SOMETIMES a book disappoints you hugely. That’s what happened when I read Rendezvous With Rama.

Inspired by reading the summary of it and my enjoyment of the groundbreaking film of Clarke’s book 2001 A Space Odyssey, I bought it, read it but had to abandon it. My Kindle told me I’d managed 25 per cent of the story when I threw in the towel.

It’s a great story idea – scientists discover that an object hurling into the solar system is not a random rock, but a spaceship from another civilization. Astronauts head to investigate in the hope of making first contact.

Unfortunately, the story is told incredibly slowly.  There’s a lot of build-up, meetings between the powers that be on earth about what they might find. Astronauts board the vessel, explore it and admire its design. They hike around it and climb up and down ladders. But find not a single living soul.

Call me old fashioned, I thought  I was getting a first contact story. I gave up in frustration, which is something I almost never do with books. It’s even more unusual that I have not felt like trying to go back and finish it. I just found it dull.

Maybe this was a groundbreaking book in 1973, but with so many other science fiction classics still to read, this one is at the back of a very long queue. Then again it won a Hugo and a Nebula Award, so critics liked it.

There are four books in this series, the last three written jointly with Gentry Lee:

Rendezvous with Rama

Rama II

The Garden Of Rama and

Rama Revealed

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