Field One

Field #1

by Simon Winstanley

“It’s books like this that keep the sci-fi genre fresh and exciting…”
“Up there with Asimov…”
“I can't recall seeing time travel done this way before.”
The result of over three years of research, Field One is a seamless mix of real science, historical events, and solid Sci-Fi thriller. Believable and chilling in equal measure, there’s enough to have you questioning the world you know, the people who run it, and whether you yourself would be among the ‘Saved’.

All life extinct in 64 The data couldn’t lie.
Archive’s conclusion was To escape, make Time.
Their solution was 7 billion people must never know.
Their solution is failing.
The future lies with a high-functioning sociopath,
a child genius fascinated by time,
an officially retired space program,
and Field One...

★★★★★ “The perfect balance of sci-fi and action, and the best science fiction book I've read since Altered Carbon.”
★★★★★ “The story structure is unique, the plot lines thrilling, and the ending is just the start.”
★★★★★ “I read just about every time travel book available but this one is different and special.”
★★★★★ “Gripping, addictive and amazingly cerebral.”
★★★★★ “Ridiculously good. Brilliant science, well written.”
★★★★★ “Complex, intelligent and deep.”
★★★★★ “The story telling is gripping, found myself having to remember to breathe.”
★★★★★ “Time, shadow governments, psychology, end of the world stuff, heroes and villains, AI, futurism, chaos and control, and a whole heap of other cool stuff.”
★★★★★ “It’s books like this that keep the sci-fi genre fresh and Exciting…”
★★★★★ “I can't recall seeing time travel done this way before.”
★★★★★ “The best sci-fi I have read for a long time. Intelligent, thought provoking, good characters (strong female characters are refreshing to have). Up there with Asimov, in this reader's opinion.”

With one hand he shielded his eyes from the glare of the slide projectors, and with the other he pointed at the images. It appeared that the flower and its container were surrounded by a small transparent bubble.
“What you’re looking at, is a Chronomagnetic Field…” he said, “The flower inside the Field was proceeding through time at three times the normal rate.”
“What are the limitations to the size of this… Field?”
“None, as far as we can tell, except for practicality.”
Manipulating time around a sample flower was one thing, but saving a planet was quite another. With over sixty years to prepare for the arrival of ‘1951VA’, Archive knew that the comet wasn’t the immediate problem. The problem was human nature.

Field One
Field Two
Boundary
EVA
Inside the Field (An illustrated guide)
Barcode (Archive Member exclusive)
The Bridge (A Field Series standalone sequel)

Genres: Science Fiction, Fiction

505 pages, Kindle Edition

Published December 10, 2015

About the author

After choosing between Astrophysics and Electromechanical Engineering, Simon Winstanley went on to become (variously) an Engineer, Technology Teacher, Concept Illustrator, 3D Motion Ride designer, Visual Effects supervisor and Science Fiction author. He lives in North London, but his mind still commutes off-world.

To sign up on his readers list, please visit:
http://eepurl.com/ciroNL

@FieldOneAuthor on Twitter and Facebook.
simonwinstanleyauthor on Instagram

Reviews

[MR ROBERT B KNOWLES · Rating 5 out of 5]

Great concept and well written - recommend this to anyone

I really liked this book. For me it had everything I look for;
- great and easily read writing style
- awesome concept with enough explanation to be comfortable
- likeable characters and good characterisation
- unexpected twists and turns

Looking forward to the next book in the series!

[Chrissy · Rating 3 out of 5]

This sci-fi story embodies the "not all eggs in one basket" philosophy in that, in order to prevent a global catastrophe and the extinction of the human race, it makes use of the space program and "space lasers", time manipulation, intellectual enhancement drugs... Sometimes it felt like there were too many sci-fi "baskets" dealt with and a closer focus on fewer of the aspects would have benefited the story. The story also features conspiracy theories as a plotline, though - interestingly - most of the time we follow not the people trying to uncover a conspiracy, but the people doing the conspiring. It contains some interesting observations about society.

How do you persuade our species to save itself?

It's very focused on the world-building and plot, on how the "science" does and does not work, on how secret organizations, society and humanity as a whole work, less on characterization of individual characters. I personally tend to prefer a more character-focused approach, drawing me in through the individual human element. Here, the characters weren't exactly flat, but they were still only drawn in the broadest strokes, developed exactly to the point necessary to function as a vehicle for the plot, but no further.

The plot was interesting and the "science" bits made sense in the Doctor Who way: as in, for me as someone who did well enough in science class in school, but hasn't had anything to do with science since leaving school, I was able to just go along with it. Reverse the polarity of the neutron flow. ;) There are quite a few info-dumpy sections of technical explanations, where I would've liked to zoom in a little and witness/feel what was going on from inside one of the characters rather than just reading a "science-y" explanation of what was happening. Hard sci-fi fans might love this attention to detail in regards to how the science does and does not work, but no matter what genre, I'm more interested in the human element and would've preferred more focus on how the characters feel about what they are doing instead of the science behind what they are doing.

The chopped up timeline, jumping back and forth, wasn't confusing anymore after a while, but it sometimes had the effect that instead of letting us see things unfold, it told us in a history book-like fashion how things had unfolded.

At the beginning of the book, I felt like too much was shrouded in mystery and kept back from the readers, which didn't have the probably desired effect of intriguing me, but instead made me almost abandon the book because for too long I had absolutely no idea what was going on plot-wise and no feeling for who any of the characters really were either. Nonetheless, once I made it past the halfway mark, it did make me want to finish the rest of the book in one sitting. I enjoyed the moral ambiguity behind Archive, and though most of the characters didn't really manage to make me form a connection, a few - mainly Kate Walker and, surprisingly given how little page time he got, Miles Benton - did manage to pull me into their story more and more the further into the book I got.

[Sue · Rating 5 out of 5]

Enjoyable and well-written sci-fi tome with elements of thriller, impending apocalypse, space travel, biological enhancements and the development of advanced technologies involving time manipulation.

The plot is sophisticated and complex, partly because of the 'jumping around' to follow the various characters at different points in their personal time-lines. To be honest, I did find this a bit distracting at first and had to keep going back to the start of the chapter to remind myself when the segment was taking place, but after getting to know the main characters it did get easier. I would say that the author is brave to take the approach of avoiding a linear time-line.

There was quite a large cast of characters in the book, not all likable but most with well-developed back-stories which were revealed bit by bit to expose their motivations and reasons for their actions. Again, this was done in quite a sophisticated manner which must have taken much planning and forethought.

In terms of the writing, it was well above average (especially for a first novel!) but there were occasional problems with over-used and mis-placed commas which sometimes spoiled the flow.

I would recommend this book and would buy a sequel.

[Louise · Rating 5 out of 5]

So I have now read the whole series of Simon Winstanley's series and I can whole heartedly say this is the best series I have read this year and will remain in one of my top favourite series for the foreseeable future.
This series is cleverly written but not bombarded with science that leaves you wondering if you should have a PHd as a requirement to read it as many do! The stories are an intricate woven dance through time that follow characters you get to know and want to find out about.
This is a story of time travel, world disaster, family, friendship, love, politics, but most importantly of humanity and human capability.
The writing is compelling and exciting, and while the different storyline s at first seem jarring they soon seem natural and logical and add to the excitement as each book races to its conclusion.
I cannot recommend it more highly, it is such an engaging series I defy anyone not to enjoy it that does not give it at least 5 chapters!
An absolute MUST READ, one to leave you thinking and a series that would be worthy of a reread and still give return!
Go on give it a go!!

[Sean Randall · Rating 3 out of 5]

This had a great deal of potential. Clangingly British in spots, it did jump around a lot and you had to keep careful track of dates to know if what was happening made sense. The opening and closing sections were almost Arthur Clark-like in their obelisk-homaging of the bridge and the field, and the idea behind the story certainly is a good one. I'd have to read a sequel to decide just where this will go, though.c

[Tom Sinclair · Rating 5 out of 5]

A good book!

Having just finished a Peter Hamilton series I was Hoping to find another series with a similar pulling power. Well, I just stayed up all night finishing this, so tick. If I had to criticise something it would be the constant time jumps. Still a solid read, 4 stars from me.

[Meral · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book was gifted to me by a co-worker and I wanted to share my review for people who hadn’t heard of the writer before (like me).

Sci-fi novels aren’t usually my thing, as I find them a smidge too realistic in terms of human nature. And this one is definitely full of the bleak truth that, in a world-ending event, a lot of people suck.

So, the plot revolves around the discovery of something that will destroy all human life and a group called Archive who are trying to save everyone secretly (to avoid mass panic).

The story is told in a mix of POVs that cross a bunch of timelines. It’s cleverly done with events happening early in the book that only happen chronologically towards the end (again, the story crosses timelines so “chronologically” may be a stretch, but you get the idea!) but there’s so much depth and detail in between that you end up going “ohhh I remember that! That’s why! Omg!”

The science is explained in detail (very much going over my head) but with lots of descriptives that allowed me to visualise what was going on and work out a much-dumbed-down version that I could understand for myself. If you like time travel and the science thereof, you’ll enjoy it, I’m sure.

Though Simon Winstanley is yet to convince me to love sci-fi, I am eager to buy the next two books in this series!

[Catherine Griffin · Rating 4 out of 5]

A massive conspiracy aims to save humanity from a civilisation-destroying asteroid impact.

From the start, this is a rather confusing book: the first few chapters introduce different characters in different times and places and it takes a long while for the pieces to come together. Throughout, it jumps around in time — the chapters have date labels I think, which may help some people (I prefer to ignore any stated dates and just follow the plot). Despite those handicaps, it’s good stuff and well worth struggling through any sticky patches.

The premise is basically that a big space rock is set to hit the Earth. A secret organization of scientists and the super-rich intend to save the Earth, or at least themselves, by means of their super-secret-research (and lasers on the moon, obviously). Like all huge conspiracies, it’s pretty daft, but this was well enough written for me to suspend disbelief.

Overall, enjoyable and engaging science fiction which will keep your brain in gear. Slightly sloppy writing but with few editing errors.

This is the first book of a trilogy, all in KU. I’ll probably read the rest at some point.

[Moshe Eshel · Rating 4 out of 5]

I liked the book a lot.
Finally someone handling conspiracy theories from the right side...

However, once I got the general drift, it became a little less exciting with lots of very simplified and maybe expected/unsurprising story lines.
The sense at the end is that there are a lot of neat ideas, but some are hardly explored enough.

Also waiting for the end of the book to introduce villain #1, this is more like TV series than books imo.

But the book flows nicely, at the beginning I had to jump back & forth for references, but that quickly wasn't necessary as the characters stopped being new.

And it is definitely nice enough to buy book #2 which I did straight away when I finished the first.

[William Belfield · Rating 4 out of 5]

It's good, very solid first book my Simon Winstanley. Very similar to Seveneves by Neal Stephenson which is a fine endorsement. Got kind of difficult where terminology was concerned, not validated whether the technology and terms exist or is of the authors creation. Also difficult to keep track where the timeframe was moving forward and back by each chapter. That said, the scenario of life on earth being obliterated by a meteor or comet is very real, and the benefits of a reboot being appealingly attractive.

Like I said, very much like Seveneves (life on earth being obliterated, subjects from each race shipped up to the ISS etc),will comment further once I have completed Field Two.

[Mitchell Schneidkraut · Rating 3 out of 5]

Far fetched sci-fi where it was difficult to figure our what place or time you were reading about

A little bit far fetched, with the entire space race with Russia and the moon landings serving to hide the developments to save the human race from an asteroid that will crash into the Earth and largely destroy it.

Then the development of time travel to escape Earth's doom.

Lots of action and keeping the reader guess what will happen next. There was way to much jumping forward and backward in time and jumping from one place to another. At times with short chapters it was hard to figure that year it was or where you actually were.

[Mirsha · Rating 3 out of 5]

This was an okay book let down by its writing style. The book tells it's story by cutting back and forth between different time periods and characters. Unfortunately the book tends to drop big points, then use later chapters to back fill the events leading up to it. This leaves the narrative a bit harder to follow at points and knowing the event they lead up to undercuts the storytelling. This is further compounded by the short length of many of these chapters which lends portions of the feeling of being pure filler to pad the book out.

[Pegwinn · Rating 4 out of 5]

Not your dads time travel book

Doom is coming and so a secret world spanning pragmatic organization is needed to save it. Time travel is one component. A false moon landing the other.

It took a couple of tries to get into this book to be honest. The first pinball style back and forth between years really needs to be paid attention to. If you get to page sixty or so it will start to make a bit of sense and the story then is promoted to “good, better, then pretty dang good” on my personal rating scale.

[Alistair Ravie · Rating 3 out of 5]

Would have liked to give it more but its one of a series and I'm not keen on series where individual books don't tell a complete story. This one leaves you hanging.

A big comet is on its way to destroy life on Earth (shades of Deep Impact?). Its going to take years to collide (this is early 50s - pre space age). This provides the impetus for the space program and the program we see is only the public tip of the iceberg.

There are schemes within schemes and ruthless powerful organizations. With all the deception and subterfuge can it all work out for the good.

Continued in part 2...

[Alan L. · Rating 5 out of 5]

An entertaining story regarding an asteroid due to hit Earth. The story takes place over many decades, and the novel switches between a number of timelines both past and future. This makes for an inventive, if complicated story, in which you need quite good memory for people and events which evolves through the four novels in the series.
A story this complex needs to be well written, and the author certainly achieves it. He must have had hundreds of post it stickers on every wall to keep track, lol.

[Andy Parkes · Rating 4 out of 5]

Great bit of sci-fi!

Simple enough premise. Huge asteroid found on a collision course with earth. They have 64 years to come up with a solution

Really interesting how it leans on real world history and uses them as plot devices.

Takes a bit of getting used to as the story jumps between various characters in various points in time and I did get lost a couple of times

First of a trilogy so plenty more to look forward to, can't wait

[Stephen Van Court · Rating 2 out of 5]

Too disjointed

A table of contents would have been helpful. This is a strange thing to say about a novel, but it seemed like the author wrote the story then just randomly rearranged the chapters for some bizarre effect. Spoiler: This book is only an introduction to a longer story. Since I don't understand the motives of the characters, and there doesn't seem to be a resolution, I will not continue reading the series.

[Warren Stringer · Rating 3 out of 5]

Well, the fragmented timeline feels like Christopher Nolan on steroids. But, unlike Memento, it doesn't offer much in plot development. Too many timeframes occupied by too many characters. As for characterization, well the story moves from questionable motives to an implausible coincidence to a character's infuriating lack of professional rigor. There is an incident which burst my suspension of disbelief. I am 86% through the book and may not finish.

[John Maguire · Rating 4 out of 5]

Slightly annoying jumping around between a lot of different timelines that takes a while to get used to but then you realise that it's in the footsteps almost of Agatha Christie and the purpose is to gradually fill in the missing pieces. Even more obvious through the second in the series. Enjoyable read.

[Grant · Rating 4 out of 5]

Riveting tale of cataclysm foreknown

Interesting take on a cataclysm tale. The time jumping of the story did get a bit wearing towards the end. Reasonably good characterisation although some of the larger characters who were more peripheral to the story felt a bit like cardboard cutouts. Still quite riveting to the end.

[Nick Olson · Rating 4 out of 5]

Field One was a good read

Interesting premise.

Multiple overlapping time lines kept different character POVs separate until it was their time to merge. Plots were revealed and several climaxes appeared to threaten the overall ‘plans’ but it all held together to the book’s end.

Don’t know yet it I’ll attempt the following books but perhaps.

[Chester Michael Emerson · Rating 3 out of 5]

Chaotic

Basically I enjoyed the book. I was however confused most of the time. Lots of characters and confusing time line. Chapters went back and forth in time with different characters.
Story was good enough for me to persevere and finish. Not sure yet if I want to start next book.

[William S. · Rating 3 out of 5]

Disjointed

Each chapter bounces around in different time zones. Each time zone is a different story. There are different people involved in each time zone, and it's difficult to keep up with the various names in each time zone as the story bounces from one to the other with each new chapter. None of the stories finish as the book finishes.

[Stuart Duffey · Rating 5 out of 5]

The whole series are epic and quite simply one of tge best Sci fi books I've ever read. Can't believe it hasn't been commissioned for TV series yet.

The flow of the story being non linear is superb and has you on your toes as a reader. The characters are supeb and the pulls and motivations that change through the course of the story are just brilliant.

A must read

[D Scowalez · Rating 3 out of 5]

Great start with a great concept. However, The further the book got on the more the time jumps got confusing, making the characters blend into each other (and not in a good way.) not sure I can be arsed to continue with the story, maybe one day.

[Theresa · Rating 2 out of 5]

I struggled to get through this. I downloaded this because of the reviews but I was disappointed right from the beginning. The writing seems dated and I just didn't get into it. Finishing it was an effort.

[Anton Kruglyakov · Rating 4 out of 5]

Reminds a bit Spin (first book) and Isaac Asimov 'Foundation'. The same theme of 'preserve humanity knowledge' and 'imminent catastrophe'. However, the motivation of heroes is questionable and social consequences of upcoming catastrophe aren't as detailed as in Spin.

[Paul1984 · Rating 4 out of 5]

The first in a series which combines a well paced plot with hard Sci-Fi an unusual combination these days.There is a tendency to drift to Space Opera by many of today's authors.

Read all 3 back to back. ;)

[Kayley Higgins · Rating 4 out of 5]

A difficult book to get into with the shifting around of time but really worth it in the end. Once I've read the series I am going to re read as there Is definitely subtleties that I missed first time around. Highly recommended reading the whole series though.

[Tanya Stevens · Rating 5 out of 5]

At first I thought there was too much going on - I have no idea how it was done - but the story really works, it was compelling and so interesting. I felt taken on a roller coaster journey and that I was somehow more enlightened for reading this. Definitely going to read more of this series.