Free (iTunes) Broken Symmetries [Vintage Sci-Fi Particle Physics Techno Thriller]

[ATDrake]

Broken Symmetries by Paul Preuss (ISFDB, Wikipedia), whose work you may know best from either his "Venus Prime" tie-ins in the Arthur C. Clarke spinoff franchise, or having seen The Core sfnal disaster adventure film (Wikipedia) which was ve-e-e-ry loosely based on one of his novels (Wikipedia), depending on how old school you are, is the 1st in his Peter Slater series of sci-fi adventure technothrillers starring the eponymous plucky theoretical physicist, his feisty photojournalist love interest (f/m), and his archnemesis du livre, another physicist who claims that his discovery of a new particle which Our Hero suspects to be unstable and dangerous will change everything, leading to the obligatory disaster that must be thwarted, free courtesy of publisher Diversion Books, who are e-printing it from its original 1983 Pocket Books Timescape edition.

This placed 23rd in the voting for the 1984 Locus Award category for Best SF Novel, has quoted blurb praise from the late Roger Zelazny on it, and the 2nd-in-series apparently netted a quote from Ursula K. Le Guin.

Currently free @ iTunes (available to Canadians and most places worldwide, as Diversion freebies often are). Normally these also become free at Amazon as well, but this doesn't even exist there in the store yet, even though the 2nd-in-series, Secret Passages already has a listing. Now shown up and slated to drop @ Amazon (usually available to Canadians & in the UK and elsewhere).

If you happen to like this one and wish to read more thrilling adventure tales of plucky theoretical physicists thwarting their misguided archnemeses' fabric of space-time-endangering experiments, the 2nd novel, as well as some of Preuss' other backlist sfnal thrillers, are reasonably low-priced from Diversion Books and couponable @ Kobo.

And this has been the selected 3rd (non-repeat) free ebook thread of the day.

Because two-fisted science adventures are made of win and awesome, even if some of them eventually become bywords for Insultingly Stupid Movie Physics.

(Incidentally, my very favourite snarky sci-fi disaster film review is this one by a paleoclimatologist who had to be bribed to watch it: The Day After Tomorrow (Wikipedia), as reviewed by William Hyde of Duke University, who received $100 for it, which went to charity.)

Enjoy!

Description
BROKEN SYMMETRIES introduces theoretical physicist Peter Slater and world-traveling photojournalist Anne-Marie Brand. They meet in Hawaii, where Anne-Marie is in pursuit of a story about the giant atom-smasher TERAC, the newest and biggest particle accelerator in the world, built amidst the pineapple fields of Oahu. Dr. Martin Edovich is the triumphant scientist behind the project—he claims that "his" discovery of I-particles will win him the Nobel Prize and change the face of physics.

But Peter Slater predicted the existence of I-particles long ago and suspects that they are unstable—explosive and potentially cataclysmic. And as TERAC ramps up, Slater’s theory is about to be tested.

The symmetries of matter itself are about to be unexpectedly broken, unleashing the fury of self-annihilation...

[Athens80]

Originally Posted by ATDrake

Normally these also become free at Amazon as well, but this doesn't even exist there in the store yet, even though the 2nd-in-series, Secret Passages already has a listing.

I see 99¢ at amazon.com.

[ATDrake]

^

That wasn't there an hour and a half ago. Edited into the OP for price-drop-check linkage, thanks!

[gweeks]

It's free at Amazon now.

Greg

[Manabi]

Originally Posted by ATDrake

Description
BROKEN SYMMETRIES introduces theoretical physicist Peter Slater and world-traveling photojournalist Anne-Marie Brand. They meet in Hawaii, where Anne-Marie is in pursuit of a story about the giant atom-smasher TERAC, the newest and biggest particle accelerator in the world, built amidst the pineapple fields of Oahu. Dr. Martin Edovich is the triumphant scientist behind the project—he claims that "his" discovery of I-particles will win him the Nobel Prize and change the face of physics.

But Peter Slater predicted the existence of I-particles long ago and suspects that they are unstable—explosive and potentially cataclysmic. And as TERAC ramps up, Slater’s theory is about to be tested.

The symmetries of matter itself are about to be unexpectedly broken, unleashing the fury of self-annihilation...

Sounds interesting, but the name TERAC is just way too close to the infamous THERAC-25. Pretty sure no one would want to name their accelerator that, simply because of what happened with the THERAC-25.

If you're a computer science person, or someone interested in reading about radiological disasters, the full report on the THERAC-25 is a really good read.

Grabbed the book too, thanks!

[ATDrake]

Originally Posted by Manabi

Sounds interesting, but the name TERAC is just way too close to the infamous THERAC-25. Pretty sure no one would want to name their accelerator that, simply because of what happened with the THERAC-25.

Well, this novel originally came out in 1983, and both Wikipedia and the report said that those incidents happened circa 1985-87, so barring revisions by the author, life imitates art, I guess?

Thanks for the linkage. Oh Canada, my home and never-ending source of nuclear-related medical health crises…

[Manabi]

Originally Posted by ATDrake

Well, this novel originally came out in 1983, and both Wikipedia and the report said that those incidents happened circa 1985-87, so barring revisions by the author, life imitates art, I guess?

Thanks for the linkage. Oh Canada, my home and never-ending source of nuclear-related medical health crises…

I didn't catch the dates, that makes sense. I guess it's even possible he was inspired by a THERAC machine for the name, since they had been around before the incidents in 1985-1987.

And wow, I hope they have the supply issue sorted out before they shut it down for good!

[ATDrake]

Originally Posted by Manabi

And wow, I hope they have the supply issue sorted out before they shut it down for good!

Unfortunately, that's not likely to happen.

This is the Harper Government™* that not only fired our Nuclear Safety Commissioner after ignoring her advice, they also went and forcibly sold off parts of our relevant Crown Corporation in a dodgy deal so that it and all the stuff it did are now mostly privatized (and IIRC, also blocked proposals for the creation/repurposing of backup reactors and/or other alternatives at the time), oh, and also demonstrated their contempt for us and our non-faith-or-"oil"-sands-based future by having appointed a creationist chiropractor who kept cutting funding for science programs as our official Minister of Science & Technology for most of their reign (since replaced by someone who at least doesn't openly deny evolution in that weasel-wordy I-am-totally-unqualified-for-the-position-of-power-I-hold-over-people-whose-test-tubes-I-am-not-fit-to-clean sort of way).

I can only hope that my fellow Canadians will give them a good and thorough turfing come election time.

* No seriously, they keep wasting millions of dollars worth of taxpayer money on ads telling us how great they are for us as a party government and how much they're doing for the country in their name instead of say, spending it actually doing stuff for the country.

[mohaworld]

Originally Posted by Manabi

I didn't catch the dates, that makes sense. I guess it's even possible he was inspired by a THERAC machine for the name, since they had been around before the incidents in 1985-1987.

And wow, I hope they have the supply issue sorted out before they shut it down for good!

i think they already resolve the issue .. and i not we hope also

[Purple Lady]

Can someone who got this book free from Amazon see if they can access it from the My Content and Devices page? If I click the link from there I get a page not found. If I search for the book manually I can find it, but it doesn't show that I bought it, which means I could buy it again by mistake.

I contacted Amazon CS by phone and got a supposed Kindle specialist, but he did not appear to understand the problem. He wanted to know what device did I have a problem sending it to, and that's the first thing I checked and it was sent successfully. He said I can see that you bought the book and I told him again that what the problem was. He just couldn't understand, but said kept repeating that yes, I understand. After going thru a couple of useless things like signing out of my account and signing back in I gave up. I swear Amazon CS is rivaling Kobo for the last two issues I had.

[koland]

Originally Posted by Purple Lady

Can someone who got this book free from Amazon see if they can access it from the My Content and Devices page? If I click the link from there I get a page not found. If I search for the book manually I can find it, but it doesn't show that I bought it, which means I could buy it again by mistake.

The original (free) listing has been pulled (probably by the publisher or author).

However, it is still in my library and a quick "read now" check shows that the text is there.

The listing you are finding searching is a "new" edition (although no doubt identical to the one that was free. This happens both when the publisher really releases a new edition (and doesn't want to give it those who purchased the first editon, as a corrected edition) and when the publisher/author has no clue how to edit their listing in KDP and they create a second edition by mistake and then delete the original one.

Oh, and, of course, when the publisher/author intentionally creates a second listing and deletes the first, to prevent people linking the reviews or using the quick-glance method to see if they 'bought' a book before.

Just one reason I don't rely on the product page to tell me if I have a book....

[Purple Lady]

Originally Posted by koland

The original (free) listing has been pulled (probably by the publisher or author).

However, it is still in my library and a quick "read now" check shows that the text is there.

The listing you are finding searching is a "new" edition (although no doubt identical to the one that was free. This happens both when the publisher really releases a new edition (and doesn't want to give it those who purchased the first editon, as a corrected edition) and when the publisher/author has no clue how to edit their listing in KDP and they create a second edition by mistake and then delete the original one.

Oh, and, of course, when the publisher/author intentionally creates a second listing and deletes the first, to prevent people linking the reviews or using the quick-glance method to see if they 'bought' a book before.

Just one reason I don't rely on the product page to tell me if I have a book....

I just tried and the read now worked for me too. I figured it was something like you say - a "new" edition. I would expect Amazon to link my purchase to this new addition when I request, or tell me that sorry, they can't for whatever reason. The Kindle CS had no clue what was going on.

[crich70]

Fixed link. The ones above keep on giving me the message that they are broken.
Amazon US