A First Time Reader.

[Iolanthe]

Finished A Dark and Hungry God on Friday night - what a roller coaster ride - unputdownable. I DON'T feel sorry for Milos! Can't wait until tomorrow when the last two books should arive, but, I know, I just know, that This Day All Gods Die will arrive and Chaos and Order won't!

Another question, answers in very simple language please. What exactly is "The Gap". I have an impression, but not an understanding of it. The woman whose name I forget managed to move a block of stone from one place to another and invented the gap drive. Therefore the drive enables the ship to move very long distances (light years?) which is in fact moving across time? I've seen dimension written a lot. Is moving to another dimension the same thing?

[Vraith]

Yea, it seems to be a different physical dimension with complicated relationship with "normal" space.
In my head, it's sort of like:
If you picture normal space "shape" as like a donut, physical travel has to stay in the donut and follow the rules [like speed of light]. But the Gap field allows you, instead of going around inside, to break through the crust and cross the donut hole...then break back into the donut. And exactly where you re-enter the donut depends on the state you were in when you left it [how fast, what direction you were going, how big you are, etc.]
Notice you don't ever actually travel faster than light, you just take a shortcut instead of going the long way round. [someone probably has a better visualization than mine...but hey, it works for me].

But you also don't move across time in an absolute sense, though in a relative sense there are a few time-traveling appearances/effects. For instance, you can't go back in time and kill the lion to save Daryl Hannah...but if your drive was powerful enough, and your instruments precise and sensitive enough, you could jump way out in front of the light then watch the movie being made.

[Orlion]

It's like Asimov's hyperspace. Only it drives some people insane.

[Iolanthe]

Yea, it seems to be a different physical dimension with complicated relationship with "normal" space.
In my head, it's sort of like:
If you picture normal space "shape" as like a donut, physical travel has to stay in the donut and follow the rules [like speed of light]. But the Gap field allows you, instead of going around inside, to break through the crust and cross the donut hole...then break back into the donut. And exactly where you re-enter the donut depends on the state you were in when you left it [how fast, what direction you were going, how big you are, etc.]
Notice you don't ever actually travel faster than light, you just take a shortcut instead of going the long way round. [someone probably has a better visualization than mine...but hey, it works for me].

But you also don't move across time in an absolute sense, though in a relative sense there are a few time-traveling appearances/effects. For instance, you can't go back in time and kill the lion to save Daryl Hannah...but if your drive was powerful enough, and your instruments precise and sensitive enough, you could jump way out in front of the light then watch the movie being made.

Thanks Vraith, that helps. I do like to "understand" what I'm reading about. Like Pooh, I am a woman of small brain.

[Rigel]

Like Pooh, I am a woman of small brain.

Nice reference But the fact that you're reading anything by Donaldson, let alone The GAP cycle, proves that isn't true

[Iolanthe]

Very kind, Rigel. And I think I got the quote wrong - he was a bear of "very little" brain I think.

[Lefdmae Deemalr Effaeldm]

Oh come on, Io, what are you saying about yourself? Well, looks like at least on this people around you know better: you're smart and grasp things easily. What you do have, is an inclination towards the humanitarian side, and even that can be just due to having less practice with technology and practical science. As for riddles, guessing abbreviations etc - that kind of abstract inapplicable logic is something many of the smartest people get irritated about or even hate to death) People rarely excel in the fields they don't interact with, that shouldn't be expected.

I have one more analogy for the Gap drive, perhaps it's not much needed, Vraith explained well, but may be a slightly different approximation.

Imagine people leaving in a 2-D world, as if they're drawn on a sheet of paper, moving on its surface only, like characters in an old computer game. The sheet of paper may be folded, crumpled, even made into a Moebius strip.

Two points on the surface, even the edges of the sheet, may have a millimeter of distance between them, and it's plainly visible to us 3-D dwellers, but to the 2-D creatures only clinging to their surface is possible, even if they can fold the paper, they're not able to use that. If they invent their 2-D brand of a Gap drive, they'll be able to cross the distance between the edges of their sheet of paper through the third dimension, jumping through that 1 millimeter gap.

[Vraith]

Heh, I thought [still think in part] 'ol Io was joking about the little brain thing...but if not, in line with Rigel, the only little brain thing you've said is the thing about having a little brain I think....Oh, and thinking Pooh is a woman.

[Iolanthe]

Eff, you found me out. I do tend to be a bit self effacing. But truly, when it comes to science and mathematics I am a dumbo. They made me do remedial maths at teacher training college (which I eventually left early having no talent with a whole class, but I found my niche in one to one piano teaching). Yes, when it comes to things that really interest me, I do have a brain. And I'm still willing to learn, and learning.

[Hashi Lebwohl]

Don't forget the metaphysical Gap--the seemingly-insurmountable distance from where you are now, a place where you cannot see how to solve the problems facing you, to where you wind up, the place in which you found the solutions that did not occur to you before. That distance can be more difficult to cross than travelling between stars. Just like with the physical hyperspace gap, crossing the metaphysical gap changes you and could possibly drive you insane.

[Iolanthe]

That was something I hadn't thought of, Hashi. Thanks.

Finished A Dark and Hungry God on Friday night - what a roller coaster ride - unputdownable. I DON'T feel sorry for Milos! Can't wait until tomorrow when the last two books should arive, but, I know, I just know, that This Day All Gods Die will arrive and Chaos and Order won't!

Guess what, TDAGD arrived today, C&O didn't So I've started on The Real Story again as I did get through it rather quickly the first time. I'm getting more out of it now having read the next two books, and the Ancillary bits.

Heh, I thought [still think in part] 'ol Io was joking about the little brain thing

[Lefdmae Deemalr Effaeldm]

Vraith, how could I fail to mention that...

Hashi, a very interesting parallel, right, it can be much harder.

I think mostly because for the internal problems any solutions by others or by accident don't apply much, takes own effort, sometimes even even stepping over one's self - like it's possible to accidentally mention how a heavier stone hits the opponent in the head harder, it's quite possible also to learn how that works from a book someone wrote, but takes an own decision to persuade with words instead) Another interesting sample - the distances between the sub-forums here - mere centimeters between, for instance, the Tank and the Mallory's, but the gap between them is almost uncrossable for many people.

And congratulations on your 2k posts The Mile High Club has more)

Io, on the upside, you can claim being a Seer now - or at least a person with a lot of foresight and understanding of life)

[Iolanthe]

Chaos and Order still hasn't arrived Now I'm well into Forbiden Knowledge again. Effy, I see that a dissection on chapter 1 of FK has been done and will look it tomorrow night.

[Iolanthe]

At last, Chaos and Order arrived. Just finished the first Sorus chapter.

I think I'm talking to myself here!

[Savor Dam]

I think I'm talking to myself here!

Not at all...just quietly envious of the first-time experience of these books that is now two decades behind some of us...and wishing for the time and bandwidth to go back for another reread.

[Iolanthe]

At last, Chaos and Order arrived. Just finished the first Sorus chapter.

And now I understand the gap. I was trying to imagine some sort of physical thing they were crossing, but I was wrong. The first Ancillary Documentation in Chaos & Order explains it. The gap is from where they apply the gap drive to where they stop using it - from tach to the other word beginning with "t" that I can't remember right now. From one side of the doughnut to the other, from one side of the piece of paper to the other. Simple, isn't it?

I think I'm talking to myself here!

Blimey, how did I manage that? Must have clicked on Quote instead of Edit!

[Avatar]

Entering tach and resuming tard, I believe.

--A

[Stutty]

Entering tach and resuming tard, I believe.

--A

Indeed, with their implied etymologies being tachyon ( a faster than light particle [theoretical]) and ritarddo (itallian term used in music for "slow down".)

stutt[/b]

[I'm Murrin]

Actually tachyon and tardion, and the books go into the fact that, in the Gap setting, the entire existence of tachyons and tardions was debunked but the names stuck, heh.

[Iolanthe]

So I'm halfway through Chaos & Order, reading one chapter at a time then going off to do something else - because I'm really scared about what will happen when Nick gets those codes - then suddenly, out of nowhere, it's just like the shower scene in Psycho. Brilliant!

I've only got about 100 pages to go now, then on to This Day All Gods Die.