The Life of the World to Come
category: space opera, author:Kage Baker
book 4 of the Company novelsoriginal copyright 2004,
read in February 2011
Agamedes' opinion: 7 out of 10
This is a Boys Own adventure. A space opera set largely on Earth, though at many different eras. Time travel as a replacement for sailing off to adventure on the Spanish Main...It would be nice, though, if the book reached a conclusion.
This is the first and possibly the last Company novel that I have read. It seems that the world -- and all of time -- is ruled by a super-secret, all-powerful organisation. (Though it misses other requirements to be a "thriller".) Since The Company now exists and has always existed, even time travel cannot wipe it out. The only hope is a mysterious future time beyond which no-one can travel.
Meanwhile, we get the life story of the hero and a brief meeting with the heroine.
It seems -- from references in this novel -- that the heroine has met several previous incarnations of the hero. How this could have happened is made quite clear in this book. Perhaps it was glossed over in previous books...
The current hero incarnation is born in the "present", a few centuries ahead of now. And I must say that I enjoy the cynical attitude to the future: a future that is extremely safe, extremely politically correct and extremely boring.
Anyway. The hero comes into his own -- fights for freedom and revenge, steals a timeship, has twenty-four hour sex with the heroine, attempts to save Mars but gains guilt instead, discovers his past persona... You know, all the usual stuff. And he is now living just a few years before the mysterious we-don't-know-what-happened block into the future. With a fair chance that he -- the hero -- will create that block as he saves the world from The Company...
And the book ends.
Okay, no real surprise. When you sell a few books, you want to extend the options for more.
What is bad, is the inconclusive conclusion.
Okay, the hero now knows about the evil Company. And he has a souped-up sailing ship which can travel through space and time. Plus an all-powerful electronic assistant and a "crew" of entertainingly argumentative ... people. So what?
The hero has discovered his origins. He has confronted his creators -- who are, themselves, pawns of The Company.
Then he sails off into the sunset.
Piss weak.
This is a great, fun book. I like the way that time travel is made simple and non-paradoxical. The ending is totally unsatisfactory.
If I were thinking of reading more books by Baker, here's what I'd do: Check what books are written; confirm that in one, at least, The Company is finally wiped out. Then buy the entire series and read it as one extended novel.
But if Baker is unable to reach a true ending for the series -- forget it. There are books which are just as good. Where the author has had more luck in developing a satisfactory ending.
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