Hyperion

Hyperion continued to annoy me all the way to the very end, but I can't deny the presence of some bright spots that made it worth the journey. Final thoughts below. Expect spoilers.
Dan Simmons is still the most frustrating author I can recall reading. He has this tendency to be on the verge of creating a masterpiece, then decides to paint a stripe of gun-metal grey across the middle.
The central conceit of Hyperion is so well designed and is what ultimately kept me clinging to this book. The parts where he leans into the existential horror of it—that is, the Priest's tale and the Scholar's tale—are exquisite. These stories are some of the highest calibre cerebral sci-fi I've read. If he had decided to write all 6 tales in this style, this book would have easily made my all time list.
It was a wise decision for Simmons to place the Priest's tale at the beginning, because without it I may not have had the good grace to endure the rest. I'm discovering I have almost zero interest in reading action for the sake of action. Both the Soldier's tale and the Detective's tale suffered from this. If you must have a complex action sequence, I think it's imperative the reader understands why they should care about the outcome. The metanarrative must supercede the narrative.
Simmons has a puerile streak which undermines his worldbuilding. He seems to think the reader will struggle to relate to events, places, and people in his future world unless they are connected to events, places, and people of the present day, which leads to some really hokey and tasteless inclusions. “AIDS 2 virus”. “The First and Second Holocaust”. “The New Prophet”. “New” anything, for that matter.
Let's talk about the ending. Simmons's choice to insert his short story "Remembering Siri" is such a bizarre choice in pacing, and it was at this point that I lost faith that he would pull the strands together. I think this could have been safely left out. The rest of the Consul's tale actually did pull the strands together in a sense, only for Simmons to seemingly abandon the story on the edge of a cliff, forcing the reader to buy the next book in the series.
All the way along, I've been trying to work out what this book reminds me of, and I think I finally worked it out. When it comes to stories based around intrigue, withholding answers, bizarre twists, frustrating directions, and a sense the writer didn't really know where they were going, there's no better example than Lost. It probably won't surprise you to know I lost my patience and stopped tuning in after season 2.
I won't be reading The Fall of Hyperion, at least for a while. I'm calling your bluff, Dan Simmons. I'd rather leave the story at this point without knowing what happens.
For Duré and Weintraub, however, I will never forget Hyperion.