I loved the book, but after figuring out the ending I'm a little confused. I mean, the whole book was amazing in the sense that it paints you a perfect picture of how man evolved and brings up some amazing, although hypothetical, situations regarding how we will continue to evolve and become one with the universe... but then the end, it just brings up this whole... "nuclear weapons are bad" statement, and it felt like it came out of nowhere. If the book would have just ended with Bowman becoming omnipotent and such, the book would have been perfect. Nonetheless it was still a great book.
Also, with Bowman becoming omnipotent at the end, is this supposed to be suggesting that man's final stage of evolution is to become god(like)? It appears that Bowman had become godlike in the end. It reminds me a lot of The Last Question by Isaac Asimov
Lastly, did Dave Bowman ever actually leave the monolith on Japedus? Or did he just go on an intellectual journey through the stars while simultaneously becoming omnipotent?
I have never seen the movie so this is just what I'm getting from the book. I had to spark note the last 2 chapters because I just got extremely lost out of nowhere at a few parts.