The Ringworld Engineers: The Ringworld Series, Book 2

A continuation of the Ringworld series. Fun read.

The RIngworld and sequels is a classic, considered a must read in some circles. I'd avoided them sort of by accident due to simply being busy with other things when they came to mind in the past. Finally I bought the Kindle version of Ringworld and eventually found an afternoon to read it. It was OK, not great but really pretty OK for an old-timey SciFi book.Since it was on my mind, I immediately got this book, 'The Ringworld Engineers'. It was a fast read and sort of fun, but just partway through I started to see a lot of holes in the fabric of the tale. I clamped down like a pitbull and finished it, but I'm out, no more Ringworld for me. I don't want to spoilerize it but let's just say a lot of the details of the future worlds in Ringworld just have not aged well, and a lot of the suspension of disbelief points that have to be glossed over to explain why things get done the way they get done become difficult to overlook.The fascination with interspecies sex was pretty baffling and served no purpose that I could see. Hand waving it away as 'birth control' on a platform with essentially infinite living space just made it even more nonsensical. I think it had to have been thrown in there to appeal to 15 year old boys in the age before internet porn.After a while it was eye-roll after eye-roll as I waded to the end, which was also pretty unsatisfying.In summary, I wish I'd read the first book and stopped. I'm stopped now.Giving 4 stars as a gift, if it wasn't Niven I'd be hard pressed to give it 2.

I have been in love the "Tales of Known Space" since I was a young girl. Niven actually built an entire world inside his stories, both large and small.But after listening to the Audible version of this book, I could barely get through even the sample of the book because listening to the narrator was a lot like biting on aluminum foil, or sliding down Olympus Mons by your fingernails with a ground made of chalkboard. So I decided that I could forgo the spoken version in lieu of own imagination, as disappointing a choice this was.However, I've never heard of this editing company before I saw this ebook, and, upon looking into it after being repeatedly insulted by such poor editorship, I looked online, on its "website," it honesty like it operates out of someone's basement.The reason I removed a star from this book is because of the fact that this ebook has the worst editing I've ever seen in my life! As I looked at the photos of this Mickey Mouse operation, it shows two people at cheap desks, and it's hard not to think that that they might be relatives of Mr. Niven who who received a "gimme" because of their close family ties, as the site is so cheaply made that's it's easy to believe that these two -- a teenager and his "Mom" perhaps? -- because no professional company would ever release such printed drivel and expect to remain in operation in the world of print. I wonder why Tor was not the printing company...The word "you" is the most battered, coming out as "yon," other words are either spelled incorrectly because of the normal location-based keyboard accidents, but for others, there simply is NO explanation for how any typist could have tapped most of these words into a line. And worst of all, some mistakes are SO incorrect that, unless you have a vocabulary that's extremely well versed in not just SciFi but in Known Space, you will likely end up not having the slightest idea what the writer is saying!If you can find this book from any OTHER editing company, I suggest you do so!

The book is a continuation of the first part of Ringworld series with story going on 23 years later. The style is very similar to the first volume, however, it seemed to me that there is a little room for suprises and unexpected changes in the story line as we already know something about the Ringworld from the previous book. For this reason, the story is sometimes rather boring and too long. There is a lot of inter-stories before we come to something interesting and important. The book is divided into three parts and the second one seemed to me unnecessary (just filling stuff). However, overall I enjoyed the book.Note that it is necessary to read the Ringworld first, otherwise it is almost impossible to understand what is going on.

Builds on previous story, excellent progression . Larry Niven has a marvelous vision of the universe. The one we experience and the one he imagined.

The adventure races by at a fast clip. The story occasionally jumps about without preamble making me reread parts,without being able to find any segway.

Why in the world would Kindle would only have volumes1,2,and 4? How disappointing!I'll buy the rest of the series when part 3 is published on Kindle.So, anyone listening?

I had read these books many years ago, and I still find them exciting to read. Having the storyline and characters continue in this book is great. Read this book only after reading Ringworld. The first book much better lays out what this universe is abiut.

Since the first book Louis Wu has degenerated into a pleasure addicted dropout, whilst Speaker-to-Animals has got his name and his harem of females and Nessus too has his mate and children. But Nessus’ mate, the ‘Hindmost,’ deposed leader of the Puppeteers, is determined to return to the Ringworld to acquire technology that will ensure his return to power. To this end he kidnaps both Louis and Speaker, now Chmeee, and together they return to the Ringworld.As before Niven tells a cracking tale of adventure in the strange environs of the Ringworld. This time, having had many of his scientific faux pas corrected by his various fans, the science is significantly more robust, which was a great relief to me as the multiple small (and stupid) science and maths errors in the previous book were a source of considerable irritation. However this time his characters were pretty dreadful; Chmeee is far more single minded than in the previous book making him much less interesting, the Hindmost seems to flip from dominant to underling as required by the plot and Louis is presented this time as pretty much omniscient (though not omnipotent), with solutions for everything. Sadly Niven’s characters in this book, both main and subsidiary, have become two dimensional cardboard cut-outs and completely unbelievable. And what is with Niven’s obsession with rishathra, interspecies sex used to cement deals between different species? Not mentioned once in the previous book here it appears in almost every chapter, serving, despite its avowed negotiating function in the book, no real purpose except possibly to titillate Niven’s audience.Though fewer than in the previous book, there were still numerous inconsistencies. For example; early in the book he has mines on the Ringworld, despite the fact that there is only a thin covering of rock and soil over the base scrith material from which the Ringworld is constructed, a fact that he later acknowledges with “They'd be lucky to have anything left to mine. For half a million years they had been confined to one world, a world whose surface ended a few hundred feet down.” And yet all the various species seem to be able to produce metals to use in construction, with the only source mentioned being mining rather than recycling. As I said; inconsistencies.On the plus side Niven is once again sufficiently mesmerising in the shear breadth of his imagination that it’s not too hard to forgive the many flaws. I enjoyed the book but because of those flaws could not give it more than three stars.

The sequel to the wonderful Ringworld, 'Engineers' continues the adventures of the human Louis Wu, the Kzin Speaker to Animals (now named Chmeee), kidnapped and brought back to Ringworld by the erstwhile Hindmost of the puppeteers to try to nab Ringworld technology. Ringworld Engineers evokes the same sense of wonder as the first novel, providing greater detail (and also th creators) of the vast artefact.Highly recommended

Of all of Niven's Ringworld novels, this is my favourite. It's got a scope larger than the first book, a faster pace, better science, more interesting and well developed characters, even Louis is given a significant boost of nuance, but for all that it doesn't lose the awe-inspiring scope of the original or the ever-so-slightly tongue-in-cheek aspects that creep into Niven's work from time to time.I've given it 5 starts because I first read it something like twenty years ago and I've just re-read it now and I still thoroughly enjoyed it, even after filling the intervening time with other writers, though if I'm being totally brutal, it maybe should only have four when you compare it to more contemporary stuff from other writers.

I've just re-read Ringworld and this sequel several decades after the first time, and still enjoyed them both.The big problem this time round is that I'm using my Kindle, and the number of basic typos in the Kindle edition of Engineers is truly staggering ! I counted at least one per page, but I diligently made a note of each one & logged them. I haven't a clue whether someone at Amazon actually really DOES take note of reported errors and actions them, but I certainly hope so !

As sequels go Ringworld engineers is a good book, but it's not as engaging a read as Ringworld. Most of the characters from the original are back for this follow-up, but it does feel very much like it was never intended and it's an add on rather than the conclusion of, or continuation of the first. After reading some of the reviews for later books i decided not to go any further than this book as I didnt want to ruin what is essentially a great story. If you liked ringworld, then you will like this, if you though ringworld was ok, but nothing special then i wouldnt bother.