Spoilers warning
Picked it up from the Goodreads science fiction top list. The description did not make much sense to me but I decided to give it a try based on the popularity.
It was a bit hard for me to get into but after a while the narrative made sense. It felt cosy to imagine all these travelers gather around and tell stories to each other. I liked the variety of styles and themes that each character contributes. But I still felt it was not fully stitched together. Yes, there is this shared universe but the transition from one tale to another still was jarring. And the ending was underwhelming. I was hoping for some closure, and the last tale kind of provided it, but then there was a heap of unanswered questions.
What were your thoughts? If you read the sequels, were they worth it?
Hyperion is the first book in a 4-book series: Hyperion, The Fall of Hyperion, Endymion, The Rise of Endymion.
If I recall correctly, the first two were supposed to be one book, but were split to two because the publisher wanted more money or something to that effect. So finishing the first book leaves you effectively hanging with a lot of unresolved threads.
By itself, Hyperion seems like a collection of loosely related stories in the same universe. But the rest of the books in the series answer a lot (if not all, read it a long time ago) of the question and threads in the first book.
I can’t go into much detail without [mildly] spoiling the series, so I’ll just say this: the story is told by different speakers, but it all ties in pretty well.