Contact

by Carl Sagan

The future is here...in an adventure of cosmic dimension.

In December, 1999, a multinational team journeys out to the stars, to the most awesome encounter in human history. Who -- or what -- is out there? In "Cosmos," Carl Sagan explained the universe. In "Contact," he predicts its future -- and our own.

• ISBN10: 0671004107
• ISBN13: 9780671004101
• Publish Date: 1 July 1997 (first published 31 October 1985)
• Publish Status: Out of Stock
• Publish Country: US
• Publisher: Simon & Schuster
• Imprint: Pocket Books
• Edition: Media Tie-In ed.
• Format: Paperback
• Pages: 434
• Language: English

Reviews

[inlibrisveritas]

Have you ever read a book and when you finished it you find yourself just sitting there staring at the back of the book with a goofy smile on your face? That was how Contact concluded for me. A sense of awe, wonder, and utmost appreciation.

Contact is a book that proudly dances on and across the line between logical science and brilliant wonder. It’s both realistic and hopelessly optimist about the vastness of our universe and I need that in my life as often as possible. Contact is at its heart a first contact story, that centers around a woman named Ellie as the Earth finds itself on the receiving end of radio waves from another star system. However, it actually presents a lot more than that. We get glimpses at science vs religions and how there is a possible marriage between the two, and even how when separate they can evoke the same feelings. We see detailed looks at human relationships and how we can be so busy focusing on the ‘big picture’ that we tend to forget the here and now, and how we miss out on things important to us if we don’t take a step back now and then. It holds a scope so massive and yet it spends a good deal of time showing those small important moments that really make a person. The science part of this can be dense and dry, but I honestly have a love of science so I didn’t mind it at all. I thought it was pretty fascinating. However, I think even if someone kind of zoned out during those moments the story would not be lost on you.

The plot of this was quite surprising to me. I went in somewhat blind, as I haven’t seen the movie or even looked at reviews, and I am so thankful for that. It’s such an unconventionally beautiful book. Sure it’s dry and can be very dense in areas, but it kind of wormed its way into a portion of mind devoted to childlike wonder for space. I don’t necessarily think this is an easy read, and I had to listening to the audiobook while following along in my print copy just to make sure I was processing it. It certainly has its issues, but this is one of those cases where it just pressed all the right buttons for me. The first contact storyline was compelling and interesting, full of detail and reflection, and the look at Ellie’s personal life and thoughts brought so much more to table.

Overall I think this is one to try out if you are a fellow sci-fi nerd. I do recommend trying it out first, perhaps through the library or a sample before committing to it fully.

[jamiereadthis]

1. Sagan wrote the review for me. On page 18: “The book was better than the movie. For one thing, there was a lot more to it.” He’s talking about Pinocchio, and Ellie reading it as a girl, but it applies to his book too. Layers.

2. Carl Sagan, astrophysicist, is better than Carl Sagan, novelist. Some of the characters, pacing, plot, etc. just falls flat. But at the science and imagination of it, he shines.

3. Once they hit the wormholes, it’s the best part of the book. I hate that that part is so short.

4. I think each review here says some version of this, but: the ending of Contact, the novel, is so much better than Contact, the movie.

5. “You mustn’t think of the universe as a wilderness. It hasn’t been that for billions of years.”

[adamfortuna]

Having re-watched the movie many times, I thought it was finally time to give the book a shot. It matches up surprisingly well with the movie, with smart cuts from the book - I was actually impressed by that. The book goes more into Elles family life, which has a different dynamic than the movie.

The part I enjoyed the most in the book were the discussions between Elle and religious leaders. The book went much more into these discussions than in the book. Probably my favorite quotes from the book was by Elle when discussing world overpopulation: "A celibate clergy is an especially good idea, because it tends to suppress any hereditary propensity toward fanaticism."

Overall some definite differences between the book and the movie, but not so much that you're going to be surprised by what's happening.

[empressbrooke]

I've read several of Sagan's non-fiction books prior to this novel, and I strangely found him to be much less engaging here. The first half of Contact reads more like non-fiction than a story, but it's lacking the voice that made his non-fiction so good. The second half of the book, though, once the Machine gets built, suddenly has a lot more heart to it than I was expecting. Now that I'm done with it, I'm finding myself appreciating the whole thing a lot more than I thought I was going to in the beginning.

The main character, Ellie Arroway, is basically a voice for Sagan. She has his same sense of wonder balanced by a skeptic's strict requirement for evidence. I liked the vision that Sagan had of a world whose international conflicts died down once we learned we weren't alone in the universe.