389 pages
English language
Published Dec. 3, 1997 by Bantam Books.
Two and a half millennia ago, the artifact appeared in a remote corner of space, beside a trillion-year-old dying sun from a different universe. It was a perfect black-body sphere, and it did nothing. Then it disappeared.
Now it is back.
I know it's not fair to the book itself, but I struggled to finish this one because the narrator's voice did not agree with my ears. It's quite interesting overall, a bit complex but I think necessarily so given the topic.
It was quite interesting to read a science fiction novel with a greater focus on the character interaction of the artifical intelligences (here the minds of ships). It fits well into the culture universe and sure was entertaining. But it was not as good as "Consider Phlebas" in my opinion.
