Reviews

Silver by Linda Nagata

bartalker's review

Go to review page

adventurous mysterious tense medium-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Plot
  • Strong character development? No
  • Loveable characters? No
  • Diverse cast of characters? No
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

sooflo's review

Go to review page

adventurous dark mysterious reflective medium-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? A mix
  • Strong character development? Yes
  • Loveable characters? It's complicated
  • Diverse cast of characters? Yes
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.25

annaswan's review against another edition

Go to review page

4.0

This series was a wild ride! I’ve always loved the idea of uploading consciousness, and Nagata takes that idea in really cool directions. The Universe is big, and dense with danger and weirdness. I’d recommend starting with Vast, then Edges, then Silver.

ninjalawyer's review against another edition

Go to review page

2.0

Doesn’t pay off the interesting story setup in the first book, and follows characters that are mostly uninteresting. It really feels like a side story in a lot of ways, rather than the main event.

The plot isn’t just glacially slow to get where it’s going, it’s also going to a dull destination. Characters are generally shallow, with Lezuri being particularly thin. He’s one cackle away from being a cartoon villain, and the plot requires that he be at turns a near-god, but also a complete moron. The titular silver is pervasive, and is basically just magic gas.

Overall, it feels like a young adult novel that just doesn’t have much going on.

burns_cheadle's review against another edition

Go to review page

4.0

Closer to 3.5 rather than 4 stars - sufficiently entertaining but the character development is merely adequate and the plot lacks depth and complexity

oleksandr's review against another edition

Go to review page

3.0

This is far future trans/post-human story. This is the second volume of the duology, the first, [b:Edges|43483913|Edges (Inverted Frontier #1)|Linda Nagata|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1546820501l/43483913._SY75_.jpg|67627795], I reviewed here. A noted before, it is more a single story in two parts.

After a battle with a post-human Lezuri, the crew of Dragon as well as the ship are heavily damaged, its master/captain Urban is away on one of the advance scouts without connection to the rest of the crew. They change their course and in time reach the artificial world made by the power they fought and his partner.

While the first book was mostly a space travel story, here most of the plot takes place on a world ring-shaped artificial world of Verilotus, where every night ‘silver’ (nanite mass) rises to consume things left above ground or to construct from ordinary to bizarre. Urban land there in order to fight Lezuri before the later can recapture his full might. In order to do this he needs help from locals.

A nice SF story of an underrated but talented author.

metallib87's review

Go to review page

5.0

Linda Nagata, once again nails hard science fiction, and much more. Following the first book in the Inverted Frontier series, Nagata weaves a delicate yet hearty storyline that creates great suspense, action/adventure, mind-altering technologies, and exciting character development from multiple novels she has written. This was one of the best sequels I’ve ever read and really hope, Nagata continues this series see the characters can reach the Hallowed Vesties.

panireads's review against another edition

Go to review page

4.0

Great conclusion to edges, reminds me a little of Larry Niven's ringworld

tashadandelion's review

Go to review page

5.0

Nagata continues her fresh and imaginative space opera series, Inverted Frontier, with Silver, a tight, mostly planet-bound adventure centered around Urban from Edges (the first book in this new series) and Jubilee and Jolly, characters from Memory, a prior stand-alone. They join forces to engage the artificial planet's interior structures in order to learn how to control its "silver"-- the constructive and destructive swarm-like nanotech that dissolves and remakes everything on the planet's surface. They must figure all this out before Lezuri, the god-like consciousness that almost killed Urban in book one returns and gathers his strength to realize his maliciously narcissistic plan to remake the world into a hostile crucible in which its inhabitants must battle for their lives and "level up" to become the best players possible, worthy of companionship with him. The whole book is compulsively readable, as was the first volume in this open-ended series, but the last 100 pages are particularly gripping. I made my family wait a few hours to decorate our Christmas tree while I finished it up. If you enjoy space opera and aren't reading Linda Nagata's new series yet, rectify that ASAP. Her work deserves more attention.