Novels by Robert Charles Wilson (Study Guide) - Spin, Darwinia, the Chronoliths, Julian Comstock: A Story of 22nd-Century America, Axis (Paperback)

This is nonfiction commentary. Purchase includes a free trial membership in the publisher's book club where you can select from more than a million books without charge. Chapters: Spin, Darwinia, the Chronoliths, Julian Comstock: a Story of 22nd-Century America, Axis, Blind Lake. Source: Wikipedia. Free updates online. Not illustrated. Excerpt: Spin is a science fiction novel by author Robert Charles Wilson. It was published in 2005 and won the Hugo Award for Best Novel in 2006. It is the first book in the Spin trilogy, with Axis (the second) published in 2007 and Vortex (the third) currently unpublished. Spin details Earth's response to an artificial membrane placed around the planet which selectively blocks and filters incoming electromagnetic radiation, blocking out the view of anything beyond minimal low Earth orbit. The novel is told in first person, from the viewpoint of Tyler Dupree. Tyler is a close childhood friend of Jason and Diane Lawton, twins of E. D. Lawton (a wealthy industrialist who makes his money from the developing aerostat business). As children, Jason, Diane, and Tyler witness the dramatic arrival of the "Spin," as the phenomenon comes to be known, when the stars suddenly disappear one night as they are looking at the sky. Initial experiments show that the membrane is permeable, allowing space probes to pass through, but that time on Earth (within the membrane) is dramatically slowed, to a rate of 3.17 years outside the membrane per Earth second, or roughly 100 million years per Earth year. Thus, within the time of one generation on Earth, the rest of the solar system will age 4 billion years and Earth will be destroyed by the expanding Sun. The novel follows four primary protagonists, each of whom respond to the Spin, and to the certain knowledge that humanity is doomed, in distinct ways. E.D. founds a low Earth orbit satellite company (using high-altitude balloon technology) and profits spectacularly...More: http: //booksllc.net/?id=551734