So, I’ve been struggling to read Ringworld for a while now. Really, a more apt phrase would be ‘slog through Ringworld.’ I’m just not digging it a great deal. Granted, I’ve been busy reading some other things, quite a bit of which is for college, so it takes precedence over enjoyment reading. However, I have enough time to do a little enjoyment reading every day, and I’ve just not been using it on Ringworld.
After reading Lucifer’s Hammer, I expected Ringworld to be of a similar style. Not exactly the same, because Lucifer’s Hammer was set basically in present day, whereas Ringworld is set far in the future. But just a similar feel. Thus far I’ve been let down on that expectation. I think that maybe I fall into the group of ‘soft’ science fiction fans. I enjoy science fiction, but I’m more concerned about relationships, politics, economics, etc. in the galaxy / universe. Tech interests me, but honestly, I just don’t really care about a scientifically-solid explanation. There seems to be quite a bit of those in Ringworld. For me, long, drawn out explanations of something, often-times with scientific notation galore in it, along with a healthy dose of math, do two things for me:
- They break the flow of the story. It’s kind of like reading a fiction book, and one of the characters is in the kitchen cooking. Okay, cool, what are they cooking? Steak? Pork chops? Great, that’s fine, you can say what they’re cooking, but I don’t want a 2 page recipe for it. Drop it in and keep the story moving.
- They confuse me. I’m reading fiction for enjoyment. I don’t really want to have to reread a paragraph 4 times to get a vague idea of what they’re talking about.
Obviously, that second complaint is extremely subjective (actually, both are, but #2 moreso than #1, I think). I know very little about science, and even less about physics, so having a page-long explanation of orbiting the Ringworld or whatever is just frustrating. Personally, I’d just prefer they say they’re orbiting such-and-such, and get a move on with the story. 
For someone who’s really into hard science, such expositions are probably enjoyable. For me, they’re just kind of ‘blah.’
I’m going to keep slogging through and see if it picks up. I’m around page 150 right now, and thus far I’ve had mixed feelings. Some of it’s neat, others are kind of so-so, and others are just frustrating / annoying (see above).
I definitely was expecting a “wow” experience after loving every moment of Lucifer’s Hammer.
I’m a bit past the half point now, and enjoying it. I do agree that specifically the talk about the way to orbit/approach the Ringworld seemed a bit much, but other than that it’s seemed alright. Maybe I just have a higher tolerance for that sort of thing, though. I will say that it seems the character relationship, and even politics to some extent, have picked up a bit… but really I’m not that much further than you so I have no idea what it will all amount to.
However, based on this stuff allow me to make a book dis-recommendation: Rendezvous with Rama. I went into reading it knowing jack-squat about it, and while it was fairly short and I found it interesting, it was chock-full of what you’re disliking. In short a large alien artifact enters the solar system, the only ship that can really reach it is assigned to check it out, and they do so. The majority of the book is about their investigation of it and trying to piece together an idea of what this alien culture was like.
Actually I was thinking of making a completely different Ringworld observation to you. It makes me think of that Don S. Davis interview snippet. It seems Ringworld was published in 1970. Can you imagine what an attempt of it on film would’ve been like at the time?
To go on yet another tangent… the first Dune book confused me, though in a somewhat different way. Not because it tried too hard to explain things, but because it seemed to try _not_ to. So for much of the book I was lost about some of the specifics. However, I decided to check out the next anyway since it’s such a highly-regarded series… and quite enjoyed it (and the further ones) more. I guess piecing together the rules the fictional world played by were an initial high cost of entry for enjoyment.
So I thought it worthwhile to mention that in my further reading, whenever something is explained in some detail, I think of it as a “Teeters roadblock”.
Lol. I’m not sure whether to be flattered or insulted, or perhaps a bit of both.
I’m a bit further along now. They’ve (crash) landed on the Ringworld, and are now kind of puttering about, trying to figure out what to do. I’m starting to enjoy it a bit more. I’m still trying to wrap my head around ‘drinking bulbs’, but overall I’m digging it a bit more.
If there’s something it took me a while to wrap my head around, it was a longevity that allowed a man to have a romantic relationship with a woman, and later her great-granddaughter.
Yeah, that’s a bit odd as well.
Another thing that I didn’t fully understand was their ship. It was hit by something, which blasted away all of the stuff on the outside, right? Leaving the General Products hull, which is indestructible, right? So how did they keep manuevering? How do you make a little pod change direction if all of the stuff on the outside has been blasted away?
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