Timescape
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Cover of first edition (hardcover)
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| Author | Gregory Benford |
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| Country | United States |
| Language | English |
| Genre | Science fiction novel |
| Publisher | Simon & Schuster |
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Publication date
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1980-81 |
| Media type | Print (hardback & paperback) |
| Pages | 412 pp |
| ISBN | |
| OCLC | 5831180 |
| 813/.54 | |
| LC Class | PS3552.E542 T55 |
Timescape is a 1980 novel by science fiction writer Gregory Benford (with unbilled co-author Hilary Foister, Benford's sister-in-law, who is credited as having "contributed significantly to the manuscript"). It won the 1980 Nebula and British Science Fiction Awards, and the 1981 John W. Campbell Memorial Award for Best Science Fiction Novel. The novel was widely hailed by both critics of science fiction and mainstream literature for its fusion of detailed character development and interpersonal drama with more standard science fiction fare such as time travel and ecological issues.
Pocket Books used the title of this book for their science fiction imprint.
The story is written from two viewpoints, equidistant from the novel's publication in 1980. The first thread is set in a 1998 ravaged by ecological disasters such as algal blooms and diebacks on the brink of large scale extinctions. Various other events are mentioned in passing, such as student riots and an event of nuclear terrorism against New York City which took place before the events of the novel. This thread follows a group of scientists in the United Kingdom connected with the University of Cambridge and their attempts to warn the past of the impending disaster by sending tachyon-induced messages to the astronomical position the Earth occupied in 1962–1963. Given the faster-than-light nature of the tachyon, these messages will effectively reach the past. These efforts are led by John Renfrew, an Englishman, and Gregory Markham, an American most likely modeled on Benford himself.
The second thread is set in the University of California, San Diego (UCSD), in La Jolla, California, in 1962 where a young scientist, Gordon Bernstein, discovers anomalous noise in a physics experiment relating to spontaneous resonance and indium antimonide. He and his student assistant, Albert Cooper (also likely based on the author and his experiences at UCSD), discover that the noise is coming in bursts timed to form Morse code.
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