Juggler of Worlds: 200 Years Before the Discovery of the Ringworld (Known Space, 2) Mass Market Paperback – June 2, 2009

There comes a time in the career of a Science Fiction writer when they start winding down. They tie up loose ends, they mine the tailings of their previous works, they update their vision to include new real-world technologies, and (sometimes) they find an heir to take over their universe. Isaac Asimov did a spectacular job in the end-tying department, Anne McCaffrey is apparently planning a dynasty, and Arthur C. Clark's swan song was, frankly, painful to read (but that's another review). This book is such a work.The book is part of a threesome - Fleet of Worlds, Juggler of Worlds, and the as-yet-unreleased Destroyer of Worlds. In it, we find Nessus, a long-time character in Niven's other books (here greatly expanded in depth), Simon Ausfaller, Beowulf Shaeffer, and a host of other well- and lesser-knowns. Newbies to Niven's work won't be totally lost, but will miss some of the more subtle craftmanship in the storytelling - the authors' multiple nods to previous plotlines is admirable.The story and writing here is a bit choppy. Sometimes, one gets the sense that a bunch of half-finished short stories were haphazardly glued together, and, in one twist, a last-minute deus ex machina could have been much better integrated much earlier in the timeline. However, the characters are well explored, the plot isn't too absurd, and the writing is, for lack of a better term, still "Nivenesque".I thoroughly enjoyed the book, warts and all. I eagerly await the last installment of the triad. That Niven is breaking in a new partner is clear. That this is and will be a fruitful collaboration is also.

A great tie in with many characters and series of events, time and places.Been a Larry Niven fan since I was 11 years old. The entire Ringworld/Puppeteer series are my favorites. Not by much though, because Larry's other works such as collaborations with Jerry Pournelle are just as great tales.To me, having Larry's entire library of stories and novels, is an embarrassment of riches. Another aspect for me is I can read his trilogies repeatedly, and find something knew to savor in the richness of characters and story lines.

If you've read Larry Niven's Tales of Known Space, then you already know most of the events that occur in this book.But you never saw them from the perspective of Sigmund Ausfaller or Nessus before. And that's the twist here. This book retells an awful lot of things you thought you already knew about, and exposes the sides you didn't know about. There are connections you probably never suspected. WHY was Julian Forward playing pirate on the outskirts of Sol System? WHY did Carlos Wu develop his super-autodoc? How ELSE can you destroy a General Products hull? Well, you'll find out these things, and many more.After you've read this book, you will know Sigmund Ausfaller, and you will understand a lot more about the ARM, and the Birthright Lotteries, and ... Well. But that would be telling.Go read.

This is a return to Larry Niven's Known Space universe that he wrote so much about in the 60's and 70's. It aims to fill in some the gap between the adventures of Beowulf Schaeffer and Louis Wu's exploration of Ringworld about 200 years later. This book is the first in a trilogy that is examining that timeframe.I'd say the main two characters are Sigmund Ausfaller (an ARM - think Homeland Security zealot of the UN) and our old friend, Nessus the Puppeteer. However, we also see quite a few of the old standbys from Known Space, including Beowulf Schaeffer, Carlos Wu, and the flatlander called Elephant.Getting to see some additional adventures of these folks was nice, but like I said, it was a grind to get through this book. Why? For starters, it's a little on the long side, about 450 pages in print, and secondly, remember all those familiar characters? Well, we see them going through the same old adventures Niven wrote about back in the 60's and 70's as short stories.It's not a straight text drop-in or anything. Rather, it's more of a "meanwhile, back at the ranch" thing, and I've got to tell you, it's boring back at the ranch, especially when you already know what's happening out with those neutron rustlers. It was like "see that really exciting thing over there? Well, don't look at it. Nope, we're gonna stay right here and talk about it afterwards."I can see that given how the plot went, this was somewhat necessary, but it still felt very, very boring. I almost gave up on it twice, and every time I thought that surely we had gotten though all the old stories, it turned out that no, there was still one or two more that I'd forgotten about.Anyway, finally about two-thirds of the way through the book we get into really new material instead of life back at the ranch. That part was pretty good, and it was nice seeing what happened to some of the characters as well as a few more reveals about the Known Space universe.Probably the highest praise I can give it was that it managed to revisit all those old stories without doing any obvious retcons. This lack of retcons is about the only reason I'm considering reading the rest of the trilogy. I figure that we're past all the retellings by now, so the second and third books should be all new material. But if they start messing with Louis or the Ringworld, I'll try to find a Kindle-friendly version of throwing the book against the wall.

I first stumbled over Larry Niven's fiction in the 70s when I was... um... much younger than I am now. His Known Space novels and stories spoke to me as teenager who truly expected to be living in space by now. So... that didn't work out... but having Amazon recommend the Fleet of World Series brought back that nostalgia!Juggler has everything that Known Space fans love: swashbuckling but flawed heroes, aliens that are at once exotic and understandable and enough scientific plausibility to make you think that one day we might be exploring the galaxy. As a long lost Niven fan, I also enjoyed the Easter Eggs the author left for those of us who spent our summer vacations reading his books and stories.I recommend this book to all those old Known Spacers and anyone who likes his or her space opera with realism and optimism.

Another over arcing collaborative Piece set in Nivens classic 'Known Space' universe.At this point in the timeline the puppeteers have set their planets bound for the edge of the galaxy due to the discovery that the stars in the galactic core are exploding.The narrative follows Sigmund Ausfaller - a foil who originally appeared in most of the 'Beowulf Schaeffer' short stories from early in Nivens career. Most of those stories appear in the collection - 'Crashlander' and are set in the early period of known space.Sigmund Ausfaller has been 'collected' by the puppeteers and brought to the fleet of worlds. As an ARM agent and a paranoid schizophrenic the puppeteers find him more useful than the previously kidnapped human survivors they have been using up to this point. His connection to their previous unwitting agent -Beowulf schaeffer is a bonus.The plot of this book - as with all the others in this series retraces the path of earlier stories in 'known space' and tries to constuct a common fabric binding them all together. That fabric being the involvement of the puppeteers. Ausfaller - a minor character in the Schaeffer stories is resurrected to provide some continuity.In all honesty - its another fairly meaningless reprise of content previously delivered in other books. It lacks the flair and imagination of the original stories - and is the equivalent of a historian revisiting old notes and from them trying to reproduce a masterpiece.It may have Nivens name - but it lacks any of his magic.

LEAVE WELL ALONE.Larry Niven has for some reason, apparently gifted his brilliantly conceived 'Known Space' universe to Edward Lerner.Lerner populates it with idiot characters and mindless content. Amazon describes this as a Larry Niven book to sell it and cheat readers.

I was a confused initially as this book starts of earlier in time than the first of the series. It dos fill the background and keeps the twist and turns coming.

... started off slowly, and got slower. Covering ground that had already been exhausted in the preceding book, I was quite disappointed. Many repetitions and some contradictions later, the story started to advance but this was in the last 25%. A good ending that left enough openings for sequels, this is why I gave three stars instead of lower.

This novel, for most of its length, runs parallel to the events of Niven's short stories about Beowulf Shaeffer, collected in "Crashlander", which it reinterprets from the viewpoints of Sigmund Ausfaller and Nessus: minor characters in the "Crashlander" sequence, but central to "Juggler of Worlds". We also revisit the events of his short story "The Soft Weapon", in which Nessus has a major role.This must have been an awkward one to write, since the authors try to avoid confusing readers who have no knowledge of the other stories, while not boring hard-core fans who have committed the plots to memory.As a fan, I found the reinterpretation of old plots in a wider new scheme was interesting, but lacked the entertainment value of an entirely new story. Walking through well-remembered events made certain passages drag. In contrast, I suspect a newcomer would be baffled and frustrated by the speed with which events and characters come and go.At the end, this story picks up events from the previous novel by these authors, "Fleet of Worlds". There's a twist involving one of the characters, and a revelation about Known Space history which is rather neatly tied to "clues" taken from previous works by Niven and rehearsed in the present volume.If you're new to Niven's universe, you should certainly go for the old favourites like "Ringworld" and "Protector" first, which stand alone much better than the present volume.If you haven't read the "Crashlander" sequence of short stories, you might consider doing so before reading this work.