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Overview
Impending personal tragedy is dimming the brilliant light of Dr. Benjamin Knowlton's world. On the threshold of their greatest achievement, the renowned astrophysicist's beloved wife and partner — ex-astronaut-turned astronomer — is dying.
But something looms alarningly on the far edge of the solar system: at once a scientific find of unparalleled importance that could ensure the Knowltons' immortality, and a potential earth-shattering cataclysm that dwarfs their private one. For Benjamin and Channing have discovered "Eater," an eons-old black hole anomaly that devours stars and worlds. Yet its most awesome and devasting secrets are still to be revealed...and feared.
Synopsis
Astrophysicist Benjamin Knowlton heads up a learge research center while caring for his terminally ill ex-astronaut wife, Channing. He and his team discover a black hole moving quickly through space, devouring everything in its path, and name it the "Eater." There's no danger—its orbit will miss Earth with room to spare. Then the Eater speaks. It is a life form, an intelligence built into an astrophysical field. It seems benign enough: interested in human art, culture, and intelligence, and eager to share its vast knowledge of many previously unknown alien cultures. But gradually, humans discover the terrifying truth about the singularity. Now, as the world waits, Channing volunteers to undertake a desperate gamble: a one-to-one confrontation with the Eater.
About the Author:
Gregory Benford is a professor of physics at the University of California, Irvine. His fiction has won many awards, including the Nebula Award for his novel Timescape.
Houston Post
Gregory Benford is a distinguished physicist, astronomer and professor, but first and foremost he is a superb storyteller.
Editorials
From Barnes & Noble
Something's Hungry Out There
Dr. Benjamin Knowlton and his colleagues at the High Energy Astrophysics Center have discovered a bizarre "burster" signal that appears to be a wandering black hole. The black hole is propelling itself through the outer edges of our solar system by "digesting" asteroids and chunks of ice surrounding Jupiter, which fuel its magnetic "jets." Knowlton's wife, Channing, a former astronaut now dying of cancer, is one of the few who can understand these unique scientific circumstances and also assist him in deciphering the strange facts. Alongside them is longtime friend Kingsley Dart, now the Royal Astronomer of England, who arrives to aid Knowlton and to rekindle his strong emotions for Channing. Eventually, though, it becomes clear that the signals they're receiving aren't random at all, but proof that the black hole, which eventually comes to be called the Eater of All Things, is a sentient traveler from the most distant reaches of space.
The Eater is at first childlike and wishes only to converse. As data is downloaded to it, and the anomaly better learns our language, it seems to take a vile pleasure from speaking in a purposely vague manner, refusing to tell about its origins or its intentions. Eventually they learn that the Eater is hideously bored after its billions of years wandering and that in its travels it has destroyed many alien civilizations. Now, as the Eater changes course and heads toward Earth, it demands that thousands of "remnants" be sent to it: encoded memory banks of people whose brains are to be dissected and "copied," allowing the weary Eater to create a vast library of humanity in order to read a person's entire life like a book. When the Eater begins attacking the Earth, Channing permits herself to be the first to undergo the process. Her persona is left intact aboard a shuttle, which will be used as a weapon to hopefully destroy the deranged sentience.
As usual, Benford refuses to let the hard science completely overshadow all other questions and subplots arising in the course of the novel. Keen political observations are made prominently here, and the reader can't help but be pulled into such a complex series of poignant scenes. As the Eater makes out lists of the "remnants" it wants, the governments of the world must decide whether to give in or to try to stave off an attack by a creature that can literally bore through the entire planet. It's unnerving to see how easily dictatorial governments give in, allowing the Eater to take the encrypted personalities of "forced volunteers."
Benford also makes engaging use of the alien life form and its bizarre beliefs and motives. Despite its ambiguities, the Eater is a fully developed, superbly imagined creature with a compelling nature all its own. It's an entity that exists within our own scientific precepts, bordering on being our own worst nightmare. Even in the most alien being, Benford's emphasis remains on the human condition. Other characterizations are no less affecting or effective. Especially moving is the growing relationship between Channing and Dart, which is rich, intricate, and much more than mere window dressing in a story that towers in its imagery and implications. Benford's attention to dialogue, disposition, and the ramifications of our world's actions is always mentally stimulating and emotionally heartfelt. Eater is a fascinating blend of philosophical grandeur, enduring love, and high-concept SF that will undoubtedly leave its bite upon the reader.
—Tom Piccirilli
NY Times Book Review
Benford is a rarity: a scientist who writes with verve and insight not only about black holes and cosmic strings but about human desires and fears.Chris Donner
There are two sides to any story, and by this I don't mean two differing point of view on events. Rather, there are two components: the narrative, and the characters who live out that narrative. In general, it seems fair to say that science fiction is a narrative-driven genre, and while the characters are important, they often play second or third fiddle to the storyline. Sometimes this focus on narrative is essentially unavoidable -- take Asimov's Foundation Series. The work spans thousands of years, and no one character could remain alive long enough to resolve its conflicts.Gregory Benford, then, might be considered an exception to the rule. He tries, and many would say succeeds, to give his characters a certain equality with the narrative. Eater does this adroitly, with as much of the conflict resulting from the tension between Benjamin and Channing Knowlton and Kingsley Dart as from the events surrounding them.
This love-triangle-that-was reawakens when these three co-workers and competitors are forced to deal with an enigmatic singularity that is rapidly approaching our solar system, and which suddenly decides it's time to talk to us. Faced with this unfathomable intelligence and its uncertain plans regarding Earth, the three members of this triangle are forced to combine their intellects and experience in a time of unique crisis.
When they first discover this wandering black hole and see it "eating" asteroids and other space debris, the competition, especially between Benjamin and Kingsley, is damaging and counter-productive to the interests of research. But when it becomes clear that this Eater is in some way sentient, and that it perhaps would like a taste of our solar system, it is these three individuals who help formulate Earth's response and seek to ensure that, however Eater satisfies its hunger, there will be some of us left to remember it and carry on.
And their story doesn't take place in a vacuum either. In fact, Benford does a masterful job of depicting the academic versus political worlds and how they both react to a potential cataclysm. The inertia and manipulation that takes place in the political realm is especially worth remembering for Americans in this election year 2000, and it is contrasted with the almost childlike awe felt by academics, who can be equally ineffective in dealing with real-life situations if they are not prodded.
All of this focus on characters does not in any way take away from the narrative itself, and Benford's newest novel is very much a story of forces greater than ourselves and how we might respond to their indifference to ensure our own survival.
In this sense, Eater is standard science fiction fare. And you certainly can partake of this meal simply to satisfy your appetite for the big and the dangerous. But if you hunger for more, there are flavours here that will challenge your palate, and which will be left for you to savour long after the actual eating is over.
— SFSite.com