Locations in Revelation Space
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These are locations and places featured Revelation Space series of stories and novels.
See also: List of Revelation Space locations
Contents |
[edit] Monument to the Eighty
The Monument to the Eighty is a fictitious monument appearing in several of Alastair Reynolds' novels. It is first encountered in Revelation Space, and is described as a monument commemorating the self-sacrifice of eighty volunteers of a scientific experiment led by the character Calvin Sylveste (who was one of the eighty himself).
The goal of the experiment was to map the complete neural structure of the human brain into a computer, making the computer a host for the mind in question. This would preserve the mind and memories, while the scanned person would be run as a simulation. The volunteers died as a result of the "brain-scanning" and many of the simulations crashed shortly after, hence a monument was built in their honour.
[edit] Chasm City
This is the largest settlement on Yellowstone. When the Amerikanos originally settled the system by robot, the location of Chasm City (a huge crater spewing unusual gases) was spotted. The crater and gases help to provide a breathable atmosphere for the city that is contained underneath 18 huge biodomes know collectively as "The Mosquito Net".
Chasm City became one of humanity's greatest achievements as the Demarchists presided over a golden age known as the Belle Epoque. During this time, the city itself and the planet's orbiting habitat system (The Glitter Band) became a humanity-wide byword for opulence, luxury and success.
This all changed however, with the onset of The Melding plague. As the buildings, implants and technology that ran Chasm City were disrupted and ran amok, the city in its current state was effectively destroyed along with its golden age. Humanity survived though, falling back onto long abandoned technology such as steam power and the city stratified itself into 2 layers; The Mulch, and The Canopy. The Mulch is a shanty town at street level where the melding plague remained rife (possibly still existent), and The Canopy being a relativley modern retreat in the topmost stratum where the rich cling to their technologically enabled lifestyle with the remnants of their nanotechnology.
[edit] Sky's Edge
Sky's Edge is a fictional planet located in the 61 Cygni system and appears in Alastair Reynolds' Revelation Space universe.
In the Revelation Space universe, Sky's Edge is the only planet to be settled by a generation ship. The planet's history is described in the book Chasm City. Before the invention of lighthugger ships, a flotilla of five generation ships (Santiago, Brasilia, Islamabad, Palestine and Baghdad) travelling at eight percent of light speed was deployed from Earth to 61 Cygni, each with 150 waking crew and just over one thousand cryogenically frozen colonists (know to the crew as momios, as a Spanish-based calque of the word mummies). The planet was named after Sky Haussmann, a man who caused the Santiago to overtake the other ships and arrive first at Sky's Edge by jettisoning all of the frozen passengers, and who was later crucified for his crime.
Upon arrival at Sky's Edge, the populations of the generation ships went to war with one another, the colonists of the Santiago settling in the South and the colonists of the two other surviving ships living in the North. During the course of the journey, Sky, as captain of the Santiago, had alienated the other two ships and hostilities eventually escalated into war when they landed. The war apparently lasted until the point at which the human population of Sky's Edge was destroyed by the Inhibitors.
Sky's Edge is described as relatively backwards compared with some human worlds (though few core worlds are mentioned in anything but passing references in the novels), as it possesses little in the way of high technology and few can afford things such as the immortality treatments readily available elsewhere in colonised space. The war raging on Sky's Edge is the reason for this, the planet apparently exports little but a few biological products harvested from its extensive jungles due to its industries being devoted to the war and so trading ships only stop by about once a decade, usually after being snubbed by traders in more lucrative markets. The people of Sky's Edge rarely buy anything but weapons from the Ultra traders. Only Nueva Valparaiso has remained relatively unscathed by the war, because it is the site of a space elevator which is destroyed during the events of Chasm City; this is run by the cult of Sky Haussmann.
The ecology of Sky's Edge is superficially earthlike, as it includes recognisable plants and animals but it is said to be metabolically incompatible with Earth flora and fauna, causing fatal anaphylactic shock in any creature or person who tries to consume it.
[edit] Tangerine Dream
This is the largest Jovian Supergiant in the Yellowstone system. Antoinette Bax disposes of her fathers body in its atmosphere and first meets Clavain during the act.
