--- product_id: 8282856 title: "Hyperion (Hyperion Cantos)" price: "€ 24.01" currency: EUR in_stock: true reviews_count: 13 url: https://www.desertcart.at/products/8282856-hyperion-hyperion-cantos store_origin: AT region: Austria --- # Hyperion (Hyperion Cantos) **Price:** € 24.01 **Availability:** ✅ In Stock ## Quick Answers - **What is this?** Hyperion (Hyperion Cantos) - **How much does it cost?** € 24.01 with free shipping - **Is it available?** Yes, in stock and ready to ship - **Where can I buy it?** [www.desertcart.at](https://www.desertcart.at/products/8282856-hyperion-hyperion-cantos) ## Best For - Customers looking for quality international products ## Why This Product - Free international shipping included - Worldwide delivery with tracking - 15-day hassle-free returns ## Description A stunning tour de force filled with transcendent awe and wonder, Hyperion is a masterwork of science fiction that resonates with excitement and invention, the first volume in a remarkable epic by the multiple-award-winning author of The Hollow Man . On the world called Hyperion, beyond the reach of galactic law, waits a creature called the Shrike. There are those who worship it. There are those who fear it. And there are those who have vowed to destroy it. In the Valley of the Time Tombs, where huge, brooding structures move backward through time, the Shrike waits for them all. On the eve of Armageddon, with the entire galaxy at war, seven pilgrims set forth on a final voyage to Hyperion seeking the answers to the unsolved riddles of their lives. Each carries a desperate hope—and a terrible secret. And one may hold the fate of humanity in his hands. Praise for Dan Simmons and Hyperion “Dan Simmons has brilliantly conceptualized a future 700 years distant. In sheer scope and complexity it matches, and perhaps even surpasses, those of Isaac Asimov and James Blish.” — The Washington Post Book World “An unfailingly inventive narrative . . . generously conceived and stylistically sure-handed.” — The New York Times Book Review “Simmons’s own genius transforms space opera into a new kind of poetry.” — The Denver Post “An essential part of any science fiction collection.” — Booklist Review: Perfectenschlag -Dwight - Hyperion is phenomenal! The writing is so eloquent that it was actually shocking to believe that this was written in 1989, it felt like this had easily been written and released this year because nothing felt dated about the story, the characters or really anything involved with the storyline. It’s described as The Canterbury Tales in space, though I’ve never read The Canterbury Tales, I can’t exactly say that. What I can say is that this was truly something unique to me, as I’ve not really experienced a type of story telling like this where it felt like six different novellas tied into one large story. After reading this I can truly say that Simmons is a master of the science fiction genre by writing such a masterful tale that had me reading every chance that I got and frothing over his beautiful writing style. Hyperion’s setting of a 29th century world has such an intricate plot with a very rich and detailed universe where humanity has colonized numerous planets. One of my favorite things is spotting references, and Simmons has a lot of them placed within the story, at one point I would say “oh this reminds me of this” and then Simmons would point that out later letting you know that’s why it’s similar, part of that is using historical themes such as Greek and Biblical Hebrew to help tell a part of the story. Hyperion has a perfect pacing that never felt sluggish or too fast moving at any point and if you’re looking for a story that is much more character driven than plot, as the focus is on learning about the characters, this is definitely the story to read. Within each story, Simmons does a great job of weaving in action and drama with stories of political power, familial love, religion and fate. What intrigues me the most is that while the story of the characters is happening, a war is underway with the Ousters, that could destroy Hyperion. “Words bend our thinking to infinite paths of self-delusion, and the fact that we spend most of our mental lives in brain mansions built of words means that we lack the objectivity necessary to see the terrible distortion of reality which language brings.” The story follows six pilgrims and their expedition to Hyperion, my worry with how this story was told is that I could end up not liking one or more of these stories within, but that was not the case, each story is well established and thought provoking while also being dark and tragic to their own extents and always leading back to one thing, the Shrike, a terrifying creature that is sent back in time. The differences in the style of each story is what made this so unique, one story felt somewhat like Westworld or Ready Player 1, one was a bit more comedic, another one felt like a nod to Isaac Asimov’s iRobot, while another had a Benjamin Button, 50 First Dates quality about it to give multiple parallels to how different each one of these characters are. Simmons attention to focus on these characters that are deeply complex and so very flawed is what makes this stand out the most, on top of that there is the mysterious Shrike creature that is sent back in time, a creature that is described almost like Galactus the world eater, but with a more sinister xenomorph look to it. With everything that’s been revealed about the characters, there’s still quite a bit of mystery still left to figure out in the rest of the series and its sequel since the story ends on a bit of cliffhanger with the group reaching their destination as all their stories have now been told. I’m not a big fan of cliffhangers, but this series is old enough that all books are available, so there’s no reason for panic. Another thing I’m always leery about is multiple narrators, because if one is bad, it can put a damper on the story, but again, this was not an issue because all five narrators, Marc Vietor, Allyson Johnson, Kevin Pariseau, Jay Snyder & Victor Bevine were terrific. They made this story even better with superior performances that got me in my feels and had my spine tingling from theme sheer terror that they felt, this was perfect in every way imaginable. As Dwight would say, perfectenschlag. Review: I am going to assume that there is not going to be some nice neat conclusion where everything that has gone on before ... - At the outset, let me say that I have not yet read The Fall of Hyperion. I was aware before I read Hyperion that this was the first part of a two part work. Actually, I am now not sure whether the story really concludes with the Fall of Hyperion, or this story line is in fact a series. According to Wikipedia; “The Hyperion Cantos is a series of science fiction novels. The title was originally used for the collection of the first pair of books, Hyperion and The Fall of Hyperion, and later came to refer to the overall storyline, including Endymion, The Rise of Endymion, and a number of short stories.” Given my understanding that the story line continues for some time, I am going to assume that there is not going to be some nice neat conclusion where everything that has gone on before falls into place. This is certainly not unusual in the science fiction genre. To say that there is a lot going on in Hyperion would be putting it mildly. Clearly, the main story line focuses on the 6 characters, not including Het Masteen, who are making the pilgrimage to the Shrike. The pilgrimage takes place within what appears to be the larger story of the Ousters, the Hegemony and the TechnoCore. How all of these apparent competing interests relate to one another and which one might be in the best interests of humans remains a mystery to me. Actually, there are also other things going on or that have happened in the past that are not clear to me. For example, what exactly is/was the Hegira? While most of the story is grounded in traditional science fiction, it certainly appears to me that Hyperion might also be described as a horror story within a work of science fiction. For instance, the Shrike, whatever it turns out to be, reminds me of something that might be found in a Stephen King novel. Be prepared that the author uses flashbacks to tell some of the stories being related by the pilgrims. Accordingly, when a pilgrim’s tale begins you may initially have no idea what is going on. Nevertheless, things begin to focus as the story unravels. This is especially true with the Consul’s story, as there is also an element of time displacement that underlies his story. Another thing that remains as somewhat of a mystery to me is why poets seem to have such a central role in the story. One of the pilgrims is a poet who will break out into poetic verse during exchanges with his fellow pilgrims, and whose own tale seems to involve a poetic connection to the Shrike. There is also the reincarnation of the poet John Keats in the cybrid named Johnny and Hyperion itself has a city of poets. If there is some reason that this poetry theme is essential to the story, I don’t know what it is. As somewhat of an aside, I have to give credit to the author for including self-sustaining superintelligence in the storyline. I note that Hyperion was written in 1989, and to the best of my very limited knowledge, the perils of superintelligent machines were not well known at that time. As has now been recently reported, both Elon Musk and Stephen Hawking have stated that they believe AI is a threat to humanity. In my opinion, Dan Simmons is a very talented writer. Mr. Simmons has definitely conjured up a future that can only be the work of someone with an extraordinary imagination. I enjoyed reading Hyperion and did not feel let down by an ending that did not resolve the issues in the main storyline. ## Features - Hyperion (Hyperion Cantos) - Hyperion & The Fall of Hyperion 2 Book Set ## Technical Specifications | Specification | Value | |---------------|-------| | Best Sellers Rank | #5,152 in Books ( See Top 100 in Books ) #4 in Space Operas #8 in Science Fiction Short Stories #549 in Epic Fantasy (Books) | | Customer Reviews | 4.5 out of 5 stars 29,508 Reviews | ## Images ![Hyperion (Hyperion Cantos) - Image 1](https://m.media-amazon.com/images/I/81i2XR+FDfL.jpg) ## Customer Reviews ### ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ Perfectenschlag -Dwight *by M***Y on January 29, 2025* Hyperion is phenomenal! The writing is so eloquent that it was actually shocking to believe that this was written in 1989, it felt like this had easily been written and released this year because nothing felt dated about the story, the characters or really anything involved with the storyline. It’s described as The Canterbury Tales in space, though I’ve never read The Canterbury Tales, I can’t exactly say that. What I can say is that this was truly something unique to me, as I’ve not really experienced a type of story telling like this where it felt like six different novellas tied into one large story. After reading this I can truly say that Simmons is a master of the science fiction genre by writing such a masterful tale that had me reading every chance that I got and frothing over his beautiful writing style. Hyperion’s setting of a 29th century world has such an intricate plot with a very rich and detailed universe where humanity has colonized numerous planets. One of my favorite things is spotting references, and Simmons has a lot of them placed within the story, at one point I would say “oh this reminds me of this” and then Simmons would point that out later letting you know that’s why it’s similar, part of that is using historical themes such as Greek and Biblical Hebrew to help tell a part of the story. Hyperion has a perfect pacing that never felt sluggish or too fast moving at any point and if you’re looking for a story that is much more character driven than plot, as the focus is on learning about the characters, this is definitely the story to read. Within each story, Simmons does a great job of weaving in action and drama with stories of political power, familial love, religion and fate. What intrigues me the most is that while the story of the characters is happening, a war is underway with the Ousters, that could destroy Hyperion. “Words bend our thinking to infinite paths of self-delusion, and the fact that we spend most of our mental lives in brain mansions built of words means that we lack the objectivity necessary to see the terrible distortion of reality which language brings.” The story follows six pilgrims and their expedition to Hyperion, my worry with how this story was told is that I could end up not liking one or more of these stories within, but that was not the case, each story is well established and thought provoking while also being dark and tragic to their own extents and always leading back to one thing, the Shrike, a terrifying creature that is sent back in time. The differences in the style of each story is what made this so unique, one story felt somewhat like Westworld or Ready Player 1, one was a bit more comedic, another one felt like a nod to Isaac Asimov’s iRobot, while another had a Benjamin Button, 50 First Dates quality about it to give multiple parallels to how different each one of these characters are. Simmons attention to focus on these characters that are deeply complex and so very flawed is what makes this stand out the most, on top of that there is the mysterious Shrike creature that is sent back in time, a creature that is described almost like Galactus the world eater, but with a more sinister xenomorph look to it. With everything that’s been revealed about the characters, there’s still quite a bit of mystery still left to figure out in the rest of the series and its sequel since the story ends on a bit of cliffhanger with the group reaching their destination as all their stories have now been told. I’m not a big fan of cliffhangers, but this series is old enough that all books are available, so there’s no reason for panic. Another thing I’m always leery about is multiple narrators, because if one is bad, it can put a damper on the story, but again, this was not an issue because all five narrators, Marc Vietor, Allyson Johnson, Kevin Pariseau, Jay Snyder & Victor Bevine were terrific. They made this story even better with superior performances that got me in my feels and had my spine tingling from theme sheer terror that they felt, this was perfect in every way imaginable. As Dwight would say, perfectenschlag. ### ⭐⭐⭐⭐ I am going to assume that there is not going to be some nice neat conclusion where everything that has gone on before ... *by J***H on December 5, 2014* At the outset, let me say that I have not yet read The Fall of Hyperion. I was aware before I read Hyperion that this was the first part of a two part work. Actually, I am now not sure whether the story really concludes with the Fall of Hyperion, or this story line is in fact a series. According to Wikipedia; “The Hyperion Cantos is a series of science fiction novels. The title was originally used for the collection of the first pair of books, Hyperion and The Fall of Hyperion, and later came to refer to the overall storyline, including Endymion, The Rise of Endymion, and a number of short stories.” Given my understanding that the story line continues for some time, I am going to assume that there is not going to be some nice neat conclusion where everything that has gone on before falls into place. This is certainly not unusual in the science fiction genre. To say that there is a lot going on in Hyperion would be putting it mildly. Clearly, the main story line focuses on the 6 characters, not including Het Masteen, who are making the pilgrimage to the Shrike. The pilgrimage takes place within what appears to be the larger story of the Ousters, the Hegemony and the TechnoCore. How all of these apparent competing interests relate to one another and which one might be in the best interests of humans remains a mystery to me. Actually, there are also other things going on or that have happened in the past that are not clear to me. For example, what exactly is/was the Hegira? While most of the story is grounded in traditional science fiction, it certainly appears to me that Hyperion might also be described as a horror story within a work of science fiction. For instance, the Shrike, whatever it turns out to be, reminds me of something that might be found in a Stephen King novel. Be prepared that the author uses flashbacks to tell some of the stories being related by the pilgrims. Accordingly, when a pilgrim’s tale begins you may initially have no idea what is going on. Nevertheless, things begin to focus as the story unravels. This is especially true with the Consul’s story, as there is also an element of time displacement that underlies his story. Another thing that remains as somewhat of a mystery to me is why poets seem to have such a central role in the story. One of the pilgrims is a poet who will break out into poetic verse during exchanges with his fellow pilgrims, and whose own tale seems to involve a poetic connection to the Shrike. There is also the reincarnation of the poet John Keats in the cybrid named Johnny and Hyperion itself has a city of poets. If there is some reason that this poetry theme is essential to the story, I don’t know what it is. As somewhat of an aside, I have to give credit to the author for including self-sustaining superintelligence in the storyline. I note that Hyperion was written in 1989, and to the best of my very limited knowledge, the perils of superintelligent machines were not well known at that time. As has now been recently reported, both Elon Musk and Stephen Hawking have stated that they believe AI is a threat to humanity. In my opinion, Dan Simmons is a very talented writer. Mr. Simmons has definitely conjured up a future that can only be the work of someone with an extraordinary imagination. I enjoyed reading Hyperion and did not feel let down by an ending that did not resolve the issues in the main storyline. ### ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ A stylistic tour de force that demands much of the reader and gives much more. *by R***K on July 12, 2015* Dan Simmons invites you to partake of a space opera after the heart of The Canterbury Tales in the first of the Hyperion Cantos, which promises to be an epic adventure with concepts and plot twists fit for a season of Doctor Who. Known space stands on the brink of interstellar war between the human Hegemony and the barbarous Ousters, a nomadic branch of humanity that has lived for generations in a nomadic existence in the dark between the stellar oasis of the stars, and have evolved and mutated into something perhaps other than human. And all the while a third faction – the independent AIs of humanity’s making – keep to their inscrutable plans, offering computing service to all while seeking to manipulate organic life to further the AIs’ own interests. In this pivotal moment, poised at a conflict of unprecedented scale that could well mean the extermination of sentience at worst and the devastation of civilization at best, news comes from the mysterious world of Hyperion: the legendary Time Tombs are opening, and a final pilgrimage is called. Artifacts of an unknown and immeasurably advanced power, the Time Tombs are gateways to eternity, offering enlightenment and puissance to the worthy pilgrim. To the unworthy pilgrim, the reward is death most brutal and terrifying, because first, the sojourners must face the guardian of the Time Tombs: the Shrike. To quote one character: He’s Michael the Archangel and Moroni and Satan and Masked Entropy and the Frankenstein monster all rolled into one package. He hangs around the Time Tombs waiting to come out and wreak havoc when it’s mankind’s time to join the dodo… Personally, I’d add Gort the robot from The Day the Earth Stood Still to that list. The real one, not that godawful remake. Like Gort, the Shrike is terrifying and inscrutable, beyond reason and appeal, and if it’s programming concludes that you die, the Shrike will execute that program, and it’s target, and no force in the universe can stand against it. And the Shrike is on the move. The reader’s introduction to this epic comes in the vector of seven different people from very different walks of life, and even from different times, since many have spent time in stasis or have experienced years or centuries compressed into minutes or days during faster-than-light travel through space. Seven people who under normal circumstances would never have met, now travel together across the world of Hyperion to the Time Tombs, knowing that only one will survive. All the while, Hyperion is on the front lines and will be among the first targets hit by the Ouster attack. As they travel, they agree to take turns sharing their stories, what brought them to Hyperion, what they want and why they are willing to risk everything to get it. And to add an extra layer of complication, one of the pilgrims may well be an Ouster operative. The story takes the form of six novellas as the seven pilgrims take their turn. Each novella is masterful, written in a different style and a different voice, relating the character’s story while serving to explore different aspects of this vast universe and its history. A disgraced Catholic priest discovers a race of beings who may have achieved the immortality his faith has promised, or is it an obscene parody of life? A debauched poet chronicles his rise and fall and his drive to create a poem unlike any other, even if it is humanity’s funeral dirge. A private detective is hired by an AI avatar solve a murder. The victim? The AI himself. A ruthless warrior, hero and butcher, tells the story of his defense of a planet in a pitched campaign to fight off an Ouster incursion, and now seeks the true meaning of war and it’s answer. And more. The framing narrative is fraught with perils as well, since our pilgrims must worry not only about the approaching Ouster invasion, but a murder mystery among their own ranks. And in the end, somehow Simmons manages to wrap up all these threads and leave us on the springboard for the true epic promised in the following three novels of the Hyperion Cantos. All in all, a seamless masterpiece. I not only loved it, but I truly can’t understand how anyone could not be sucked in immediately. I plan to devour the next novels soon, and I only hope they live up to the start in Hyperion. I can only say that the first book is definitely worth re-reading, and the Shrike deserves iconic status. On a side note, readers will also benefit from a familiarity with some of the literary references in the book, particularly Keats’ unfinished Hyperion, from which the tale draws many influences. Also, the narrator of the audiobook, Marc Vietor, is a genius in terms of conveying different characters. ## Frequently Bought Together - Hyperion (Hyperion Cantos) - The Fall of Hyperion - The Rise of Endymion (Hyperion) --- ## Why Shop on Desertcart? - 🛒 **Trusted by 1.3+ Million Shoppers** — Serving international shoppers since 2016 - 🌍 **Shop Globally** — Access 737+ million products across 21 categories - 💰 **No Hidden Fees** — All customs, duties, and taxes included in the price - 🔄 **15-Day Free Returns** — Hassle-free returns (30 days for PRO members) - 🔒 **Secure Payments** — Trusted payment options with buyer protection - ⭐ **TrustPilot Rated 4.5/5** — Based on 8,000+ happy customer reviews **Shop now:** [https://www.desertcart.at/products/8282856-hyperion-hyperion-cantos](https://www.desertcart.at/products/8282856-hyperion-hyperion-cantos) --- *Product available on Desertcart Austria* *Store origin: AT* *Last updated: 2026-05-30*