2005-10-25 Lightweight Space Adventure

Having just completed the Kim Stanley Robinson "Mars" series, I was attracted to this Ben Bova title, expecting something of similar quality , but unfortunately this was not to be the case. "Venus" was a fairly insubstantial novel; the writing style was juvenile, the dialogue awkward and the characterisation cliched although ,to be fair, I think it is aimed at a different ,less discerning market than Robinson's books. On the plus side, "Venus" wasn't a bad adventure story, the scientific and technological elements of the novel were credible and by the end of the book, I felt I knew a great deal more about the planet than I had before and the kind of surprises that might lie beneath its inpenetrable clouds. Maybe someday someone will write a novel(s) about Venus to match that of Robinson's "Mars" trilogy, but this effort from Ben Bova falls well short of that benchmark.