Children of Time
by Adrian Tchaikovsky
★ Top 25 book of 2015 · #13 on Best Books of 2015
Humanity's last survivors flee a dying Earth and follow ancient star maps to a world prepared for them. They find it already occupied by new threats, setting two civilisations toward conflict and leaving open who truly inherits the planet.
Best for: Space-opera fans who like survival stakes and questions about who deserves a new world
Children of Time is #13 on BookWard's Best Books of 2015, out of 56 2015 books that cleared our data bar.
What Children of Time is about
A scientist named Dr. Avrana Kern orbits a terraformed planet, preparing to release a nanovirus that will speed up the evolution of monkeys. When the plan goes wrong, the virus reaches a very different species: jumping spiders. Over generations, those spiders begin to build a civilization of their own, guided in part by an artificial intelligence shaped from a human personality.
Meanwhile, the last humans from a dying Earth travel aboard the ark ship Gilgamesh, searching for somewhere to live. Much of their story is seen through Holsten Mason, the ship's chief classicist. The two threads move toward each other across vast stretches of time, asking what intelligence looks like, how societies survive, and whether strangers can ever learn to share a world. Epic in scale yet thoughtful in tone, it won the 2016 Arthur C. Clarke Award and began a series.
Children of Time on the Best Books of 2015
Children of Time came out in 2015. Of the 56 books first published in 2015 that met BookWard's data bar, it ranks #13 on our Best Books of 2015 list.
Why it made the list: 493 readers have shelved it on Open Library; readers rate it 4.3 out of 5 (76 ratings). The list ranks each year’s books on how many readers have picked them up, how highly readers rate them, and how many are reading them right now.
Nearby on the 2015 list
- Simon Vs. the Homo Sapiens Agenda Becky Albertalli, #11
- The Bazaar of Bad Dreams Stephen King, #12
- Adult Children of Emotionally Immature Parents Lindsay C. Gibson, #14
- Everything, Everything Nicola Yoon, #15
See all Best Books of 2015 Best books by year
More years: Best Books of 2014 Best Books of 2016.
The numbers behind it
- Readers: 366 want to read it, 11 are reading it now and 116 have read it, according to Open Library.
- Ratings: 4.3 out of 5 from 76 Open Library ratings.
| Signal | This book (0 to 100) | Weight |
|---|---|---|
| Reach | 73 | 55% |
| Reader love | 80 | 25% |
| Being read right now | 41 | 20% |
Questions about Children of Time
When was Children of Time published?
Children of Time by Adrian Tchaikovsky was first published in 2015.
Was Children of Time one of the best books of 2015?
Children of Time is #13 on BookWard's Best Books of 2015, out of 56 2015 books that cleared our data bar. 493 readers have shelved it on Open Library; readers rate it 4.3 out of 5 (76 ratings).
Why is Children of Time on the Best Books of 2015 list?
493 readers have shelved it on Open Library; readers rate it 4.3 out of 5 (76 ratings).
More of the best books of 2015
- Six of Crows Leigh Bardugo, #1
- The Hired Girl Laura Amy Schlitz, #2
- Queen of Shadows Sarah J. Maas, #3
- November 9 Colleen Hoover, #4
- The Sword of Summer Rick Riordan, #5
- Red Queen Victoria Aveyard, #6
See the full Best Books of 2015, the Top 100, or new books on Rising.
How we know
This page uses public data: Open Library reader counts and ratings, and Wikipedia page views for recent years. The description is paraphrased from real source text. Rankings reflect reading interest, not quality or sales, and can be affected by data gaps. Lists update monthly.
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