RogerBW's Blog

2014 science fiction. The mixed human and alien crew members aboard a wormhole-building ship move from world to world, on their way to the job that'll let them move into the big time.

This is a science fiction story about people. There's very little by way of action, or even convoluted plotting: everything is set up to tell us the stories of the various crew members. The story begins with the arrival of Rosemary Harper, a young clerk who's been hired on to get the paperwork into some sort of order (though she clearly has some secrets to worry about). This gives an excuse for a description of the ship and the rest of the crew through a stranger's eyes:

She wore an orange jumpsuit smudged with grease and gunk, patched on the elbows with bright fabric and big stitches. There were hasty notes handwritten on her sleeves, things like "CHECK 32-B -- OLD WIRES?" and "DON'T FORGET AIR FILTERS YOU DUMMY" and "EAT."

But this isn't one of those young adult novels about someone Leaving Home and Finding Herself. Rosemary doesn't even stay as the principal viewpoint character. Almost everyone gets some time as the focus of attention, and the plot is subordinated to this: the ship's journey conveniently brings it to a series of places where each character can have their Important Moment that tells the reader more about them.

It's a weakness in the book, and so is the lack of actual science in this science fiction: the ship's fuel seems to be based on algae, by some means never explained, and the tech in general does what it needs to do to make the story work, rather than the story flowing (at least to some extent) from what the tech can do. It's a pity things are imbalanced in this way, but the character part of the story works so well that I forgive these relatively minor problems. (And this is probably a good book for introducing someone who doesn't read SF to the genre.)

The great thing is that nobody here is a villain. Everyone, on the ship and off, has their reasons for doing what they do, which make sense to them. Everyone on the crew is to some extent likeable, or at least trying to be. Eventually.

The setting is pleasingly free of cliché. There's a Galactic Commons, the overall government for most of the civilised species, but humans are only a small part of it and some people still don't think they should have been let in. It's neither a paragon of virtuous government nor a monster of tyranny. The other species aren't super-wise or "more evolved"; they just have different problems. Humans aren't known for being the best at fighting, or engineering, or anything else really.

It's a very talky book, but never felt slow. It's great fun, and heartwarming in a good way. Very highly recommended.

To be followed in October by A Closed and Common Orbit.