It might seem a little odd to suggest, after finishing up a 638-page paperback that could have been much shorter without losing impact, that David Brin is an author with admirable restraint, but I'm writing this review with that thought very much in mind. 'The Uplift War' is the third novel set in a rich universe that's focused on a fantastic science fiction concept, that of biological uplift, the use of genetic manipulation to raise species to sentience, but he's only written three more since, even though he's built quite the expansive bibliography.

What's more, it's a standalone novel, as indeed were its two predecessors. 'Sundiver' was a novel of strong imagination, especially for a debut, but it's clearly the work of an author in the process of honing his skill. 'Startide Rising', which won the Hugo Award for Best Novel in 1984, is a peach of a book, telling a very different story within that same universe and exploring the uplift concept in a mature way against an excellent backdrop of adventure. I liked the one and loved the other but was eager to dive into this third book, which also won the Hugo, four years on in 1988.

And here I want to know more, which means that I may well dive into the 'Uplift Trilogy' that told a single story across three volumes in the nineties. The story of the Streaker, that neo-dolphin ship that sparked such galactic response in 'Startide Rising' is only mentioned in passing here but has a prominent place somewhere in that trilogy. I want know what happens to it and what really lies behind the secrets that it inadvertently stumbled upon. I didn't get those answers here. They may or may not be found in the 'Uplift Trilogy' but I can't help but wonder why Brin didn't milk a series that had brought him two Hugos in three books and had so much potential for exploration.

Compare with Orson Scott Card, for instance, who won two of the three Hugos given out between Brin's pair of wins. His were for the first two novels in the 'Enderverse', not as immediately rich a universe as Brin's but which he's expanded on in a whole slew of directions over the years, so that 'The Last Shadow', which I reviewed last month, wraps up more than one strand of novels amongst the sixteen novels, two novellas and one collection published thus far. I respect Brin for expanding his universe without letting it dominate his career.

This time, we're on a planet named Garth, previously leased to the Bururalli, who weren't uplifted well and so devolved and ruined its ecosystem. That was fifty thousand years ago and now humans are there, a wolfling clan in the eyes of the galactics, who are given leases only to planets deemed this hopeless for colonisation. The events of 'Startide Rising' have shaken up that balance though and now the Gubru, a species of intelligent alien birds, invade Garth in order to hold it hostage as a bargaining chip in learning whatever secrets the Streaker uncovered. And that's the novel.

Well, it's not quite that simple, but it pretty much is. We leased Garth and we've been doing what we can to restore it to health but now the Gubru have taken over and we want it back. Six hundred pages later, we see how that went. As a war story, it's occasionally fascinating for tactical reasons, but its true value doesn't lie there. It's never going to be seen as one of the great science fiction war novels, because the war for Garth is over almost as soon as it begins and becomes a battle of resistance. The Gubru overwhelm our meagre spacefleet and drench the occupied areas of Garth with a gas that incapacitates human beings. For a novel all about humanity's ever-shifting place in galactic culture, it contains precious few humans.

And that's what makes this special, as it made 'Startide Rising' special, because it's told through a range of perspectives that aren't ours. In fact, the most prominent human in the story, because he figures out how the gas is being targetted and how to avoid it ongoing, moves away from being an overt human as the book progresses. He's Robert Oneagle, the son of the planetary coordinator of Garth, and he spends a good part of this novel in Tarzan mode, sometimes literally, but he also builds a relationship with an alien, Athaclena, the daughter of the Tymbrimi ambassador, and the connection between them changes both greatly.

Both are worthy characters, but their plot strand are far from the only ones here. There's another that follows Athaclena's father, Uthacalthing, who fails to leave Garth when the Gubru arrive but, in the manner of the Tymbrimi, has a long game to play that involves practical jokes. He spends a majority of the book in the company of the Thennanin ambassador to Garth, Kault, as they travel on foot from their wrecked ship back to civilisation. Those sections seem skippable until we grasp what Brin is actually doing and realise how important Uthacalthing is to the big picture. I almost want to re-read immediately with that in mind, especially as one notable pun that I won't spoil is enough to suggest that parallel between this character and the author who created him.

And there are plenty of strands focused on neo-chimps, the first client species that we uplifted to sentience. They aren't affected by the gas that takes out the humans on Garth and the Gubru fail to realise how advanced they've become in a mere few centuries, thus consistently underestimate them. My favourite character here is surely Fiben Bolger, a neo-chimp who serves as a pilot in the military on Garth. His pivotal story arc interacts with almost everyone else's and so makes him an important link between everything that goes on, whether he's leading the way or not.

Then there are the Gubru, whose society is fascinating, and their own client species, the Kwackoo. We're given plenty of chapters from their perspective, especially focused on the most important of them, the three Suzerains appointed to the Triumvirate as representatives of the military, the church and the bureaucracy. They run things together until they reach clear consensus, when one of them ascends physically to queen and the others can mate with her. Between Gubru, Tymbrimi and Thennanin, there are more important Galactic characters here than humans, even before we factor in the neo-chimps and the neo-gorillas, who play a pivotal role beyond that pun.

I've enjoyed all three of these standalone Uplift novels, but in different ways. I found 'Sundiver' a fascinating debut novel. It's wildly ambitious and it doesn't succeed at everything it tries, but it's a blast seeing how Brin works through so many different concepts his first time out. My favourite of the three is 'Startide Rising', because I was enthralled not just by the concepts but by the tense action adventure that frames them. This time, I enjoyed the deep dive into client species and how they think, along with a solid look at multiple galactic species and how they think too. This is sheer worldbuilding and its majestic stuff, even if it is long. ~~ Hal C F Astell

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