Slow Bullets

A terrific novella by Alastair Reynolds, separate from Revelation Space.The setup early on is far more than it seems at first (although the title does somewhat give this away)The middle half of the book has great pacing and some good events and fine characters, although the character of Prad should be fleshed out a bit more. Still, the issues raised and interesting and fun, and some of the plot elements are pretty scary.I found the ending to be a bit rushed and unsatisfying. I'm not sure that further episodes in this series are justified.Although I did enjoy this, and read all of it in one day (novella), I think the Amazon Kindle price was a bit steep for such a short work.

I enjoyed this story but it is quite short and sweet I felt, and might not be what someone who is a fan of the Revelation Space trilogy was looking for. But I think what it does cover - the big overarching theme - is a pretty interesting and humbling idea. Indeed it could happily set the stage for many more books , much more along the epic lines of his trilogy - if the author was inclined.

This is a very short book, I obviously hadn't noticed the "novella" description when I eagerly pre-ordered it many months ago.To start with it reads like a full novel, lots of unanswered questions, plenty of mystery waiting to be investigated, and it was with some surprise that I looked up to see that I was apparently 71% of the way through the book after only 40 minutes.It is a good story but the characters and the situation are let down, in my opinion, by the novella format which skims over the last hundred years or so of what should have been the story in a couple of paragraphs.

A strangely stifled sci-fi novella, lacking much of the ineventive sparkle of Reynolds' 'Revelation Space' series.Gets off to a blistering start with the abuse of the titular Slow Bullets, but then changes direction and bogs down in a stalemate scenario.It has the feel of an earlier work or maybe an offshoot from another book which didn't quite fit. There are some interesting concepts but none of the major players grabbed my attention, and the plot kinda fizzled out.Interesting, but probably only worth tracking down if you're a diehard AR enthusiast.6/10

This novella is such a tease .. there is a much bigger story here. I really enjoyed this as it cracked on holding right to the bare essentials to tell the story. The idea of a ship of soldiers ending up far in the future and having to survive after the collapse of civilisation is enough in itself. - but thye reason as to why it had collapsed and how it had happened - definately a bigger story !Scur is a good lead character but really the only one we get to understand - it would be nice to get that developed further. I also liked the idea of data storage decaying and a novel solution to the problemSo I can recommend this as a good read but its over too soon and I just wanted more of this story

Sadly, this simply wasn't up to the usual standard that I've come to expect from Mr Reynolds. The plot is interesting, but as others have pointed out, the premise of malfunctioning volatile memory is rather farfetched (even if "the sickness" is to blame). I can forgive the plot, but I can't forgive the cost and the length; the book is simply too short.However, the length of the book is a blessing in disguise if you have the misfortune to download the audiobook. I have no idea where they got the narrator from, but listening to her talk is like being in a bossy english teacher's class listening to a lecture on the incorrect use of the semi-colon.

I thought this was a good story. The plot suits a novella in many ways; I think to expand it to a full novel would have required moving in on past its current endpoint, or adding whole other areas.It is however way overpriced for what is in effect a short story. Worth maybe £2.

Not the best Reynolds book I've read.Starts off well but never actually seems to get a good tempo building.Where a story would be getting in to a exciting climax or maybe a twist to keep you reading this book ends.Don't get me wrong it’s a good read to pass a few hours, but nothing to keep you gripped.Read in a day.