The Ragged Astronauts, by Bob Shaw

[nwhyte]

Second paragraph of third chapter: From the window of his study he had a panoramic view of the city's various districts - residential, commercial, industrial, administrative - as they sifted down to the Borann river and on the far bank gave way to the parklands surrounding the five palaces. The families headed by the Lord Philosopher had been

Comments

[coth]

I remember all five of these, and both Queen of the States and Schismatrix were pretty good. I suspect that if someone reread all five nowadays they would give the award to any of the other four over The Ragged Astronauts.

[autopope]

I haven't read Queen of the States, but Schismatrix is pretty much the under-appreciated taproot of the New Space Opera -- or rather, the other taproot aside from Iain M. Banks' Culture series. David Hartwell published it and subsequently lamented that it was ahead of its time and nobody understood it; the nearest thing I can think of is Revelation Space, but that came nearly two decades later.

[coth]

That doesn't surprise me. We read Schismatrix for the City Lit evening class, and I remember the idea of it - the fundamental argument between the mechanists and the shapers - very clearly, but it was a difficult book and even in a quite sophisticated reading group not everyone finished it.

Queen of the States is Josephine Saxton being Jungian and dreamlike - a complete contrast!