sci-fi book of all time. This and the 2nd Cantos. I’ve read both several times and they still hold my interest. Dan Simmons knows how to tell a story. Love the multiple world buildings. Ps…where is the fantastic cover art that Cantos 2,3 and 4 have?

World building- epic Action- epic Writing- epic Story telling - epic Thought provoking- epic Top 5 sci-fi I have ever read

Deliciously described tale; a great adventure begins! Loved it.

Simply amazing

Great read

Stories told of a sojourn of semi interesting characters on a disjointed quest. Mindless details of what? Having read Dune, Foundation and Lensman series I expected something on that level and finished feeling that I had been bated into purchasing another book in order to have any sense of completing a story. There is no “hero’s journey “. No character the reader can identify with. Just a feeling that maybe I should not have spent the time reading this book.

The few complaints here seem to be about not understanding what’s going on. Stick with it. All the odd sci fi elements are explained as you go. Really compelling work.

What he tries to do in this book doesn’t work. If you’re going to make the narrative confusing and fractured, that’s fine, but it needs to come together at some point. Also the motivations of the characters were rarely clear and they didn’t always do stuff that was in character for them. Very disappointing for a book that I was told by everyone is one of the best sci-fi books of all time. I have no idea what the hype was about. It felt like a college student got high on LSD while reading Neuromancer, went to a Writing class that same day, vomited on the Canterbury Tales and tried to paint what dripped off into a novel.

This was well written and interesting. Has all the hallmarks of a great book and a great Sci-fi book. However, I had no clue that it was 600 pages of character building and background, ending in a cliffhanger. I wasn’t expecting that and was let down by that. Otherwise fascinating and fun.

Although I don’t like the new modern cover. It looks like a design for a science mag, a news article and like all modernized book covers, they are simple, abstract and don’t do the author service. I prefer the old covers that related to the story inside.