OMG.  I loved this book!  I have reader cookies for big ideas, bright ideas, fabulous world-building, and depth of character.  Vernor is capable of all of that, and he showed his stuff pretty brilliantly in The Children of the Sky. This book is solid science fiction, and as good as A Deepness in the Sky, which I read many times.  I’ve even gone off an bought a copy of A Fire Upon the Deep to re-read, just so I can start the story over and finish it all.

In some ways, The Children of the Sky is much more simply plotted than Vernor’s other work in this series.  But it’s not a simple book.  The nuances are pretty fabulously done between humans and tines (and you gotta love an alien series that is essentially packs of dogs).  Vernor does a nice job exploring the interior politics of disbelief and hope, and the lengths to which humans will go to have power.