This is a classic science fiction book that fans of long-standing SF books will enjoy. It features space exploration, descriptions of new worlds, a sense of wonder that infects the reader, a sociological analysis of societies subject to the restrictions of life in a small habitat, etc.
Reading a book of this type, from time to time, is comforting, although at the same time, it reminds one how much Science Fiction has changed, and therefore, how long one has been reading novels of this genre… and unequivocally, one always ends up remembering one's age… but well… let's leave this topic and focus on "Titan".
Reading "Titan" You would say that you are reading a novel written in the times of the two great masters who are now deceased: Asimov and Clarke. But no… Ben Bova wrote it in 2006. Once you know this fact, you can't help but wonder if this Ben Bova is or isn't the same Ben Bova, editor of Asimov and many other science fiction authors, winner of countless awards and legendary in the world of SF… and it turns out that yes, it is the same one. Which leads us to wonder how old Ben Bova must be? Luckily we have Wikipedia to get us out of this trouble and offer us this type of information. So we discover that Ben Bova was born in 1932, which makes him 77 years old (See Wikipedia's information sheet). Ben Bova on Wikipedia) and that, in fact, it is the same Ben Bova that we have been following for years through the books we read, but about whom, as far as I am concerned, there has been a silence that has lasted almost a decade.
It is not surprising then that the book written by this author seems to be taken from a temporal fracture opened in our library. It really is from another time.
Jokes aside, the book is well written and the narrative has a rhythm. It reads very quickly, except perhaps for a bit that refers to an election campaign in the habitat in which our protagonists live (and I imagine it is not the author's fault, but rather the saturation of election campaigns that we readers suffer), and it leaves a good taste in the mouth.
The plot tells us about the adventures of several characters who live in a gigantic colony ship (very reminiscent of the ships in Clarke's various Rama books) that orbits in space near Saturn. On this ship we find scientists who are studying Titan (one of Saturn's satellites), we find scientists who are studying Saturn's rings, we find retired astronauts, a habitat administrator who has no scruples when it comes to perpetuating his power over it, political exiles, and an endless number of secondary characters who give dimension to the rest of the characters and create a context in which a credible and interesting story can develop.
The book is, without a doubt, 100% recommended.
I read somewhere that this book had been written to take advantage of the interest generated by Titan following the landing of the European probe Huygens, which was travelling inside the NASA spacecraft Cassini and arrived at Titan in January 2005. This may be so, although the Spanish version of this novel arrived a little late in Spain and here in 2009, almost no one remembers either Huygens or Cassini as names of spacecraft and missions, but rather as the scientists from whom they took their name.
While writing these lines I realized that I had not heard anything about these ships for a long time and I searched for information about them. I discovered that there is no news about them since July 2008… I imagine that Huygens must be abandoned on the surface of Titan and that Cassini must be orbiting Saturn sending data to NASA… as far as ESA is concerned, the mission ended in 2008.
For those who wish to refresh their memory about these ships, here are the links:
- ESA page for these missions http://www.esa.int/SPECIALS/Cassini-Huygens/index.html
- Pages on this blog covering everything related to Titan (articles and videos): Titan
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