Series Review: Dan Simmons' "Hyperion Cantos"

Author: Dan Simmons
Series title: Hyperion Cantos
Included novels (4):
Hyperion (1989)
Fall of Hyperion (1990)
Endymion (1997)
Rise of Endymion (1998)

Website / Wiki:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hyperion_Cantos

FLR Rating: ****1/2 (4.5 stars of 5)

Review:
Perhaps ebbing more toward Sci-Fi than fantasy, Simmons' four novels are fascinating page-turners. Hyperion won the Nebula and Locus awards, while the other three were finalists for those awards as well. Read them now.

The Basics:
Hyperion and Fall of Hyperion form a single long story; the two Endymion books complete the tale, but in a setting that is nearly 300 years later than the first. As time travel (or at least time manipulation) is a major theme across the stories, we do get several characters who appear in all four books.

The human race has extended across hundreds of worlds around the galaxy, and travels instantaneously from world to world via a device called a 'farcaster.' Set to enter this network is planet Hyperion, a mostly vacant, grassy world that is home to a collection of buildings known as the Time Tombs, where time functions abnormally. These tombs are the home of a steel-skinned, four-armed creature of death known as the Shrike. Our story focuses on seven pilgrims making the long walk to visit the Tombs; they wish to each ask the Shrike a question. One will have his wish granted, the other six will die.

As they travel, they share their backgrounds by telling their story, a la Chaucer's Canterbury Tales. (In particular, the stories of Father Paul Dure and of Sol Weintraub and his daughter Rachel are brilliantly written by Simmons.) Book two doesn't follow Chaucer's format, but it does complete the story, as federation CEO Meina Gladstone discovers the truth behind the farcasters, the spaceborn humans known as the Ousters, and the AI known as The Core. Simmons gets a little wordy sometimes when discussing how the AI entities exist, and his creation of a cyborg with the personality of the poet John Keats seems a little pretentious (wouldn't you bring back the persona of someone USEFUL... Einstein, Hawking, Alexander the Great, maybe even Shakespeare?)

The two Endymion novels take place much later than the Hyperion stories. The Catholic Church, nearly a forgotten entity during Father Dure's time, is now the single most powerful force in the known galaxy (the Pax)... and they are in utter terror over a young girl, Aenea, and intend to find and kill her. Raul Endymion is conscripted to find her first and convey her to safety. Like Huckleberry Finn, they end up riding on a raft, cruising down a river connecting world to world by the now-broken farcaster portals. Pursued by the Pax, the Shrike and the Core-spawned cyborg Rhadamanth Nemes, the two travel from world to world as Aenea's power grows and rebellion against the Pax (now hopelessly in bed with The Core) increases.