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| Darwin's Radio,
Greg Bear |
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| Books,
Justin Harries,
20 January 1999 |
Rating: F3
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The American writer Greg Bear is best know for creating vast SF epics, but with his latest novel, Darwin’s Radio, he turns his attentions inward, to the body itself. Joining the ranks of Criton and Cooke (both namechecked in the novel), Bear has fashioned a biological thriller, replete with enough technobabble to pass a first year med. course.
Darwin’s Radio proports the case that evolution, rather than the gradualism perpetuated by Darwinists, can jump into new forms overnight, triggered by natures own biological computer. Cue much scientific tooing and froing, as the novels heroes, a motley bunch of scientists, attempt to understand the destination that our very own bodies are pushing us toward. Our motley bunch contains of a disgraced palaeontologist, a female scientist who uses her own body as a laboratory and various governmental officials who, being governmental officials, denigh the possibilities our protagonists present. Society is ill equipped to deal with such a rapid alteration of its species, so brings on my old favourites – riots, general unrest and social malaise. So its left up to our heroes to transverse the rocky road of evolution and finally face the ultimate truth – a higher level of humanity.
Mr. Bear has certainly done his homework; I learnt more about genetics here than one of those Christmas lectures from TV. However the form that Bear communicates this information is, at times rather indigestible. Dumped unceremoniously between sketchy character development, these info bursts often become too dense and repetitive. Full marks to Bear however for taking no prisoners – this is, after all, meant to be hard SF. It’s just a shame that the characterisation is rather bland and contrite, we’ve seen these characters in print thousands of times. Really they are ciphers to push the scientific themes of the story onward – and Bear makes sure they do with the minimum of fuss. One of interesting human dealings that Bear tackles readily and well, is the level of beuroricy rife in the medical industry. All too human and realistic, I suspect.
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Being a fan of body horror, and especially being a sucker for long words that make you feel brainy, I avidly consumed Darwin’s radio, only to find it a little dry for my tastes.
Harper Collins
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