Incredibly, the Xeelee chronicles never actually introduce a Xeelee at all in the entire nine book saga.

This is an opera in the truest sense of the word, a huge journey by many characters across an immense stage as large as time itself, with a main protagonist that never actually appears. Indeed, as the journey passed halfway and began to accelerate, I realised that it was my definition of space opera that was in error, not the author's story telling. Yes lots of super cool technology - Stephen Baxter loves his deep explanations of science - but none of the huge capital ships smashing into each other as space battles rage across the cosmos: hinted at, explained in historical narratives, but not engaged.Īnd yet I was really enjoying the journey. Continuing onwards into successive books, and with considerable time jumps along the way, I found myself asking the samee question: was this space opera? Certainly not in the manner of the three authors mentioned at the start. Yes the story was intriguing, fascinating, character driven, with some great settings, but space opera? Hmmm.

Halfway into the first book, I was confused. Not one to dip my toe, I opted for the Omnibus, nine books in one kindle package, with the full intention of not surfacing until I was xeeleed to the core. Banks, Peter Hamilton, Neal Asher etc - I had been intending to read the famous tales of the Xeelee for quite some time, and having finished a large fantasy set, I was in need of space and stars rather than swords and sorcery. To learn more about how and for what purposes Amazon uses personal information (such as Amazon Store order history), please visit our Privacy Notice.Ī lover of space opera - Iain M. You can change your choices at any time by visiting Cookie Preferences, as described in the Cookie Notice. Click ‘Customise Cookies’ to decline these cookies, make more detailed choices, or learn more. Third parties use cookies for their purposes of displaying and measuring personalised ads, generating audience insights, and developing and improving products. This includes using first- and third-party cookies, which store or access standard device information such as a unique identifier. If you agree, we’ll also use cookies to complement your shopping experience across the Amazon stores as described in our Cookie Notice. We also use these cookies to understand how customers use our services (for example, by measuring site visits) so we can make improvements. We use cookies and similar tools that are necessary to enable you to make purchases, to enhance your shopping experiences and to provide our services, as detailed in our Cookie Notice.

Xeelee omnibus