The Gripping Hand (Moties, volume 2) by Larry Niven & Jerry Pournelle

[james_davis_nicoll]

The Gripping Hand (Moties, volume 2) by Larry Niven & Jerry Pournelle

Comments

[tree_and_leaf]

I read both volumes about twenty five years ago. I can still remember a fair bit about "The Mote in God's Eye," including that I liked it a good deal (and I have been known to say "on the gripping hand." I can't remember a *thing* about the sequel, other than the plot being precipitated by the protagonist hearing someone, ironically enough, say "on the gripping hand." I suspect this tells me all I need to know about it.

[kithrup]

I remember various elements from it, but what I mostly recall is the ending: "and so, we declare by authorial fiat, this thing which was ruled out before is now the solution to the problem."

It was the last Niven and Pournelle book I ever read.

[(Anonymous)]

Should you end up doing a Tor.com column regarding birth control and SFF, I humbly request sufficient advance notice to purchase a large quantity of popcorn for consumption while reading the comments.

--
Nathan H.

[dsrtao]

Make room, make room for multiple visits.

Column one: Five Books Where Population Control Is Central To The Plot

Two: Five Books About Mandatory Birth Control

Three: Five Books Where Birth Control Is Forbidden

Four: Five Books Where Easily Available Contraception Would Have Fixed The Problem

[ross_smith]

With a bit of creativity, those could all be the same list.

[anzha]

This book was infuriating for me when it came out. I really liked - but not without criticism - the original. This one threw out lots of details of the previous book's world building and then decided to urinate all over it.

The generational condemnation thing was annoying as well and also was in their sequel to Legacy of Heorot.

[(Anonymous)]

Sequels plural - a novella I will not seek out, and a novel which would fill a useful gap in any collection.

[(Anonymous)]

Like our host and Tree_And_Leaf, I recall Mote with some moderate fondness, but can't recall any details of Gripping Hand. But I confess I have used the phrase "On the gripping hand" once in a while, as it is a handy reply to people presenting a false dichotomy or utilizing the fallacy of the excluded middle.

--
Nathan H.

[(Anonymous)]

I used it in a work email once. It turned out I as the only one who'd read _Mote_, so it didn't entirely aid communication.

Paul Clarke

[(Anonymous)]

The birth control the Moties had figured out had a couple of issues, namely that it was both irreversible and only usable before puberty. (This shouldn't have been an issue for Mediators, but in the Mote system you're either a Master or you're expendable.) Humans, of course, are Special and came up with something better.

I've noticed Tor sometimes makes comments on posts expected to be incendiary by-approval-only. A bit sad, but if I want Usenet I know where I left it.

Many will know this, but the J.R. Pournelle in the footnotes is Jerry's daughter, not Jerry himself.

[dsrtao]

... and she turns out to be a better writer than her father.

[arkessian]

I am so glad I missed this, and don't intend to fix that omission.

I read The Mote in God's Eye when it came out (precocious 16 year-old, haunting Hudson's bookshop in Birmingham England looking for new SFF) and enjoyed it, although I had a lot of WHUT moments... At this late date, I mostly remember 'and maybe the donkey will learn to talk' because I don't dare revisit the book. I tried a bunch of later Niven and Pournelle and (predictably, perhaps) bounced off. So I prefer to leave 'Mote' as a mostly happy memory.

[kazrak]

I still use "on the gripping hand" as the third option for on the one hand/on the other hand, and I know I read this book, but I have no memory of the story whatsoever, even after reading the review.

The phrase "there's no _there_ there" comes to mind.

[theresawright]

The first sentence of your review sums up the novel quite nicely.

[(Anonymous)]

"2: Have I ever done a piece on birth control for tor dot com? Could I write a piece that didn’t leave the comment section in flames? "

Pick "The Eleventh Commandment," "The Marching Morons," "The Deadly Mission Of P. Snodgrass," please!

[chrysostom]

Eleventh Commandment has been reviewed by James, btw.

[(Anonymous)]

Thanks!

[estrevan]

I’ve not read the book itself but John Clute’s review (collected in Scores) is a thing of beauty:

“… an aristocracy-by-birth composed almost entirely of ass-tight WASP males, icy spouses of same, and the utterly appalling sanitary spoiled children of both, all of these latter being specially abled to exude, when duty calls, the profoundly moving spartan charisma natural to any twenty-year-old scion called from his yacht (this does actually happen) to defend an unearned income. Every one of these little shits knows the true secret of being rich, too: which is that being rich allows you to hire the lives of others. But stop, stop right here. We begin to drift. We begin to feel mind-wiped. We must not talk about how Niven/Pournelle envision the future course of the human race: the desert sanctities of hierarchy; the Constable Plod ass-backward monarchist airhead cholerics who embody the military ethos: but stop. Back to the story… there is no story.”

[chrysostom]

Clute can be great.

[chrysostom]

I'd like a source on that Herbert quote beyond "someone on Usenet."

[jessie_c]

The most memorable section in the book was the crottled greeps.

[carbonel]

Meh. It was entirely there as an in-joke playing on the fannish catchphrase of, "If you didn't want crottled greeps, why did you order them?" Which is from Before My Time, but I've encountered it in old fanzines and such.

[jessie_c]

Truth. But it's the only thing which stuck in my memory, probably because of the way it was so clumsily shoehorned into the narrative, breaking it irretrievably.

[(Anonymous)]

There is one part I remember with fondness. There are monitoring the formation of the new jump point and several characters start a side discussion. They are interrupted by (approximate quote from memory, not exact.)
"Jump point stabilized!"
"How can you tell?"
"A ship just came through. Two ships."
"Oh, shi-"
"Three ships. Four ships..."

The sudden surprise change of pace was handled well, I thought.

Riderius