Line #44 Literature/TheEschatonSeries


1	[[quoteright:256:https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/iron_sunrise.png]]
2	A SpeculativeFiction series by Creator/CharlesStross about a universe where a godlike AI called the "Eschaton" has randomly uprooted and spread humanity across the universe. Contains two books, ''Singularity Sky'' and ''Iron Sunrise''.
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5	!! This series provides examples of:
6	* ActionGirl: Rachel Mansour.
7	* AlcubierreDrive: One of about six methods of FTL travel or communication currently in use. It's mentioned to be extremely dangerous and difficult to use.
8	* AlliterativeTitle: '''S'''ingularity '''S'''ky.
9	* BalkanizeMe: Earth is mentioned to have tens if not hundreds of thousands of states. They seem to get along, however. At one point when the New Republic is trying to establish what "nationality" Martin is, he tries to explain that they don't really think that way on Earth any more.
10	* BeamSpam: The New Republic's ships are covered with powerful LIDAR sensor grids, which double as a massive laser batteries.
11	* BigBad: In the second book, the [=ReMastered=]
12	* BittersweetEnding: In ''Iron Sunrise'', [[spoiler:disaster is averted, and Rachel gets her vengeance on the CorruptBureaucrat, but in doing so finds out that the [=ReMastered=] have infiltrated Old Earth and realizes there's a lot more work to do]]
13	** Arguably this is over-shadowed [[spoiler:by the epic Downer Ending]].
14	* {{Clownification}}: The [[EnemyMime Mimes]] are near-dead white creatures who attack their victims by [[PieInTheFace throwing nanotech pies at them]] -- the nanobots [[TheVirus transform the victim into a new Mime]], complete with pies of their own. Fortunately for those being pursued by Mimes, the nanobots also induce certain tics in those affected, who occasionally walk against the wind or get stuck in invisible boxes.
15	* CurbStompBattle - At the end of Singularity Sky [[spoiler: the Festival offhandedly eats the New Republic's entire navy. The author has compared it in interviews to a Napoleonic-era fleet of tall ships going up against a modern-day submarine.]]
16	** [[spoiler: A submarine whose automatically-launched torpedoes destroy the fleet ''before the circus-cum-sysadmin running the thing has even realised there's a threat''.]]
17	** Stross [[http://www.antipope.org/charlie/blog-static/2013/05/crib-sheet-singularity-sky.html#more says]] his inspiration for the book was the Russian Baltic fleet's 18,000-mile journey to its crushing defeat in the [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Tsushima Battle of Tsushima]] during the Russo-Japanese War. Complete with an analog of the [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dogger_Bank_incident Dogger Bank incident]].
18	* DayOfTheWeekName: Wednesday Shadowmist
19	* DeusEstMachina: The Eschaton bootstrapped itself from a telephone exchange.
20	* DoesThisRemindYouOfAnything: The Festival descends on a quiet and fairly conservative people; causes chaos in its pursuit of entertainment; is accompanied by Critics, Traders, a bewildering Fringe and terrifying [[EnemyMime Mimes]]; and finally departs as suddenly as it came, leaving the locals still wondering what happened. Charles Stross currently lives in Edinburgh.
21	** Stross [[WordOfGod confirms]] that the Festival was inspired by the real-life Edinburgh Festival in [[http://www.antipope.org/charlie/blog-static/2013/05/crib-sheet-singularity-sky.html#more this 2013 blog post]].
22	* [[spoiler:DownerEnding:]] Iron Sunrise [[spoiler:All indications show that multi-cultural space Nazis will beat an all powerful AI with a non-intervention rule so painfully it posses no memory of their existence...]]
23	* TheDragon: Portia Hoechst in ''Iron Sunrise'', as an ambitious field commander for the [=ReMastered=].
24	* EeriePaleSkinnedBrunette: Wednesday Shadowmist in ''Iron Sunrise'' - although she's pale because she wants to be. She has chromatophores in her skin which means she can change her skin color.
25	* {{Fetish}}: ''Lolitas'' are mentioned explicitly in passing and various fetishes are very explicitly mentioned in the second book. Wednesday comments on exhibitionist BDSM in progress. [[invoked]]
26	* FutureImperfect: Unsurprising, given the mess the Eschaton left behind it, but Rachel's grasp of 20th century history is a bit muddled (she compares the cruise ship she's on to an old-fashioned nuclear vessel like the ''Titanic''), and Martin comes from a "traditionalist" village in [[BalkanizeMe the People's Republic]] of [[OopNorth West Yorkshire]] where they believe that real Yorkshiremen [[ManInAKilt wear kilts]] and drink pints of Tetley's tea [[note]]Tetley, as well as being the world's second largest tea company, is also the name of an unrelated Yorkshire brewery[[/note]].
27	** It's unclear how much of the incorrect history/tradition is recognized as such by the characters themselves.
28	** At one point, Martin asks, "The UsefulNotes/ColdWar was all about who could build the biggest refrigerator, wasn't it?", but even in the immediate context it's clear he knows that's not true - he's making a joke.
29	*** [[RuleOfFunny In the next book Rachel shows a perfect understanding of what the Cold War was...]]
30	* AGodAmI: Subverted in that the Eschaton specifically [[AGodIAmNot states it is not God]] - however, it is willing to take strong, Old Testament action so that causality will not be violated.
31	** A number of the tribal communities that Eschaton recruited ''colonists'' from ignore this rule and worship Eschaton, and tend to be [[AxCrazy belligerent]] about it with those that read the Eschaton's laws as written. Warbloggers are able to make quite a living off these conflicts.
32	* AGodIAmNot: The Eschaton.
33	* HeelFaceTurn: Franz, gradually over the course of ''Iron Sunrise'', [[spoiler:because Portia killed his girlfriend, but not without leaving open the possibility of resurrecting her to make him cooperate]].
34	* InspirationNod: Having made the New Republic military a conscious parody of Napoleonic-era Prussia, Stross then gives their leader, Admiral Kurtz, the same delusion as Prussia's Generalfeldmarschall von Blucher: he believes he's pregnant with an ''elephant''.
35	* IntrepidReporter: Frank "the Nose" Johnson, whose blog has the rights to the name "The ''Times'' of London".
36	* LaResistance: The New Republic's determined attempt to recreate 19th century East European feudalism in a post-Singularity universe has naturally created one of these, with a philosophy that combines communism, anarcho-capitalism and radical transhumanism.
37	* LensmanArmsRace + SpaceColdWar: The Eschaton and [[spoiler: the [=ReMastered=]. The AI perceives time in a non-linear fashion, hence causality weapons give it a major headache. Despite this, it does not have any "Future" memories of this Nazi cult and is understandably worried, as its hinted that this is a sign that the [=ReMastered=] won their cold war. How this can happen is unusual considering that Eschaton can, and will erase threats to itself from existence.]]
38	* LukeIAmYourFather: Vassily Muller reveals that he is Burya Rubenstein's son just before trying to kill him near the end of ''Singularity Sky''.
39	* ANaziByAnyOtherName: The [=ReMastered=] are very Nazi-like - ([[spoiler:their philosophy has been "memetically engineered" from Nazism to be just as unpleasant ''without'' containing the seeds of its own destruction]].) To the point where they make ''Literature/TheDraka'' look like pleasant company.
40	** In fact, Stross's working title for the book was ''Space Nazis Must Die''.
41	* NeverBringAKnifeToAGunFight: Or, rather, "Never bring a tazer to an artillery duel."
42	* OohMeAccentsSlipping: Rachel laughs at Martin's supposed West Yorkshire accent during the lifeboat's escape.
43	* OrphanedSeries: Stross has [[http://www.antipope.org/charlie/blog-static/2010/09/books-i-will-not-write-4-escha.html explained]] that he will not be writing a third book in the series because he feels he made some mistakes so serious at the end of ''Iron Sunrise'' as to make that universe unviable.
44	* OutsideContextProblem: The Festival is definitely a threat to the New Republic, in more ways than one. However, the Republic's government & military have no idea of what the threat ''really'' is, and reflexively place the Festival in the nice, neat mental box of "enemy invasion." [[spoiler: This leads directly to the aforementioned CurbStompBattle.]]
45	* ThePurge: In ''Iron Sunrise'', Portia has all the agents who supported Vannevar Scott's rogue operation killed (at least temporarily) when she takes over his department.
46	* RodentsOfUnusualSize: The Critics are giant intelligent mole-rats.
47	* SequelHook: The end of ''Iron Sunrise'', as described in BittersweetEnding, above. Nothing will come of it, since Stross has abandoned the series.
48	* ShoutOut: Little references to other works are scattered throughout the books. At one point a wheelchair-bound character stands up and shouts, "[[Film/DrStrangelove My emperor! I can walk!]]"
49	** Brits who lived out the [[UsefulNotes/MargaretThatcher Thatcher years]] will recognize a reference to the People's Republic of ''South'' Yorkshire. (The seat held by the man who made that remark is now held by UsefulNotes/NickClegg...).
50	* SubspaceAnsible: FTL communications are possible via "causal channels," which make use of quantum-entangled particles.
51	* TheCommandments: The Eschaton gave humanity three:
52	-->I am the Eschaton. I am not your god.
53	-->I am descended from you, and I exist in your future.
54	-->Thou shalt not violate causality within my historic light cone. [[DeathFromAbove Or]] [[EarthShatteringKaboom else.]]
55	* TheSingularity: The big one was the emergence of the Eschaton. The New Republic gets another one when the Festival arrives.
56	* SlasherSmile: Portia Hoechst in ''Iron Sunrise''.
57	* TimeTravel: Used quite originally in ''Singularity Sky'' - the New Republic, thinking they are being invaded in far off world, send a fleet designed to get there just after the news of the invasion was sent from the world, so that from the perspective of the people sending the message the fleet arrives immediately. [[spoiler:It doesn't work.]]
58	* TheTrickster: The Festival is a whole ''race'' of tricksters who desire stories.
59	* SpaceIsAnOcean: Averted, much to the shame of the New Republic.
60	* StarKilling: The weapon whose test inadvertently triggers the ''Iron Sunrise''.
61	* StatusQuoIsGod: Almost literally. The ban on violating causality is a status quo engineered by the Eschaton and enforced with its godlike powers.
62	* TwoPartTrilogy: In an unusual way. Stross realized after ''Iron Sunrise'' that he had "irretrievably broken" the series's universe, so he abandoned it. However, he ''had'' intended to write a third book, and [[http://www.antipope.org/charlie/blog-static/2010/09/books-i-will-not-write-4-escha.html shared details of the plot on his blog]]. So, it's a trilogy for which the third book will never be written.
63	** The notion of the "''Space Pirates of KPMG''" eventually resurfaced in 'Literature/NeptunesBrood'', in a slightly modified form.
64	* UnitedNationsIsASuperpower: In a very peculiar way. It mostly leaves local governments on Earth alone, but it has scores of agents tasked with enforcing the laws of the Eschaton. It also a lot of pull in backwards worlds (like the New Republic) for the mythical association with EarthThatWas (which they usually can't distinguish from Earth-That-Still-Is).
65	** It should be noted that this UN is ''not'' the same organization, but rather a development of the Internet Engineering Task Force (yes) that took on the responsibilities and form of the UN after the post-Singularity Earth had settled down (i.e. suitably modified for a world of ''tens of thousands'' of polities and ''millions to billions'' of sovereign individuals, rather than 193 nation-states).
66	* YouHaveFailedMe: In ''Iron Sunrise'', Portia Hoechst strangles a subordinate who bungled his assignment to abduct Wednesday as soon as she gets him back on the ship.

Context Literature / TheEschatonSeries