Book Review: Rendezvous with Rama

A fascinating and mysterious classic of first-contact sci-fi.

Arthur C Clarke’s Rendezvous with Rama has been recommended to me a lot over the last year or so, and for good reason. It’s one of the heavy-hitters of classic science fiction, one many would consider an “essential” read. I’m not so prescriptive as that. Even though I fully believe in the benefits of reading widely, and of having a mixed repertoire of the classic and modern - especially as a writer - I also believe that people should read whatever they want to read, and not to be made to read something that doesn’t suit them. That said, Rendezvous with Rama is one I would highly recommend. After reading it, I can see why people were recommending it to me left and right. I can’t quite get over the similarities between the first three chapters of my first draft of From the Grave of the Gods to the opening three chapters of this book - a feat I achieved quite by accident. We have the observation of an extrasolar object on a parabolic trajectory through the solar system, while still out near the orbit of Jupiter, which was at first mistaken for an asteroid or comet but turns out to be an alien spacecraft, and humans go in a spacecraft of their own to explore it. That’s where the similarities end, however. Rama stays on its parabolic arc when intercepted by humans, whereas the object in my novel smashes into Mars before humans mount their expedition (and of course, I try to make it clear in my blurb that a lot of the rest of the book takes place back on Earth following the aftermath of the expedition). But as an opening concept, you’ve got to admit it’s pretty close. In my first draft, I actually had three full chapters of different characters making these observations through telescopes. But in the end, I deconstructed them and started the book with the expedition to Mars, folding the original lore into the backstory through conversations and the like. It’s a good case-study into the benefits of reading widely as an author, because on the one hand, it could very easily have come off as a rehash (though I think by some luck I managed to avoid that!). On the other hand, I’ve spent a long time in private bemoaning the fact that I couldn’t think of any comparative titles to help with marketing, when here was one all along which works fairly well - if only I had read it sooner!

Blurb

An enormous cylindrical object has entered Earth’s solar system on a collision course with the sun. A team of astronauts are sent to explore the mysterious craft, which the denizens of the solar system name Rama. What they find is astonishing evidence of a civilization far more advanced than ours. They find an interior stretching over fifty kilometers; a forbidding cylindrical sea; mysterious and inaccessible buildings; and strange machine-animal hybrids, or “biots,” that inhabit the ship. But what they don’t find is an alien presence. So who―and where―are the Ramans?

Review

Rendezvous with Rama is an excellent example of a well-researched, technical, hard sci-fi that encompasses the wonder of exploration within a tantalising mystery as the characters try to make sense of this bizarre alien world. The book raises questions about how “alien” alien can be, even given certain apparent similarities, as well as a technical exploration into the concept of an O’Neill cylinder as a habitable world - what it would look and feel like to move around in such an environment. Detailed considerations are made to Newtonian physics, such as the “southern” boundary of the Cylindrical Sea (a wide river of water circling the inside of Rama around its rotational axis) being kilometres taller than the northern, and how the external heating of Rama as it comes close to the sun affects the internal environment. I really enjoyed the sense of adventure into the uncanny, as Rama is at once familiar and totally alien, and the way in which our characters encountered and dealt with the inherent dangers of such a world is fascinating.

I found the worldbuilding generally on the human-side of things to be a little weak, but that’s not really the story’s focus, it’s just a backdrop to explain why and how humans are able to explore Rama at all. We hear humanity has colonised many of the planets and moons in the solar system by the time Rama appears, and interplanetary travel is pretty commonplace, but we don’t see much of any of it. The political meandering was interesting, but a bit on the thin side, though I did like the sequence towards the end with the Hermians. The real strength of the novel hangs on Rama as it is both itself a setting and a character in its own right. All the worldbuilding went into literally building that world and it’s marvellous.

The weakest part of the book by far were the human characters. It’s a pretty typical complaint I hear about this era of science fiction - focus on big concepts and technical stuff, but cardboard characters. I’ve complained about this myself in Asimov’s Foundation, but I didn’t find it nearly as egregious here. In fact they at least each had something to distinguish them - hobbies and interests, slightly different personalities that shone through their staunch professionalism. But none of them were particularly deep, at least not to the extent to make the novel character-driven by any means. And Commander Norton’s attitudes towards women are… sigh. I get that it was a different time when this was written, I really do. But there were some parts - such as introducing the first female crewmember by first describing her boobs - that felt kind of unnecessary, even out-of-place. They’re fairly minor complaints, to be fair. Acknowledge, eye-roll, move on.

Pacing-wise, the book was easy to read. Very short chapters helped in this regard, and I never felt like anything got really bogged down despite how much it focused on the science of things. On the contrary, that’s what made this book really interesting. There was always something new and fascinating being discovered inside Rama, and the ending was exactly the climax the book needed. It was spectacular.

So overall I would really recommend this one. I thoroughly enjoyed the read both for the story itself, and for how it fascinated me as an author.