Narrated by: Mel Hudson
Length: 16 hrs and 30 mins
Release date: 05-02-17

The book asks the question-
What if humans were able to create life on a world they territories?,
Guided and manipulated life to create sentience and then guided their sentience through computer programs? ,
Yet lacked proper native communication with the new sentient life and in some cases are superior in certain aspects and inferior in others?

Another book that explores the philosophical concept that humans could be the Gods of another species, and maybe even the Gods of ourselves.

Here’s the publishers summary:

Adrian Tchaikovksy’s critically acclaimed stand-alone novel Children of Time is the epic story of humanity’s battle for survival on a terraformed planet.

Who will inherit this new Earth?

The last remnants of the human race left a dying Earth, desperate to find a new home among the stars. Following in the footsteps of their ancestors, they discover the greatest treasure of the past age – a world terraformed and prepared for human life.

But all is not right in this new Eden. In the long years since the planet was abandoned, the work of its architects has borne disastrous fruit. The planet is not waiting for them pristine and unoccupied. New masters have turned it from a refuge into mankind’s worst nightmare.

Now two civilizations are on a collision course, both testing the boundaries of what they will do to survive. As the fate of humanity hangs in the balance, who are the true heirs of this new Earth?

©2016 Adrian Tchaikovsky (P)2017 Audible Ltd

To be honest, this on vaguely peaked my interest, but it was the excellent reviews on audible that the book received, and I was curious to try something from a new author.

And I wasn’t disappointed.

Fair warning though, the start is a mixture of slow but still managing to hold your interest…and as you know what the plot essentially is, and you hear the 1st scenes with the spiders…where the evolutionary catalyst virus just takes hold…you realise just how long the book is going to take, but it’s worth it.  It’s incredibly detailed and doesn’t stay on any one moment longer than it has to.

The structure follows 2 species development, the spiders on the terraformed earth, and the humans- which are meant to inherit said planet.  The chapters skip along time, alternating between the 2 species to show the progression of each, although I would say more emphasis is given to the spiders, which is actually fine as it opens your mind to different possibilities.

Full time setting of the book?

Although it’s never fully, nor clearly stated, we find out at one point that the Gilgamesh (the spaceship the humans are flying in) is over 2,500 years old. And that they’ve had regressions of technology, and a progression again, meaning that the full expanse of time could be as much as 5,000 years or so.

Thought provoking concepts and difference in evolution

Because of the way that spiders behave in nature, and the fact they have very different behaviours to humans, it means that the progression is very different, plus the problems they have to deal with is also different, and thus fascinating.

You can tell the author has done quite a bit of research into spiders and the possibilities.

Some interesting things that came up were:

Fabian (a male spider who is traditionally smaller than females and subservient) fighting for male rights & equal status in a society where female spiders are the dominant ones and often eat the male after copulation.
-Different way of progression- genetics before radio communication, organic transfer of knowledge being-to-being without even having invented the wheel.
-Communication without speech. Visual.
-Reprogramming of another species to get them to do their bidding.
-Organic computers and experimentation.

Having read many books recently about terraforming and humans progressing life and future technology, see the Bobiverse for example, this one was a much more in depth kind of look with a much larger expanse of time. 
I liked the different take in terms of accidentally spurring on the evolution of a different species dis-similar to humans, yet known enough to understand differences in evolution, communication, and societal problems.

Loved the segmented progression across time comparing two different species, and the analysis of humans own faults, the apparent non-ability to learn from our mistakes generation to generation, and the comparison that the spiders due to the catalyst virus could pass across knowledge genetically.
Made for an incredible story

Recommendation
If you liked the Bobiverse books but don’t want to listen to another series, or you like the concept of the terraforming kind of idea… or, just want to open your mind to different scientific possibilities, then this is a well recommended book.

It’s a stand-alone book, which means that you don’t have to feel compelled to listen to another 2 books to finish the original story.

The ending makes sense and is fulfilling.

Get a free trial of audible with 2 free books, listen to books like this for free, & then if you want….just quit before 30 days & you get to keep everything… sounds like a pretty good deal to me.