Awesome! I just preordered a copy from Amazon.

Here's (http://www.spacearchaeology.org/tiki-index.php?page=Saturn+Returns) my notes on what I've read so far ...

One question: if the protagonist was encoded in the spiral inside the Drum, then how could his DNA have contaminated the Background?

Oops. That was me. For some reason LJ logged me off.

That's fantastic. Thanks heaps for the feedback. You're absolutely right that Imre's DNA won't have any effect on the Background, since all that's being dispersed is the remains of the Drum. Imre's mistake in that instance leads him away from the truth, which is that the Jinc have other reasons for "resurrecting" him...

Ah hah ... the plot thickens ... I'm as keen as Imre to see what discoveries the Jinc has made ...

Heh ... I notice you said "the Jinc have" in your comment here ... was that a pain when writing the book?

I just had to make some corrections in my analysis.

I notice you said "the Jinc have" in your comment here ...

Gah! Yes. Nicely spotted. I had to make a lot of corrections to the final ms, and I've been working on other projects since so the habit has slipped. That's my mistake for making the gaff this time, but it won't hold water again. :-)

Looking forward to it a lot!

:-)

I feel strangely nervous about this book, even though at the same time I feel very confident about it. Maybe I'm missing my Shane Dix security blanket/safety net.

A large part of the reason I am so looking forward to it is because it is a little outside your comfort zone.

Yeah, what you said. He's nervous = bodes well.

I hope so. Otherwise I've been nervous for nothing. :-)

Awesome! Can't wait.

Hey, I got me one of those South Park icons too, but couldn't figure out how to do the background. I look like a ghost, which perhaps isn't entirely a bad thing. :-)

The button marked "back" stands for background, not "go back".

Got it. :-)

Aha. Heh.

That's quite a cute icon! Mine came via jaylake in fact. I made it with this thing:
http://www.sp-studio.de/
and did a Prnt Scrn (on a PC) to get it into the clipboard and paste it into an image editor to make the icon...

You know, I've had that excerpt of Saturn Returns going round my head since I read it. I've been reading the excellent stories in Forbidden Planets (you know, people like Mr Lake, Paul McAuley, Al Reynolds and others), along with Richard Dawkins' The God Delusion (lots of fun!), yet as I lay in bed I was thinking of the fate of our Hungarian-named protagonist, thrust 150,000 years into the future. Cool.

Thanks, Peter. I got there in the end. :-)

You know, you're the second person I know reading and enjoying Dawkins' book. Think I'm going to have grab a copy...

I mean, on the one hand I don't really see any practising priests giving up their religion as a result of reading it; and on the other hand, it's not necessarily going to teach us atheists anything we don't already know. But Dawkins writes very well, and there is so much in there that there is plenty of fodder for atheists, and there are some great stories too.
It's worth having on the shelf I guess. I did also enjoy Dennett's Breaking The Spell, although I haven't finished it yet. Again, as polemic I doubt it will convince the believers. The reviews of both have displayed a distressing willingness to pull up the same old crap that gets well rubbished by the authors in the text, but the reviewers clearly haven't really read the books. Which is kinda funny, and it's kinda sad.

Ohhh ... I get it!

A spiral on the inside of a cylinder is a helix ... which is very appropriate considering that the helix in the Drum contains Imre's genetic code.

All grist for exoarchaeologists to argue over.

e.g. Was the symbolism intentional, or is a spiral the most efficient way to inscribe information on the inside of a cylinder?

This is great, Sean. I really like it and I want the rest of the novel immediately!

Garth Nix