Titan: A Tale of Cataclysmic Discovery

Written by Ben Bova

Narrated by Gabrielle de Cuir, Stephen Hoye, Amanda Karr and Stefan Rudnicki

Master storyteller Ben Bova continues his multi-volume "Grand Tour" saga chronicling humanity's exploration of near space with TITAN, a fast-paced thriller focused on the first manned mission to the Solar System's most intriguing world. Skillfully blending high drama, passionate characters and daring speculation with the latest discoveries from the current Cassini/Huygens probe of Saturn's moon, Bova has crafted a heart-stopping tale of epic adventure on mankind's next frontier.

The gigantic colony ship Goddard has at last made orbit around the ringed planet Saturn, carrying a volatile population of more than 10,000 dissidents, rebels, extremists and visionaries seeking a new life among the stars. Chief scientist Edouard Urbain's avowed mission is to study the enigmatic moon called Titan, which offers the tantalizing possibility that life may exist amid its windswept islands and chill black seas.

But when the exploration vessel Titan Alpha mysteriously fails after reaching the moon's surface, long buried tensions surface among the colonists. Torn by political intrigue, suspicious accidents, and an awesome discovery that could threaten human space exploration, a handful of courageous men and women must fight for the survival of their colony, and the destiny of the human race.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Macmillan Audio
• Release date: Feb 21, 2006
• ISBN: 9781593978587

Ben Bova

Dr. Ben Bova has not only helped to write about the future, he helped create it. The author of more than one hundred futuristic novels and nonfiction books, he has been involved in science and advanced technology since the very beginnings of the space program. President Emeritus of the National Space Society, Dr. Bova is a frequent commentator on radio and television, and a widely popular lecturer. He has also been an award-winning editor and an executive in the aerospace industry.

Reviews for Titan

[kale.dyer · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

I have really enjoyed the Grand Tour series of books from Ben Bova. Though the characters are a little limited and repetitive with little growth across the series the changing interplanetary settings are really interesting.

[kylecarroll · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Excellent follow-up to Saturn. Although not as exciting and dramatic as the former, it was still a solid 5/5 for me! It was nice to see old characters return and their stories expanded upon.

[brakketh-1 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

I have really enjoyed the Grand Tour series of books from Ben Bova. Though the characters are a little limited and repetitive with little growth across the series the changing interplanetary settings are really interesting.

[buffalogr · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

The story of 10K humans exiled to a habitat around Jupiter. It's spiced with some scientific exploration and a crazy politician (aren't they all? ) a fairly complex novel with many story lines, it held my interest despite its length. Where is the next Bova sci-fi?

[utbw42 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

I love Ben Bova books. Yes, they assume a lot, and with any good science fiction book you have to suspend your beliefs and/or realities to really enjoy them, but I have no problem with that whatsoever. Titan made me feel like I was really there either in orbit around Saturn or on the famous moon of the ringed planet. The book really asks: what if? What if life was found on Titan, or in the rings of Saturn? What if we were able to set up a colony of 10000 people or so in a large habitat in orbit around Saturn? It was a lot of fun to think about.

[clark7hallman · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Titan is another excellent science fiction novel in Ben Bova’s Grand Tour series. Goddard, a permanent space habitat containing 10,000 people from Earth, is in orbit around Saturn in the years 2095-2096. The unethical Chief Administrator of Goddard is planning to extract the water from the rings of Saturn to sell it to other earth space colonies, which would make the population of the habitat very wealthy. However, the scientists in the habitat are concerned that the mining operations will harm the living organisms that may live in the rings. In addition, a robotic science probe/lab on Titan, Saturn’s largest moon, has gone rogue and severed communication with the scientists in the habitat. There is also a political struggle within the habitat to replace the Chief Administrator and end the Zero Population Growth policy to make it possible for women to have children. I found this to be a very engaging novel that meets all the expectations of a definitive work of science fiction. The science is totally plausible, there is plenty of it, and it is presented within a very interesting and entertaining storyline. However, the reader does not need extensive scientific knowledge to enjoy the book. In addition, Bova provides and very interesting group of many appealing and some unsavory characters who support, love, argue, clash, conspire, and/or are deceptive with each other while attempting to enhance their own lives while influencing the sociopolitical environment of the habitat. Bova also provides compelling, life-or-death, outer-space action in the rings of Saturn and on the surface of Titan that certainly made this reader anxious. Of course, Titan is also very well written by one of the great science fiction writers of our time. It was first published in 2006 and it won the John W. Campbell Memorial Award for best novel of the year in 2007. I highly recommend it to anyone who likes science fiction or want to sample some.

[gilroy_1 · Rating: 2 out of 5 stars]

Okay, I understand that Mr Bova is supposed to be one of the preeminent science fiction writers out on the market today. This story held a lot of possibilities, as I could see that there was thought and research behind what he wrote.

This is where I start to object beyond the basics. The research ALL made it into the book. I don’t mean just a little dabble here and there with a bit of jargon to tell us what is going on. I mean pieces of the book covered the extensive research as translated through a computer probe on the surface of Saturn’s moon. Also, the book had too many main characters. I felt like I needed a notepad to write down what character was talking and when and the chapter that I listened to at the time. Main problem with that, I listened to it while driving to work, so I couldn’t exactly take notes. Along the same line of thought, nowhere on the book does it list that it is part of a series or a sequel to a previous book. If I had noticed that it required understanding the prior book to get through this one easier, I might have found the other book first. The final objection I have is that the resolution seemed to just end. The book built a high wall of suspense then just dropped the reader off a cliff, hoping they swam when they reached the end of the climax. The build up lasted for the book, and the end was one chapter, with an epilogue to cover plot holes that didn’t get wrapped up in that final chapter, explain away the final results.

The story seemed good. To make it better, I’d trim away about ten plot lines and narrow it to fewer characters for the reader to follow. Complete the story as a novella and save some of the headache, perhaps even merge it into the previous book.

[samfsmith_1 · Rating: 2 out of 5 stars]

I haven’t read a science fiction book in years. I was hiking the Pinhoti trail in Alabama, seventy-something miles in five days, and had finished the book I brought with me. At the shelter on Mt. Cheaha I found this book, which someone had left, probably leaving it after reading it as too heavy to carry. So I picked it up, happy to have something to read.

Bear in mind that I have been reading literary novels almost exclusively for the past few years. I try to write literary novels. So it took quite a few pages before I got over the shock of being immersed in such a different style of writing. I have to say that I enjoyed the book, not on the same level that I enjoy something by Geraldine Brooks or Margaret Atwood, but still, it was fun to read.

It’s written in an omniscient viewpoint in very short scenes. Every character has some characteristic that sets him or her apart from the other characters - otherwise, how would the reader be able to tell them apart? It’s fast paced and relies heavily on plot. There is nothing in the least bit subtle about the characters. Most of their actions do not ring true to me, and I think that is because there are so many of them and they are so categorized. As you read you think: this is the one that loves power, this is the one that craves adventure, this is the one that wants to be reunited with his wife, this is the one that is afraid of women, and so forth and so on.

The science? Who knows if it is feasible or not - I don’t. It seems to be a sequel, or at least some of the characters are continued from a previous book, and there is plenty of space left at the end for another book to follow this one.

So yes, I enjoyed reading it, but I would not have picked it up except under those extraordinary circumstances, and I will not buy another one or make a habit of reading them. It seems incomplete and awkward compared to the novels I usually read.

[billhall · Rating: 1 out of 5 stars]

Titan tells the story of the first year after a several km long cylindrical habitat populated by 10,000 scientists and dissidents from a fundamentalist Earth was put into orbit arount Titan to explore its surface. The story begins when the egomaniacal chief scientist lands a large tracked autonomous probe on the surface of Titan, and the probe immediately stops uploading the data it is collecting. The book follows the interactions of several main characters including the power-hungry Chief Administrator, the retired director of a large space-flight company, her sister who was resurrected after she died of cancer and was then held cryogenically until the technology was available to cure her, a professional stunt-man pilot, and a few other engineers and scientists.

Ben Bova may be a good editor, but I found Titan to be a rather clunky book to read. The material was good, but the result was quite disappointing. I read Sci-Fi for to see ideas explored, and to be entertained. Bova's characters were at best cardboard stereotypes and all too predictable. His sense of place was greatly marred by failures to properly manage the detail. For example, his habitat is a rotating cylinder, where the rotation gives the effect of gravity on the inside surface, yet he has characters working in the end caps or on the outer surface at normal gravity.

Much play was made of the fact that the habitat was illuminated by solar light beamed by mirrors into the central spaces of the habitat. Given the much greater distance from the sun and the corresponding weakness of the light, comparatively small mirrors seemed to suffice to provide Earth-normal daylight.

On the whole, the book was almost bad enough to be trashed without finishing it. A disappointment given the high cost of paperbacks in Australia ($23.00)