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Overview
Isaac Asimov's Foundation Trilogy is one of the highwater marks of science fiction.The monumental story of a Galactic Empire in decline and a secret society of scientists who seek to shorten the coming Dark Age with tools of Psychohistory, Foundation pioneered many themes of modern science fiction.Now, with the approval of the Asimov estate, three of today's most acclaimed authors have completed the epic the Grand Master left unfinished.
The Second Foundation Trilogy begins with Gregory Benford's Foundation's Fear, telling the origins of Hari Seldon, the Foundation's creator. Greg Bear's Foundation and Chaos relates the epic tale of Seldon's downfall and the first stirrings of robotic rebellion. Now, in David Brin's Foundation's Triumph, Seldon is about to escape exile and risk everything for one final quest-a search for knowledge and the power it bestows. The outcome of this final journey may secure humankind's future-or witness its final downfall...
Synopsis
Isaac Asimov's Foundation Trilogy is one of the highwater marks of science fiction.The monumental story of a Galactic Empire in decline and a secret society of scientists who seek to shorten the coming Dark Age with tools of Psychohistory, Foundation pioneered many themes of modern science fiction.Now, with the approval of the Asimov estate, three of today's most acclaimed authors have completed the epic the Grand Master left unfinished.
The Second Foundation Trilogy begins with Gregory Benford's Foundation's Fear, telling the origins of Hari Seldon, the Foundation's creator. Greg Bear's Foundation and Chaos relates the epic tale of Seldon's downfall and the first stirrings of robotic rebellion. Now, in David Brin's Foundation's Triumph, Seldon is about to escape exile and risk everything for one final quest-a search for knowledge and the power it bestows. The outcome of this final journey may secure humankind's future-or witness its final downfall...
Publishers Weekly
With the permission of the estate of Isaac Asimov, Gregory Benford (Foundations Fear), Greg Bear (Foundation and Chaos) and Brin, collectively billed as the Killer Bs, took on the Second Foundation Trilogy. Unhappily, Brins preachy, gelatinous conclusion deserves another Bfor Boring. Having followed the adventures of the galactic Foundation founder, Hari Seldon, in previous volumes, Asimov aficionados here find Seldon retired, aged, infirm and on the brink of death. Then a chance encounter with a low-level bureaucrat stimulates Seldon into creaky action against chaos, a mental disease afflicting all humanity. Seldon travels fitfully through an upside-down universe 20,000 years into mankinds future, when humans have become impotent, amnesiac creator-gods. Their creations, Asimovs positronic robots led by the enigmatic R. Daneel Olivaw, really control the universe. Brin (The Postman, etc.) resurrects many characters from the five previous Foundation volumes, but their lack of vitality makes these featureless humans as bland as robots. And he divulges these characters secrets in laborious sociological theorizing little better than a thin stream of platitudes. After so much recycling of Asimovs original, the wear and tear is showing, badly, but enough loose plot ends dangle to suggest that yet more sequels may be coming, someday. (May)
Editorials
From Barnes & Noble
The Barnes & Noble ReviewA Second Foundation Is Set
Isaac Asimov's original Foundation trilogy is rightfully hailed as one of the classic cornerstone series of SF; in 1965 it even won the author a prestigious Hugo Award for "Best All-Time Series." Taking up where the late great master left off, a second Foundation trilogy has been completed by bestselling modern authors Gregory Benford Foundation's Fear , Greg Bear Foundation and Chaos , and now David Brin, who delivers the concluding chapter, Foundation's Triumph .
For those unfamiliar with the series, here's a little background: Humanity constitutes a vast galactic empire so widespread and chaotic that it is doomed to crumble and leave the governments and cultures of 25 million worlds in utter ruin, paving the way for a dark age of barbarism that will last centuries. Hari Seldon, a brilliant mathematician, is the only man capable and willing to do what must be done in order to avert such a disaster. He is the "father" of psychohistory, a science/philosophy capable of scientifically predicting the far future. Hari creates the Encyclopedia Galactica, a storehouse of data that will contain the vast knowledge of all of humanity. A race of immortal robots is also doing all it can to aid the long-term interests of the human race, sometimes working with Hari but more often than not simply using him for itsr own ends. Hari's "Foundation" for a better tomorrow will be carried on by future generations, including his own granddaughter, Wanda, and others known as "The Fifty."
In Foundation's Triumph we discoverthatHari Seldon, now quite elderly, is prepared to die: His Foundation is doomed to fail, but he's already provided for that fact. The Fifty will ensure that a superior second Foundation will prevail. Still, Hari is haunted by the concept of chaos planets — worlds that originally draw the brightest and most artistic people to them for a renaissance of art and science, but which eventually lead to debauchery and apathy. These worlds might disrupt his plans, and despite his long-range designs, he has many doubts. When a young mathematician named Horis Antic developes a new theory that deals with cosmic currents and how they affect the soil of worlds and the evolution of planetary life, Hari is off on one last wild adventure.
Also involved here is Dors Venabili, Hari's robot wife, who was forced to leave her husband for the greater good of humanity, as dictated by the 20,000-year-old robot, Daneel Olivaw. Daneel has been planning in secret to create Galaxia, an expansive universal intelligence that will watch over humankind. However, also at work behind the scenes is Lodovic Trema, the robot who is no longer a robot, a rebel free from robotic laws and in essence "human," who feels that humanity would be better off without Daneel overseeing its interests.
Brin has created the most human volume of either Foundation series, with a huge cast of characters who emote, react, fear, loathe, waver, and desire throughout. Brin was in the unenviable position of tying up an enormous and complex narrative saga spanning 20 centuries into the future and another 20 into the past. The author should be commended for realizing that the only way to draw all the elements together is by focusing on the emotional underpinning of the main characters as the Foundation looms closer. Brin skillfully and cleverly weaves the complexities of plot of an entire, lengthy historical chronicle into a relatively short novel that brims with imaginative energy and impassioned resolve. Foundation's Triumph is an ambitious, fascinating conclusion that will astound and satisfy fans of the original novels.
—Tom Piccirilli
Publishers Weekly -
With the permission of the estate of Isaac Asimov, Gregory Benford (Foundations Fear), Greg Bear (Foundation and Chaos) and Brin, collectively billed as the Killer Bs, took on the Second Foundation Trilogy. Unhappily, Brins preachy, gelatinous conclusion deserves another Bfor Boring. Having followed the adventures of the galactic Foundation founder, Hari Seldon, in previous volumes, Asimov aficionados here find Seldon retired, aged, infirm and on the brink of death. Then a chance encounter with a low-level bureaucrat stimulates Seldon into creaky action against chaos, a mental disease afflicting all humanity. Seldon travels fitfully through an upside-down universe 20,000 years into mankinds future, when humans have become impotent, amnesiac creator-gods. Their creations, Asimovs positronic robots led by the enigmatic R. Daneel Olivaw, really control the universe. Brin (The Postman, etc.) resurrects many characters from the five previous Foundation volumes, but their lack of vitality makes these featureless humans as bland as robots. And he divulges these characters secrets in laborious sociological theorizing little better than a thin stream of platitudes. After so much recycling of Asimovs original, the wear and tear is showing, badly, but enough loose plot ends dangle to suggest that yet more sequels may be coming, someday. (May)VOYA
Hari Seldon, the developer of the master plan that is to save humanity from thirty millennia of Dark Ages, is now old and frail, his work supposedly over. He is persuaded to take one last journey into space to search for that elusive answer to a problem that has haunted him all his life. The journey is interrupted time and time again by different factions of humans and robots, each of whom kidnap Hari and his companions until being outmaneuvered or killed by the next faction. All of them want Hari to help them or vindicate their position. All think they have the answer to preserving humanity forever, but they differ on how to do it. In the end, it is the robot charged with protecting humanity, Daneel Olivaw, who will shape the future as he sees fit. Three hard SF luminaries, Gregory Benford (Foundation's Fear [Harper, 1998]), Greg Bear (Foundation and Chaos [HarperPrism, 1998]), and David Brin have undertaken to complete Isaac Asimov's epic Foundation series. They all chose to focus on the mature Hari Seldon. All are novels of ideas, not action. They are not driven by plot or characterization, but by cosmic questions. There is no need to push this book to the Foundation's many older teen fans; that series is perennially popular. At the same time, no one unfamiliar with the earlier books will plow through this philosophical treatise, which is long on words and short on action. VOYA Codes: 3Q 2P S A/YA (Readable without serious defects; For the YA with a special interest in the subject; Senior High, defined as grades 10 to 12; Adult and Young Adult).Library Journal
Near the end of his life's work, an aging Hari Seldon embarks on one final adventure that may reveal to him the ultimate secrets necessary to the unfolding of his grand plan for the future. Veteran sf author Brin (The Postman, 1985) combines a sense of completion with one of several possible new beginnings in his conclusion of a new trilogy set in the world made popular by the late Isaac Asimov's "Foundation" and "Robot" novels. Along with the other two volumes in the trilogy--Gregory Benford's Foundation's Fear (LJ 3/15/97) and Greg Bear's Foundation and Chaos (HarperCollins, 1998)--this title deserves a wide readership and belongs in most sf collections. Copyright 1999 Cahners Business Information.Steven H. Silver
David Brin has provided a worthy successor to Asimov's works in the form of Foundation's Triumph. What Brin seems to have done, is gone back and re-read the 14 novels and myriad short stories Asimov wrote, along with the related novels written by Roger MacBride Allen, Gregory Benford and Greg Bear...With master-craftsman skill, Brin has managed to write a relatively short novel which addresses all of these issues and provides reasonable explanations for nearly all of them... Brin has incorporated enough aspects of Asimov's earlier works that fans might even want to have copies of Asimov's books on hand so they can flip through to find the references...Brin has proven that there are authors who can handle Asimov's material with his voice and add to his legacy.— SF Site