Ultima - Stephen Baxter

In PROXIMA we discovered ancient alien artifacts on the planet of Per Ardua - hatches that allowed us to step across light years of space as if we were stepping into another room. The universe opened up to us. Now in ULTIMA the consequences of this new freedom make themselves felt. And we discover that there are minds in the universe that are billions of years old and they have a plan for us. For some of us. But as we learn the true nature of the universe we also discover that we have countless pasts all meeting in this present and that our future is terrifyingly finite. It's time for us to fight to take back control.

My thoughts:

The things he comes up with, my heads always spins after reading a Baxter book. He also seems to like the End Time. You know the end of it all.

I always feel all WOW. Here we have multiverses and hatches, and, aye beyond me.

The two people from the last book stumbled into a multiverse in the last book, and here Rome never fell so Rome went to space.

But that is not the only multiverse. A few other characters also from that previous verse makes it here and explore this brand new reality. And it is fascinating. What if this and that never happened, what if time took another direction. So much to explore.

The possibilities are endless.

Conclusion:
Good book. He is a great author

Hardcover, 560 pages
Published November 20th 2014 by Gollancz
Proxima #2
Sci.fi
Library

Proxima - Stephen Baxter

The very far future: The galaxy is a drifting wreck of black holes, neutron stars, and chill white dwarfs. The age of star formation is long past. Yet there is life here, feeding off the energies of the stellar remnants, and there is mind, a tremendous galaxy-spanning intelligence each of whose thoughts lasts a hundred thousand years. And this mind cradles memories of a long-gone age when a more compact universe was full of light... The 27th century: Proxima Centauri, an undistinguished red dwarf star, is the nearest star to our sun. How would it be to live on such a world? 

My thoughts:

The beginning was a bit slow, but I kept thinking it's Baxter and it got better. I think the problem was that there was this other POV that showed up, not often, not that long, but I just did not care. I was all about the settlers. Oh those were fascinating.

It's a race between China and the rest, and to beat China settlers are sent to Proxima. It takes 4 years for a message to get from there home, and the settlers are really left to fend for themselves. On a strange new world, and well there are So many more things I want to say, but honestly it's just spoilers spoilers.

Proxima is an interesting planet, and there are secrets, and the end, omg, that was freaky! I really need to read part two to see how it all plays out. There are some good secrets in here for sure.

The book is about Yuri who gets sent to Proxima (and stuff goes down and I so want to talk about but I can not.) I loved learning more about the planet and the struggle for the settlers.

The POv of whatever was boring, and I am glad when it showed up it was a few chapters and I skimmed it. I did not really see the point of it. Our solar system is boring.

Conclusion:
In the end, Baxter is a great sci-fi writers and he always comes up with such cool concepts. I need book 2 then.

Cover
ok

Hardcover, 456 pages
Published September 19th 2013 by Gollancz
Proxima #1
Sci.fi
Library