Rendezvous with Rama.

A promising opening of mysterious object and dry elder academic panel bickering.... oh don't let this be just a cool exploration of the physical properties of this space... in space... with bonus tangential misogyny... oh, the physical properties and some cold-war-commentary at least accelerate... pity for the futuristic anachronisms, 1973 feels closer to Jules Verne than to us.

... that is, it's 50% description of a docking maneuver, and 50% setup for an exciting book.

I guess that makes it one of those books you should read once, but I didn't manage to enjoy it much.

the characters were a bit no-nonsense and technical, but the setting was immensely good