Larry NivenRingworld's Children

A great book, the 4th in a series of 5 books. Brilliant theories, great characters. A ripping good yarn that moves at a good pace to keep the reader enthralled. A real page turner.

This is to my mind the novel Ringworld Throne should have been.The Fringe War - the constant jockeying for position between Humans, Kzin and others to exploit the Ringworld has turned into a Hot war.Antimatter and high energy weapons threaten the structure of the Ringworld itself.Loius wu, Hindmost and the son of Chmee are forced into an alliance with the Protector Tunesmith to save the Ringworld from imminent destruction.This book is a logical extension to the previous three. it has more in common with Ringworld and Ringworld Engineers than it does with Ringworlds throne.The plot builds nicely on the earlier books and pulls in some elements from other known space stories. Its well though out, pacey and suprising, something the last novel lacked.Its a must read for any real Niven fan and gives us some final closure for the Ringworld. The book draws on several elements from other known space stories and really feels like a well crafted piece polished over time.I think this is the last true Niven novel we will see. Recent work with his name on it has been collaborative and lacking his style and flair. This one was written with love and feeling and brings together so many other elements its obviously a work of love. This book shows us the writer of Ringworld and the Mote in Gods eye can still turn out a truly epic romp when he turns his mind to it.Mr Niven I salute you!

Seemed rushed toward the end, a little more detail.

Fourth in the ‘Ringworld’ series, this volume is slightly more entertaining than the last, but still nowhere near the standard of the first two. Various different species are now aware of the Ringworld’s existence and are engaged in “the Fringe War” over possession of it and its resources. Tunesmith, the ghoul Protector from the last novel, is trying to keep the Ringworld safe, along with a restored-to-youth Louis Wu, a reluctant Hindmost, and several Ringworld natives.Louis, formerly portrayed as highly intelligent, seems remarkably naive here. Whilst he is rightfully suspicious of Tunesmith and his motives, he fails to predict betrayals by members of the A.R.M. who end up on the Ringworld, and quickly forgives attempts on his life, leading to – surprise, surprise – more betrayals. This seems very out-of-character for him. Yes, his body is now that of a twenty-year-old, but he retains over two hundred years’ worth of memories and experience. He can hardly have forgotten that humans, and the A.R.M. in particular, can and will screw him over.Additionally, whilst Protectors are fairly interesting, they are much less fun to read about than kzinti or puppeteers. The more alien aliens are far more interesting to me, and they play relatively small roles in this book. It’s not a bad story, and provides a reasonably satisfactory end to the series, but it’s by no means brilliant. Personally, I’d recommend reading ‘Ringworld’ and ‘The Ringworld Engineers’, and stopping there.

The Ringworld series are absolutely amazing in the fact the science behind them is so believable and the stories so well crafted.What's wrong Film producers? Is your SF knowledge so limited yo are unable to envision the potential in these tales!

In Ringworld, the technology was "tapes and spools". in Engineers, it miraculously updated to a gaint microfiche reader that was so big it had to be chopped up to get it through the stepping disks. Now the storage solution if a large brick-like object that unfolds to a holographic library....this is just Niven making do with today's technology to define tomorrow's sci-fi. Like every other writer I know, he didn't foresee the digital revolution, and just updates his technology on the fly. Really, tapes and spools! It's true what they say, sci-fi reflects the era in which it was written...Well, and he goes on and on about food in this one, as in all the Ringworld follow-ups. But at least this is the one that attempts to tie all the former efforts together, though really it does so saying nothing new, beyond bringing invasion fleets into the fray (which really should have come a lot sooner...like, weeks after Ringworld was first discovered...!) It's great when you can set your own parameters for a future that won't ever happen. I mean, Microsoft just wouldn't allow it!The writing style is truly skeletal...the narrative itself seems part of a vast on-going mathematical caculation rather than an unfolding story. This is Niven's trademark writing style so can't really complain, it's done him good so far.

Space travel, aliens, sex, drugs, sex with aliens and violence.Oh and some well reasoned science to back up most of it making it less science fiction and more a view of things to come.I've found myself saying "Why haven't we developed this yet?" a few times during these books.Top notch visual writing from my favourite author (with Terry Pratchett a close second), these books take you to a gaudy construct - Ringworld where... well, no spoilers.Un-puttable-downable. But start from the beginning - Ringworld.

This book continues the ringworld series and is an interesting and good read. The charachters are good with varied relationships and the natives that are met are crazy and interesting.