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Comment by Klaster_1 | Hacker News Reader

Talking about Portias, I recommend reading "Children of Time" by Adrian Tchaikovsky, it's about the process of uplifting spiders and how humans re-establish contacts with them. Another great book about smart "spiders" is "A Deepness in the Sky" by Vernor Vinge, my favorite in the "Zones of Thought" series.

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I can also recommend "Children of time", it's a really good sci-fi book. There's a sequel called "Children of Ruin", but I can't comment on it as I haven't finished reading it.

Then, allow me to recommend it :)

It's very rare for a sequel to be better than the first, but thats definitely the case with children of ruin

I didn't know how the concept of universal consciousness could be expanded on much more after the first book, but wow was i wrong.

Portias are also talked about in Echopraxia, the Blindsight sequel by Peter Watts.

One of my favorite sci-fi books of all time. What makes it so good is how the author manages to get you to see the world through the (many) eyes of the Portia spider, and evolve it they get uplifted.

The use of ants is pure genius.

The sequel, Children of Ruin, is likewise compelling, but lacks some of the finesse and mystique of the first book.

Idk how it compares to the aforementioned books, but there is also a series of fiction by Colin Wilson “Spider World: …” (1987+). It was a great read when I was a teenager.

The Tower is a novel in which humankind has been reduced to slavery and outlawry by giant spiders in the far future.

One of my favorite books and highly recommend.

That was really good. As a kid I also enjoyed Spider World by Colin Wilson (a very YA take on smart giant spiders).

A Deepness in the Sky is so good. The spiders are all experienced through the radio, which makes them more relatable in a way.

Somebody had to mention Children of Time. It's a really good book

Children of Time is fantastic, a really unique take on sci-fi

I saw it as a really fantastic riff on David Brin’s “uplift” series. In fact, Tchaikovsky calls this out explicitly in naming one of the (IIRC) habitat orbiters Brin.

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