Am I alone in being underwhelmed by Vernor Vinge?

Cafe Society
1

Once again I find myself about two-thirds of the way through a Vernor Vinge novel (it’s A Deepness in the Sky this time), and once again I’ve realized that I’ve gotten kinda bored.

It seems like the Vinge pattern is to have one or two really interesting ideas, and then wrap them in an overly long, overly pedestrian plot as he attempts to flesh them out into a story.

Don’t get me wrong–I think his core ideas are really nifty. It’s just that I keep finding myself wishing that other authors would do remixes of the material.

(And in ADitS I’m a little :dubious: at the speed of technological progress on the part of the spider critters. At this rate, I’m half expecting them to build the goddamn Skylark sometime within the next fifty pages or so.)

2

IIRC the spider’s tech progress was almost entirely driven by the genius of that eccentric spider genius character. I think a further explanation of that tech change is implied (or fully explained, I can’t recall) at the book’s conclusion.

In Deepness and A Fire Upon the Deep Vinge really pushes for a slow and stately unfolding of his plot. Without the creative backstories & settings he really wouldn’t have much in the way of memorable characters or plots, but everyone’s gotta play to their strengths I guess. I do love that depth of background detail, so that’s what’s kept me reading his other stuff.