outdone himself in this highly original SF novel, using future technology to satirize and amplify the gulf that separates science from art. In the 24th century, politics remains much the same, with radical, Islamic fundamentalism still posing a threat. The author rapidly introduces five separate narrators, but since he delineates each with the skill of a latter-day Dickens, the reader doesn't feel overwhelmed. Nor does Modesitt overdo the future slang, which is always clear in context (what was once the United States is now "NorAm"). One of the five narrators, Senator Cannon of the Deseret District, insists on sticking to his principles in seeking re-election. Meanwhile, Lt. Eugene Chiang, who shows how little police work has changed, is investigating the "impossible" suicides of a string of concertgoers. Chiang's engaging exchanges with classical music teacher Cornett illuminate the ways technology can undermine an art form. One is reminded of Arthur C. Clarke's tale "The Ultimate Melody," as Cornett battles to make others appreciate music as art instead of as product. Set against a background of biological terrorism, Modesitt's tale explores social issues (only the rich can afford privacy as well as injections of microscopic, medical robots to stay healthy) sure to resonate with many readers. This brilliant novel is as thought provoking as it is entertaining.
Copyright 2002 Cahners Business Information, Inc.

Trusty fantasy hand Modesitt turns to hard sf--to be specific, nanotechnology--and brings to it the same informed intelligence and occasionally slow pacing that distinguish most of his work. Four hundred years from now, nanotechnology protects the elite and provides clean, safe production for most material needs. But it doesn't eliminate normal human perversity, in either individuals or group relations. When a series of mysterious deaths begins, Modesitt has us see it from the steadily converging viewpoints of a music teacher, a news researcher, a politician (complete with constituents), and an ambitious, ruthless dynastic businessman. Each viewpoint character tells his or her story in the first person, which makes the depiction of the world Modesitt creates exceptionally vivid but the narrative continuum somewhat hard to get into. Ultimately, most readers probably will be absorbed in the book and glad that the ending doesn't preclude further stories in its setting. Roland Green
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

In the 24th century, the health and physical well-being of the world's elite rests in the care of nanomachines. Despite society's apparent progress, social unrest remains a part of everyday life. The latest sf novel by the author of the Recluce fantasy series tells the stories of a music teacher battling new trends in music, a police investigator stumped by a series of unsettling crimes, a news reporter in search of the real story, a businessman bound to succeed regardless of the cost, and a politician attempting to walk a fine line between his agenda and his principles. These disparate tales produce a large-scale portrait of a future that still revolves around human concerns. Simultaneously thoughtful and entertaining, this is a good addition to most sf collections.
Copyright 2002 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.

Chapter 1
 
Vienna, 1824
 
As the last notes of the orchestra fade into oblivion, the audience surges to its feet, the applause thundering across the hall.
The tottering, wild-haired conductor remains facing the orchestra, as if afraid to turn, until the concertmaster, tears streaming down his cheeks, steps forward and takes the conductor's arm, guiding him to face the audience. The conductor finally smiles as he takes in the ovation he can see, but not hear.
But the smile that crosses the creased and pallid face is part joy, part wonder--and part horror that none recognize or sense but the conductor, who is also the composer. Both horror and wonder are lost in the applause that storms across the city, an applause that is darker than the night outside, an applause for music that casts a shadow far wider than any know and for far more years than any could guess.
 
Copyright © 2002 by L. E. Modesitt, Jr.

Edition details

• Publisher: Tor Books
• Publication date: 2002
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0765304333
• ISBN 13: 9780765304339
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 336