The Light of Other Days
Stephen Baxter
Arthur C. Clarke
In the most exciting SF collaboration ever, Arthur C. Clarke and his acknowledged heir Stephen Baxter pool talent and unprecedented cosmic insights as well as page-turning plotting skills and breathlessly good writing to produce the most awesome novel of the future since 2001: A Space Odyssey.’Space is what keeps everything from being in the same place. Right?’ With these words Hiram Patterson, head of the giant media corporation OurWorld, launches the greatest communications revolution in history. With OurWorld’s development of wormhole technology, any point in space can be connected to any other, faster than the speed of light. Realtime television coverage is here: earthquakes and wars, murders and disasters can be watched, exactly as they occur, anywhere on the planet.Then WormCams are made to work across time as well as space. Humanity encounters itself in the light of other days. We witness the life of Jesus, go to the premiere of Hamlet, solve the enigmas that have baffled generations. Blood spilled centuries ago flows vividly once more – and no personal treachery or shame can be concealed.But when the world and everything in it becomes as transparent as glass and there are no more secrets, people find new ways to gain vengeance and commit crime. And Hiram Patterson meanwhile will try to keep his deadly schemes secret – but even he, its creator, cannot anticipate the power of the all-seeing WormCam.
The Light of Other Days
Arthur C. Clarke & Stephen Baxter
Copyright (#ulink_d1dbbf8b-68f4-50e6-9561-1038b3029d08)
HarperVoyager
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First published in Great Britain by Voyager 2000
Copyright © Arthur C. Clarke and Stephen Baxter 2000
Cover design by Mike Topping © HarperCollinsPublishers Ltd 2016
Cover image © Shutterstock.com (http://www.Shutterstock.com)
The Author asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work
A catalogue copy of this book is available from the British Library
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Source ISBN: 9780002247535
eBook Edition © SEPTEMBER 2010 ISBN: 9780007379514
Version:2016-05-20
Dedication (#ua5dff630-803c-5f3f-9420-ed5de1085f67)
To Bob Shaw
Epigraph (#ua5dff630-803c-5f3f-9420-ed5de1085f67)
Is it not possible – I often wonder – that these things we have felt with great intensity have an experience independent of our minds; are in fact still in existence? And if so, will it not be possible, in time, that some device will be invented by which we can tap them?…instead of remembering here a scene and there a sound, I shall fit a plug into the wall; and listen in to the past…
– Virginia Woolf (1882-1941)
Table of Contents
Cover Page (#ufb668102-86ea-5bba-a05f-a1530e9c3b7e)
Title Page (#u841d25da-a8ac-58b8-9a5c-dbaf477db44d)
Copyright (#u38932401-c90b-51aa-a129-37e8049f5d52)
Dedication (#u011dc4f0-c87b-5288-bcc0-0dcfdd8aafe4)
Epigraph (#u34ecae45-9a39-5ef9-987c-455ec7b076c5)
ONE: THE GOLDFISH BOWL (#u45303455-ead3-5aed-93c2-0d5207535901)
Prologue (#ud935ec4c-5fdc-55d3-9a7f-cd0b0ea84196)
CHAPTER 1 The Casimir Engine (#u26eea020-b7b0-5cab-b9c2-55686959911b)
CHAPTER 2 The Mind'sEye (#u7d34ecb1-180a-583c-ace6-6bd6918cacd8)
CHAPTER 3 The Wormworks (#uf8b41a35-2971-5dbd-9f62-9896d3370bc5)
CHAPTER 4 Wormwood (#ua5666008-cc65-5c25-8465-72e08aa53267)
CHAPTER 5 Virtual Heaven (#u90d80afe-6808-5e00-9f7a-9bf6fe5eefa9)
CHAPTER 6 The Billion Dollar Pearl (#ud31bd816-69cf-5b7e-9229-775b7a61864c)
CHAPTER 7 The WormCam (#u09a7b9ac-f41d-5d2c-9501-7a1acb303953)
CHAPTER 8 Scoops (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER 9 The Agent (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER 10 The Guardians (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER 11 The Brain Stud (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER 12 Spacetime (#litres_trial_promo)
TWO: THE EYES OF GOD (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER 13 Walls of Glass (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER 14 Light Years (#litres_trial_promo)
