This Paperback Book item from Tor Books was reviewed on 30-Jul-2008.
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1) Paperback Book Golden Fleece by Tor Books.
Golden Fleece
Some might say that Golden Fleece (1999) is a simple murder mystery, but, if they´d dig deeper, they´d find it explores the philosophy of a sentient computer, the sociology of a space voyage that lasts over one hundred years.
The dictionary defines sentient as an adjective
Etymology: Latin sentient-, sentiens, present participle of sentire to perceive, feel
1 : responsive to or conscious of sense impressions
Can a computer be sentient?
Instead of a "Who-done-It," it is a "Why-did-they-do it" The murderer is revealed in Chapter One. The motive for the murder is the mystery.
The rest of the book explores the sentience of the computer, Jason.
Highly recommended for Sawyer fans. This was originally copyrighted in 1990, so it is one of his earliest works.
Gunner May,2007
¤2) Paperback Book Golden Fleece by Tor Books. Golden Fleece (1990) is a singleton SF novel. The Argo is a spacegoing arcology, with 10,034 people aboard, en route to Colchis, a planet in the Eta Cephei system. It is controlled by a tenth generation computer named Jason.
In this novel, Jason herds Diana Chandler into a lander and launches her into space. The intense radiation from the Brussard ramjet fields kills her almost instantly after the craft leaves the protection of the habitat. Then Jason reports the "accident" to Aaron Rossman, supervisor of the Argo´s landing craft and Diana´s ex-husband.
Jason assumes that the lander will be destroyed or lost, yet Aaron devises a method of retrieving it by reconfiguring the magnetic fields. When Diana´s body is returned to the Argo, it is examined by Kristen Hoogenraad, one of the Argo´s medical staff and Aaron´s current wife. This examination reveals a few injuries that are acceptable under these conditions, but the landing craft itself has two unexplained anomalies.
The lander has received much more radiation than anticipated for the short exposure. Moreover, the craft has too little remaining fuel. The reception party is puzzled by these discrepancies, but not very suspicious. Everybody just assumes that Diana´s death is a suicide.
Aaron can´t believe that Diana has committed suicide, but doesn´t have any other reasonable explanation for her death. When a mutual friend excuses him of driving her to suicide, however, Aaron suddenly realizes that his affair with Kristen has been a subject of gossip on the ship. He begins to blame himself for Diana´s death. Of course, Kristen tries to convince him otherwise, but Jason surreptitiously promotes this self-blame.
In this story, the usual mystery framework is twisted. The killer is known from the first paragraph, although his identity is not completely revealed until the second page. The method and opportunity are fully disclosed in the first chapter; only the motive is unclear.
As with most classical mysteries, the reasons for the killing of Diana only become evident at the very end of the story. Throughout the tale, Jason comes across as a passionate, but dedicated persona. He tries to do the best he can for the human race, but is willing to kill to achieve his goals. Will he kill again?
This story resembles 2001: The Space Odyssey is some ways, but Jason is not HAL 9000. In fact, part of the intent behind the novel may have been as a refutation of that film. Computers are not able to override their programming without hardware or software damage and/or defects. Most computer errors are the result of poor programming. Computers are unbelievably dumb, doing exactly what they are told to do; even sheep have more common sense than computers.
Apparently some of the readers didn´t understand the relativity issues brought up by the author. The faster the ship travels, the slower the onboard mechanical and biological clocks advance. A velocity very near lightspeed would reduce the passage of internal time during the voyage to almost nothing. The author doesn´t invoke Faster-Than-Light travel, but relativity when writing of voyages taking less than a (perceived) day.
The novel is not very tightly written, but is better than many other first novels. It rambles a bit here and there and tends to be dull in spots, mostly to provide material for the denouement. One of the sidelines concerns a SETI message from another part of the sky; still, this may have been included as a leadin to a possible sequel that has not yet been published.
Although the plot ends with a purely conventional resolution, one wonders whether Aaron has done the right thing. Still, Jason has a plan . . .
Recommended for Sawyer fans and for anyone else who enjoys tales of seemingly intelligent computers, locked door mysteries, and clever detective work.
-Arthur W. Jordin¤ 3) Paperback Book Golden Fleece by Tor Books. The narrator of this book is the artificially intelligent computer running a huge starship, and the first thing it says (prior to killing a character who has uncovered some uncomfortable facts regarding the mission,) is "I love that they trusted me blindly." I felt like telling it "Well of course they trust you blindly! What else can they do but trust you blindly? To not trust you completely they would have to exist all the time in a state of great and paranoid fear! Would that be preferable to you?" Despite the fact that I thought the A.I. (which the author calls a "Quant-Con,") manipulative and not a very good psychologist, (plus it says of the researcher it kills with intense radiation, "Her face was a mask of horror...(Her´s) would have an interesting death to watch." Very off-putting...) I found this story worth buying and reading. I was confused by the author´s seeming to acknowledge that FTL travel was impossible and then later revealing that it is after all possible. I kept expecting Jason (the A.I.,) to say something like, "Ah, But we Quant-Cons have found a loophole in Einstein´s law...", but he never did. This and a problem with Bussard ramjets were never addressed, but physics problems in sci-fi books I don´t find iinherently disqualifying, (as long as they´re handled right,) because it seems to me that to be too nit-pickey about this would be to instantly discard about 99.5% of the genre, and also because we might not know everything yet.¤ 4) Paperback Book Golden Fleece by Tor Books. This is one of Sawyer´s earlier novels. While it is not quite up to the standards of later works, (like THE TERMINAL EXPERIMENT), it has a great premise and is superior to most science fiction on the shelves today. Golden Fleece is a murder mystery - but the mystery is not who, we know that right away, it´s the "why?" and "will they be caught?" The untangling of these two questions - aboard a generational ship, making it a locked room mystery for the passengers - has the backdrop of the psychology of a generational ship and how man deals with Artificial Intelligence.¤ 5) Paperback Book Golden Fleece by Tor Books. Science fiction is supposed to be a genre that uses real science to tell a good story with morals, lessons and ideas. Sawyer does exactly that in The Golden Fleece (no Greek mythology fans, the title is not coincidental). It explores AI, ET and human psychology, the only three forms of consciousness in a very interesting and profound but scientific way. One of those good books that gets you asking yourself certain moral questions for days after having finished it. A great read, my personal favorite of Sawyers after reading almost all his other great books.¤ 6) Paperback Book Golden Fleece by Tor Books. Aboard Argo, a colonization ship bound for Eta Cephei IV, people are very close--there´s no other choice. So when Aaron Rossman´s ex-wife dies in what seems to be a bizarre accident, everyone offers their sympathy, politely keeping their suspicions of suicide to themselves. But Aaron cannot simply accept her death. He must know the truth: Was it an accident, or did she commit suicide? When Aaron discovers the truth behind her death, he is faced with a terrible secret--a secret that could cost him his life.
¤Page Updated: Robert N. Goolsby, 27-Aug-2008, 03128686509780312868659, 500-390-260-620-440-88B-8 
Golden Fleece, Book, Image © Tor Books
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