Time, Space and Origin

Manifold: Time; Stephen Baxter (Del Rey, ISBN 0-345-43075-1, 2000).

Manifold: Space; Stephen Baxter (Del Rey, ISBN 0-345-43077-8, 2001).

Manifold: Origin; Stephen Baxter (Del Rey, ISBN 0-345-43079-4, 2002).

For the associated collection, Phase Space, see this previous review.

These books grew out of a series of short stories that Baxter started working out relatively early in his career (for Baxter's own recollections see this link). Some were incorporated into the novels, some were collected in Phase Space. As with the short story collection, the novels deal with Baxter's thoughts on the Fermi Paradox: If aliens are everywhere, why can't we find evidence of them?

While I've read these (a review of Manifold: Origin will be coming later) in their order of publication, they can be read in any order. Baxter uses Michael Moorcock's concept of the multiverse, there are shared characters, some shared incidents, but we are dealing with three separate plot lines and three separate timelines and universes. For example, while Reid Malenfant's wife plays a role in Time and Origin, she does not appear in Space (having died of cancer before the start of the book).

In Manifold: Time Reid Malefant is persuaded to send an expedition to a near-Earth asteroid that appears to be connected to a signal from our future. A good chunk of this novel is found in the long tale Sheena Five, which can be found online here. After an initial success, Malefant and several others travel to the asteroid where they find a gateway. Successive scenes take place further and further into the future. Baxter does a good job of depicting the immense jumps of deep time that the characters experience and even loops the story around in a nifty way. Where are they aliens? We have met the enemy and they is us.

In Manifold: Space, Reid Malefant is present when an alien presence is detected in our own solar system. He travels to the solar focus, about 75 light-hours out towards Alpha Centauri. There he discovers a jump gate, and starts a journey from system to system, in the presence of the mysterious aliens, the Gaijjin. Meanwhile, back in our system, the Gaijjin make their presence increasingly known, mining the asteroids, studying humans, landing on Venus, etc. Baxter echoes both Sir Arthur C. Clarke and Olaf Stapledon with his vision of people traveling vast stretches of both time and space.

Both books were excellent, overall. There are parts that dragged (one sequence on Earth in the later part of Manifold: Time moved especially slow), and some of the bits that were originally short stories don't feel completely integrated into the story. The cosmic view, the wide scope of space and time, however, make up for any shortfalls.

These books have inspired some spin-off reading, as I hinted at in this earlier posting. For these, I've looked into the anthropic principle, the Carter Catastrophe, all sorts of stuff about astroengineering, the Kardashev scale, and more. All of this, naturally enough, leads to more book purchases!