"
RG Roane
Cherry Hill, 1998, 22.50, 280 pp.
ISBN: 0972329803
All the great American universities put in a bid to “house” and conduct experiments using the most advanced supercomputer Simon. Though MIT or one of the West Coast IT giants are the favorites, GCS shockingly assigns Simon to little Cabillo University in San Diego. The victory stuns everyone especially Professor Ross Erricson, the author of the winning concept in which Simon would be programmed to teach itself languages.
Simon moves into a basement room with a wall shared with dolphins residing at the nearby Ocean Park aquarium. Simon soon learns and translates “dolphinese” into English. However, though Ross, his students, and his mentor realize what they have learned, no one else believes them when they explain a dolphin's look at humanity and warn them of a secret race of people.
THE DELPHINUS CHRONICLES is a superb science fiction thriller that never slows down from the moment Simon checkmates the world's greatest grandmaster to the climax. The story line is loaded with intrigue, action, but especially insightful powerful relationships between people, humans and Simon, dolphins and Simon, and the world wide web of sonically connected dolphins so that the key cast including the supercomputer seem real. Though some extra intrigue involving nasties adds drama and tension, it temporarily slows down an incredible triumphant look at how mankind communicates and interprets events. This reviewer's interpretation communicated through this review is that RG Roane deserves strong accolades and a vast appreciative audience for this winning novel.
Harriet Klausner
"
Harriet Klausner, Resident R.G. Roane Scholar
"Students at a small college in Southern California program their supercomputer to learn languages on its own, but the school is adjacent to an aquatic amusement park and the computer mistakenly learns to communicate with the world's dolphin population. The dolphins ultimately reveal explosive information about the true origins of mankind, which falls into the wrong hands and sets off a chain of events that threatens to unravel society as we know it. "
Stan DeMann, Resident R.G. Roane Scholar
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Overall Review
Our unique search engine breaks down books and movies into
dozens of literary elements, all of which are searchable.
Ratings are on a 1-10 scale (Low to High)
Plot
Composition of Book Descript. of chases or violence - 10% planning/preparing, gather info, debate puzzles/motives - 25% Feelings, relationships, character bio/development - 20% Descript. of society, phenomena (tech), places - 45%
Tone of book
- suspenseful (sophisticated fear)
FANTASY or SCIENCE FICTION?
- science fiction story
Tech./$$$/Info hunt
Yes
Stealing/recovering/destroying
- info about lifeform(s)/society/phenomena
Robots, Computers, VR
Yes
Robot, PC, VR Plotlets:
- good computer AI
Is this an adult or child's book?
- Adult or Young Adult Book
Main Character
Identity:
- Male
- Computer
Profession/status:
- teacher
Age:
- 20's-30's
Is this an ordinary person caught up in events?
Yes
How sensitive is this character?
- sensitive to others' feelings
Sense of humor
- Mostly serious with occasional humor
Intelligence
- Smarter than most other characters
Physique
- average physique
Main Adversary
Identity:
- an organization
- an entire race
Age:
- long-lived adults
How much of work is main antagonist actually present in:
- a moderate amount
How sensitive is this character?
- hard edged
- mean, arrogant
Sense of humor
- Cynical sense of humor
- Mostly serious with occasional humor
Intelligence
- Smarter than most other characters
- Very much smarter than other characters
Setting
Terrain
- Water
Earth setting:
- near future (later in 21st century)
- current (early 21st century)
Takes place on Earth?
Yes
Style
Person?
- mostly 3rd
Accounts of torture and death?
- generic/vague references to death/punishment
- moderately detailed references to deaths
scientific jargon? (SF only)
- none/very little science jargon needed
- a fair amount of scientific explanation
How much dialogue?
- significantly more dialog than descript
- roughly even amounts of descript and dialog
