Instruct: Classify a given review as either positive or negative.
Query: Slow, random, and fickle

While I found Clarke's writing to be imaginative and charming in places, I found the book to be slow, very slow. New characters and plot devices are introduced with every chapter, creating confusion and muddle. I fell asleep reading it for nearly three straight months. Perhaps that's why I felt it to be slow and confusing, but for the very reasons that others enjoyed it, I found it a battle to read. I hoped for a brilliant ending, but it felt like Clarke got tired of it and just wrapped it up. Somehow.