Finally I have finished the entire Hyperion Cantos, the series than began with the all-time sci-fi classic Hyperion, almost concluded in The Fall of Hyperion, launched a second arc in Endymion and ends here with The Rise of Endymion. These last two books read more like a duology than the third and fourth installations of a series. The Cantos is often discussed in PrintSF, my sci-fi books discussions online community. The second half of the series tend to be quite polarizing. Some people love it, some say it is disappointing, one reader even calls it a bad fan fiction of the first two books. The Goodreads average rating for these last two books however, indicate that they are quite well liked by the majority. In my opinion they are well worth reading if you like Hyperion and The Fall of Hyperion, but they are not sf classics like these earlier books. This is not one of those series that can be read out of sequence, in fact The Rise of Endymion continues directly from the previous volume Endymion. After narrowly escaping capture by the Pax church state and their secret partner the insidious and malevolent mega AI entity the TechnoCore, our heroes the messianic Aenea and Raul Endymion have settled down on “Old Earth” (just Earth to us) for a few years. That is until one day Aenea instructs Raul to go on an interminable mission to pick up their spaceship which they left on another planet in the previous book and bring it to her at a preprogrammed destination. After finally reuniting with great difficulty they travel to the planet where the Pax run Vatican is located and confront the Pax and the evil AI.There are quite a few edge of the seat thrilling scenes in this book, especially those involving the killer super cyborgs (T-1000-like) Nemes, Scylla (and the other one). The equally formidable Shrike from all the previous books is also present to challenge these whippersnapper cyborgs. However, the book is not a thrill ride all the way as Raul’s solo adventure to reclaim their “Consul’s Ship” drags at time, though he did get to meet some wonderful characters and cultures on the way. The climax is suitably epic and mystical, and the events that follow wrap up the entire Cantos nicely. I did see the twist at the end from miles away though (if you have read this book I’d love to know if did the same).Dan Simmons’ prose is always great to read, slipping into lyrical mode from time to time, with the odd (and very odd) poems. The characterization is the main strength of this book, the protagonists and antagonists are all very well drawn. The sci-fi aspect of it is not so mind boggling now as they were mostly featured in the previous books. Some of the new sci-fi elements border on fantasy, such as FTL travelling by foot, through a sort of hyperspace shortcut. Not to mention all the “chosen one” and messianic tropes. In fact Aenea reminds me a lot of Paul Muad'Dib from Dune. All of the mysteries from the previous books (including the origin and nature of the Shrike) are explained (to the displeasure of some fans who prefer them to be left unexplained). The book is also very romantic, optimistic and yet kind of tragic.I am glad I have finished the entire series, but the first two books classic Hyperion and The Fall of Hyperion remain two of my all time favorites which I would like to reread some day. I enjoyed Endymion and The Rise of Endymion but I am not likely to reread them.
I put off reading Endymion/Rise of for a long time (like several years) because a lot of people I knew seemed not to think much of them and I already wasn't quite as impressed with Fall of Hyperion as the Chaucerian original. If anything the events in this book are a huge payoff for what I remember as the sort of abstract and confusing bits of Fall of... and in a way having that huge time span in my own reading parallels nicely the elegant way in which Simmons manages this incredibly densely plotted out 'four dimensional chess game' through the centuries that the entire tetralogy ultimately spans. Endymion itself was pretty good, a little more action oriented and lacking some of the i guess metatextual depth that I most appreciate Simmons's other novels for, but I did appreciate seeing the long term impact of the classic Priest's Tale from Hyperion. In any case, Rise really delivers on the whole series and I know it will stick with me for a long time. In arguing for Aenea's not-quite-Messianic message for humanity and the true nature of the 'Void Which Binds,' I felt Simmons really strikes a perfect balance of logically and intuitively convincing his reader of their philosophical impact. Aenea and Raul's relationship is developed very well throughout the 10 year time span of these two novels, and particularly beautifully written in the latter half of this one. There are definitely moments where the action scenes are a bit predictable, and in a series with so much jumping around in time there are certain foregone conclusions that perhaps take a bit too long to reach despite often interesting twists along the way, but the aforementioned aspects of the book far outweigh these issues for me and I know I'll be thinking over this book for quite a while.
What do You think about The Rise Of Endymion (1998)?
6.0 stars. On my list of All Time Favorites (along with the other three books of the Hyperion Cantos). In my opinion, along with the Dune series, the Hyperion Cantos is the best SF space opera series ever written and Dan Simmons is one of the best writers working today. Hyperion is a recognized classic in SF, but I believe that the other three books in the Cantos, The Fall of Hyperion, Endymion and this novel are equally superb and I think readers are really missing out if they stop at the first novel. SF does not get any better than this. HIGHEST POSSIBLE RECOMMENDATION. Winner: Locus Award Best SF NovelNominee: Hugo Award Best NovelNominee: British SF Award
—Stephen
I survived!As I’ve reported in my previous reviews of this series there were times where it seemed as if my gray matter was going to be permanently fried by this epic sci-fi story. I finally got through to the end with most of my marbles still in the bag they came in.It’s almost impossible to give a summary of this without spoiling the previous book so I’ll just say that Aenea and Raul Endymion continue their interstellar journey to fulfill her ultimate destiny as the powerful forces of a corrupted Catholic Church and the artificial intelligences of the TechnoCore try to stop them by increasingly desperate means. Oh, and the mysterious and deadly time-traveling Shrike continues to pop up.This isn’t just your standard sci-fi space opera about a chosen one saving the galaxy from the Death Star. What Simmons has done here is create a tale that spans time and space in which even Jesus was a player and the ultimate stakes are the fate of evolution of life in the entire universe. As with the other books, he’s done an incredible job of building multiple stories and fusing them all together into a rich and diverse whole. Any one of his concepts could have been the basis for an entire book or series like a planet where the cities have been built high onto the tops of mountain peaks due an acidic ocean at lower altitudes. That’s just one stop along the way for Aenea and Raul.So how did I live through it? Dan Simmons finally revealed himself to be human and somewhat fallible here in the last book. Don’t get me wrong. It’s still an excellent series and one of the most ambitious sci-fi stories I’ve read. But there were a few things that irked me in this one that took it down from five stars to four and that probably kept my brain pan from overheating.First is that Simmons goes back and alters some of what we’re previously told in the earlier books. I’m not sure if he originally planned to end it after two books but carried it to four and had to do some changing to fit an ending he came up with later, or if he just discarded some ideas late in the game, but I didn’t like that what we thought happened in the first two books turned out to be untrue. Simmons didn’t commit any crimes against his fans on a George Lucas scale, but it bothered me, particularly the revisions to the Shrike’s origin and ultimate fate.I also don’t think that Simmons knew when to turn off the creative mode and shift into resolution mode. He kept adding elaborate new settings and characters and events right up until the end game, and it started reminding me of how Lost just kept piling new characters and mysteries into its final season and didn’t do nearly enough wrapping up. Simmons still managed to provide a mostly satisfy ending, but when he added yet another mind blowing new setting in the last quarter of the book, I found myself getting a little impatient. Still, these are minor quibbles about a sci-fi story that swung for the fences and managed to deliver on almost all of it’s potential.
—Kemper
The Rise Of Endymion by Dan Simmons is a Science Fiction novel on a grand space opera level with a very personal and detailed feel to the characters. It is the fourth and last in the Hyperion Cantos series.The story follows straight on from Endymion and focuses on the final journey of Raul and Aenea to try to stop the PAX church from gaining total dominion over the hearts and souls of every human alive. It is told through the written account of Raul as he sits in a orbiting prison cell waiting for death.As this is the final book in the Cantos several old characters have been bought back in some form or another and it’s really nice to see them back and learn a little more about their history. There are several characters that are the opposite of this and are almost retired from the storyline which I found to be a shame, though it does fit the story of the book.The ending felt a little too quick for my liking. Events were wrapped-up in a short time which felt almost rushed but the final conclusion was still a good one; albeit one that could of been a little better.In Summary: A really good Science Fiction novel ending the Hyperion Cantos series. I didn't like it as much as the original two books; however, it’s still amazingly well written with fantastic ideas. Reading it by itself is not recommended but fans of the earlier books will enjoy this; I certainly did.
—Joe
