Should you read the Hyperion Cantos? (Book 1 and 2) || Series Review || April 2022 [CC]

[@esmayrosalyne]

Even though I have seen so many people read this series, I still felt like I barely knew what it even was about. Your review was was super helpful though, I am intrigued enough to give it a shot :) Thanks for sharing your thoughts!!

[@alexforce9]

I hate it when in a futuristic settings they are talking about or quoting semi modern literature or have references to something recent to us. I think we naturaly assume that majority of those stuff will be forgoten. Like - yeah, people will keep reading War and peace 500 years into the future, but after 5000? Probably not. And how many poets that lived 500 years ago we read and talk about today? Like 10 people. Out of thousands that existed.

[@FliskerX]

First Hyperion "barely 4 star"? It's 10 out of 5! I still can't find anything like it. (Also the Audiobook version is incredible)

[@jkpiowa]

I remember trying to read the first book when I was like 12 and being so confused. I've always wanted to give it another go!🚀

[@LiteratureScienceAlliance]

I cannot imagine reading this as a kid, a lot of people have but I know for sure the writing would be too dense for me.

[@bookishbooks5412]

I read this series probably about 8 years ago and loved it but watching your video I couldn’t agree more about the “negatives” or frustrations with the book. Definitely enjoyed the second book more!

[@LiteratureScienceAlliance]

Yea its not a bad read for me but all of my negatives are why it could never be a favorite of all time.

[@SheWasOnlyEvie]

🚀 I love John Keats, but it was a bit much in The Fall of Hyperion (l loved the incorporation in Hyperion though). As Jake Bishop said, "Find you someone who loves you as much as Dan Simmons loves John Keats." Haha!

[@LiteratureScienceAlliance]

Yea I think in Hyperion I was like fine, this is dated but whatever but then in Fall of Hyperion I was like "why is this the dude the AI are obsessed with?? make it make sense!"

[@LocDBooktician]

Tunning in. I never heard of these books.

[@TheNerdyNarrative]

🛸 I don’t think this is one for me - not because of the format you mentioned about the short stories, that part actually appealed to me - I just don’t get a perky feel about the rest

[@LiteratureScienceAlliance]

Yea I feel like you would have as much fun with this as you did Memory Called Empire

[@TheNerdyNarrative]

@@LiteratureScienceAlliance rofl

[@bretgrandrath2935]

Wow, great review, I think you explained why I have never read these books. I like books with spaceships in a far flung galactic setting but I don't like looking up words in a dictionary. When it happens I say to myself "I get it, you have a thesaurus". A conifer tree is a conifer tree, (I don't read poetry but I can make a Shakespeare reference). I didn't read Hyperion when it was published or even after it won the Hugo but your review gives me no regrets. It's just not the experience I look for in my reading.

[@LiteratureScienceAlliance]

Happy to validate your choices!! Its for sure one of those reads that just won't land the same for everyone and based on what you said I don't think you would have liked this.

[@SpringboardThought]

Innnteresting. They do get so much hype. All I know about it is the author is a tool, so this was very enlightening. Thank you very much. Very helpful.

[@LiteratureScienceAlliance]

Yea... the author is a lot, but also did not want to touch that can of worms. Its funny hearing what he says not cause he would for sure hate the author of the Hyperion cantos with the themes he highlights. Like its very anti empire, imperialism and pro indigenous cultures and respective the land which I feel like are not things he actually believes anymore.

[@tebhernandez]

Whats wrong with the author? What does that have to do with the book.

[@wethefoxen4402]

🛸 I actually just finished Hyperion and it was a difficult read for me because of the different voices/styles. However, I found it was yet another one of those books that I could only appreciate once I was done and saw the whole picture. And Martin just needs to STFU!

[@mattkean1128]

🚀I see why the first book is so much more popular. The short story structure does focus it, and is an interesting story telling device. It's not complete on its own though. Fall of Hyperion needs some smoothing over, but I really liked the world it built, and it was a great marriage of plot and ideas. The further away I get the more I enjoyed it.

[@LiteratureScienceAlliance]

That's great to hear!

[@TheArtfulBrittani]

🪐 I own Hyperion, but haven't read it yet...its on my TBR for this year. I went into Dune with the same trepidation and loved it, so hoping for the same with Hyperion.

[@LiteratureScienceAlliance]

Dune is fun! I will be curious to hear how this one works for you. They have very different writing styles and tropes but I get why they are both modern classics of the genre.

[@oana-mariauliu5828]

I've read two other (very different) books by Dan Simmons and the writing itself was amazing, but the two stories were so far-fetched that I felt like banging my head against a wall. You've made me curious about Hyperion now. 😅 I've studied both Keats and Chaucer's works and I don't mind trying something tributary to them.

[@alexforce9]

What are the stories? I can google ofc but why you find them to be far fethed?

[@oana-mariauliu5828]

@@alexforce9 Children of the Night and Song of Kali Children of the Night is set in Romania immediately after the 1989 Revolution. I am Romanian myself and I am old enough to remember things quite clearly. The first part of the book, the exposition, is incredibly accurate. It renders the atmosphere very well, it's as realistic as it gets. And then we get to the part that made me roll my eyes and feel like throwing the book out the window. It's a wild ride, but like a poor quality action film - there's such a contrast between the realism of the first part and the rest of the book, which is... bananas. 😅 Song of Kali, then... Very lyrical, evocative, atmospheric... and then the scene at the airport - sorry, I can't see that happening in real life.

[@alexforce9]

@@oana-mariauliu5828 Ok, Now I will have to google the plot so I can see for myself :D

[@oana-mariauliu5828]

@@alexforce9 Or read the books - if you like his style.

[@francb1634]

I'm in the weird minority that prefers the second Hyperion duology to the first. I'm also in the even weirder and more niche minority that thinks Ilium/Olympos is Simmons' best work.

[@LiteratureScienceAlliance]

I am with you in the minority of like Endymion better but I also just feel like their projects are so different. I probably like books 3 and 4 cause I connected to the main character better and if I am remembering correctly he wasn't playing with narrative structure as much.

[@safinan8008]

Thank you for this video, I was checking out this book I will see if I purchase this series?? Happy reading to you!! 🦋📚📝

[@LiteratureScienceAlliance]

Same to you!

[@kurtjanicki7325]

Simmons could have easily dropped 100 pages from each of these novels and they would have been even better - he probably even would have won the Nebula for Fall of Hyperion if he would have dropped a lot of the unnecessary literary references.

[@marcusscribner1603]

Holy crap thought i was stupid trying to read this book. Did not understand what was happening because of words lol

[@LocDBooktician]

🚀

[@amandaluceroserenity4804]

🚀 I love the series I read them a couple of years ago.

[@derrisreaditbefore]

🌑

[@devlyn873]

🌎🚀

[@bcfortenberry]

Loved these as an adolescent, as well as some of his horror stuff like Carrion Comfort. When I read them again a few years back some of the criticisms you make here became more plain to me. The language is needlessly ornate in places to the extent that it’s a distraction. Cool ideas, though- and I dig the narrative conceit of the first book. Unfortunately, Simmons is in the Orson Scott Card category for me- an author I read when I was young that I don’t bother with now because they became regressive cranks. Still, I’d say the first book in particular is worth reading for any sci-fi fan just on the strength of execution.

[@LiteratureScienceAlliance]

Yea, I don't feel like I will ever read anything outside of the Cantos because of how the author is these days. I wish I had thought of the word ornate to describe his writing, I am always someone who values clarity over descriptive beautiful writing so his style was extra frustrating to me sometimes.

[@bcfortenberry]

@@LiteratureScienceAlliance Absolutely. Some authors (like Cormac McCarthy) make baroque stylistic choices that fundamentally increase the utility of their language. Dan Simmons gets needlessly byzantine to no discernible purpose. Your point about his use of words like gymnosperm is dead on. I’ve gotta give him some credit, though. The priest’s tale in Hyperion is some crazy effective writing for my money. Pretty sure I audibly gasped the first time I read it.

[@cipriansirbu3699]

I have read all four books last year and I liked them,almost all of them 😅.Hyperion was my absolute favourite,especially The Scholar's tale and Priest's tale,five stars.The Fall of Hyperion was a step down,didn't liked the new character (male),gave it four stars.Endymion was the weakest for me,three stars and The Rise of Endymion I liked a bit more,great love story in it 😊,four stars.I think every Scy-fi reader should at least try Hyperion Cantos,it's a representation of the classic Scy-fi genre,just like Frank's Herbert Dune.

[@amandaskelton2132]

🚀 🌏

[@chrisconnors7418]

It does feel dated. I didn’t particularly like the Hyperion book. I don’t think I read the second one. Or if I read it, it was so long ago in my teens that I’ve now forgotten it.

[@LiteratureScienceAlliance]

Fair enough!

[@oprescue999]

good review, good points. #1 is a little too much setup, but the world is really cool. I liked the different genres for each tale.

[@LocDBooktician]

I do not like when they give us action clips and the movie is not giving that

[@LiteratureScienceAlliance]

Its up there with fantasy books putting dragons on the cover and there being no dragons

[@LocDBooktician]

@@LiteratureScienceAlliance that's a thing???

[@biznis9965]

I hated book 1 with passion

[@marleens]

🚀