Bowden P. (Trey) - , reviewed on 5/2/2011 + 260 more book reviews

Helpful Score: 1

Grail was a satisfying, if somewhat rushed, conclusion to the Jacob's Ladder series. I'd give this 3½ stars, and the series 2⅔ stars.

In Grail Jacob's Ladder finally reaches its goal - a habitable world, after nearly a thousand plus years of a side trip. Only to discover that humans made it to Fortune (the Jacobeans call it Grail) reached it before them. Add in the internal conflicts between the Conn family, Engineering and Bridge, the Deckers and Edenite/Go Backs and it gets interesting in the sense of the old curse.

To make it more complicated, the inhabitants of Fortune see the arrival of Jacob's Ladder as a nightmare made real, because they see it as a plague ship full of memes. And Jacob's Ladder sees Fortune as a nightmare for the way that the inhabitants have remade their minds (called rightminding).

So, did I like it? Sort of. Complicated and rushed was how it felt and could have done with a cast of characters in there. It also could have done without a seemingly extraneous assassination and/or the presence of aliens.

So, three stars. I'll be checking on Elizabeth Bear's stuff - I keep hoping for something as strong as Carnival - but from here or the library.

Likes: Generation ship reaching its destination; Two very different points of view but both are sympathetic; How weird Jacob's Ladder is.

Disikes: How rushed it was; Needed a cast of characters badly; Want a collected edition of all three volumes to see what happens.

Suggested For: Fans of Elizabeth Bear and stories involving generation ships.

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