12) Blindsight, by Peter Watts

Next up in my set of this year’s Hugo nominees. Lots of Stuff here: a crew of five almost-human specialists is sent out to investigate a vast alien artifact which has appeared in the vicinity of the Solar System, with shades of Hyperion, Rendezvous with Rama, and lots and lots of ideas about the physical nature of consciousness and perception, tied up with a damaged and therefore probably unreliable narrator. There’s enough here to keep specialists or enthusiasts in that field very happy. Myself, I found the beginning too rushed; I could have done with a decent expository chapter, or even some good old-fashioned info-dumping, to get me on track earlier. Also the author has a scholarly afterword written with welcome flashes of wit and humour, which sadly did not leak into the pages of the novel itself. Not bad, though.