An entertaining, amusing, and relatable SF tale with diverse characters.
In this SF novel, a lonely interplanetary trash collector survives a crisis in outer space and finds unusual new friends.
Feckless 30-something Kenyan Enoch Owusu, an interstellar trash collector, has just received several sudden, heavy blows in his personal life—his parents died; his girlfriend deserted him; and his best friend and partner left for a different job in quick succession. The year is 2742, and after centuries of wars and disasters, humans have colonized Mars, the moon, and Europa, all of which are governed by a military-style regime called SysNav. The Church of All Faiths, a new religion, believes that Earth received an alien signal centuries ago and expects the extraterrestrials to return and benefit humankind. Feeling out of shape, sad, alone, and powerless, Enoch is picking up space debris with a basic artificial intelligence system as his only companion when he detects a distress signal of unknown origin. His good-hearted decision to go check it out begins a series of surprising adventures that fulfill the promise of the subtitle. Watt’s narrative tone is delightfully snarky, especially in the 68 footnotes that explain various details of future history and daily life in a spaceship. Pithy, humorous descriptions vividly bring the setting and characters to life. The narrative is original and full of apt observations, including “Enoch tried to walk as sarcastically as he could...just to show them he wasn’t scared,” and “Finding a bunch of black ships in a black background of space was like one of those puzzles where you had to find the stripy shirt guy in the environment full of stripy things.” Enoch’s personal journey from pathetic basket case to brave, open-minded, and confident man is satisfying and relatable. The other characters are also intriguing and well drawn. The scientific explanations of “slip drive,” a method of fast space travel, seem plausible enough not to get in the way of the story. The ending leaves many questions unanswered, making readers hope for a sequel. Overall, this novel is a fun read that successfully combines a humane sensibility, a classic adventure story, and humor.
An entertaining, amusing, and relatable SF tale with diverse characters.Pub Date: N/A
ISBN: N/A
Page Count: 328
Publisher: Manuscript
Review Posted Online: June 11, 2022
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
A tasty, if not always tasteful, tale of supernatural mayhem that fans of King and Crichton alike will enjoy.
Are we not men? We are—well, ask Bigfoot, as Brooks does in this delightful yarn, following on his bestseller World War Z(2006).
A zombie apocalypse is one thing. A volcanic eruption is quite another, for, as the journalist who does a framing voice-over narration for Brooks’ latest puts it, when Mount Rainier popped its cork, “it was the psychological aspect, the hyperbole-fueled hysteria that had ended up killing the most people.” Maybe, but the sasquatches whom the volcano displaced contributed to the statistics, too, if only out of self-defense. Brooks places the epicenter of the Bigfoot war in a high-tech hideaway populated by the kind of people you might find in a Jurassic Park franchise: the schmo who doesn’t know how to do much of anything but tries anyway, the well-intentioned bleeding heart, the know-it-all intellectual who turns out to know the wrong things, the immigrant with a tough backstory and an instinct for survival. Indeed, the novel does double duty as a survival manual, packed full of good advice—for instance, try not to get wounded, for “injury turns you from a giver to a taker. Taking up our resources, our time to care for you.” Brooks presents a case for making room for Bigfoot in the world while peppering his narrative with timely social criticism about bad behavior on the human side of the conflict: The explosion of Rainier might have been better forecast had the president not slashed the budget of the U.S. Geological Survey, leading to “immediate suspension of the National Volcano Early Warning System,” and there’s always someone around looking to monetize the natural disaster and the sasquatch-y onslaught that follows. Brooks is a pro at building suspense even if it plays out in some rather spectacularly yucky episodes, one involving a short spear that takes its name from “the sucking sound of pulling it out of the dead man’s heart and lungs.” Grossness aside, it puts you right there on the scene.
A tasty, if not always tasteful, tale of supernatural mayhem that fans of King and Crichton alike will enjoy.Pub Date: June 16, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-9848-2678-7
Page Count: 304
Publisher: Del Rey/Ballantine
Review Posted Online: Feb. 9, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 2020
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK TO SCREEN
An unforgettable story of survival and the power of friendship—nothing short of a science-fiction masterwork.
Weir’s latest is a page-turning interstellar thrill ride that follows a junior high school teacher–turned–reluctant astronaut at the center of a desperate mission to save humankind from a looming extinction event.
Ryland Grace was a once-promising molecular biologist who wrote a controversial academic paper contesting the assumption that life requires liquid water. Now disgraced, he works as a junior high science teacher in San Francisco. His previous theories, however, make him the perfect researcher for a multinational task force that's trying to understand how and why the sun is suddenly dimming at an alarming rate. A barely detectable line of light that rises from the sun’s north pole and curves toward Venus is inexplicably draining the star of power. According to scientists, an “instant ice age” is all but inevitable within a few decades. All the other stars in proximity to the sun seem to be suffering with the same affliction—except Tau Ceti. An unwilling last-minute replacement as part of a three-person mission heading to Tau Ceti in hopes of finding an answer, Ryland finds himself awakening from an induced coma on the spaceship with two dead crewmates and a spotty memory. With time running out for humankind, he discovers an alien spacecraft in the vicinity of his ship with a strange traveler on a similar quest. Although hard scientific speculation fuels the storyline, the real power lies in the many jaw-dropping plot twists, the relentless tension, and the extraordinary dynamic between Ryland and the alien (whom he nicknames Rocky because of its carapace of oxidized minerals and metallic alloy bones). Readers may find themselves consuming this emotionally intense and thematically profound novel in one stay-up-all-night-until-your-eyes-bleed sitting.
An unforgettable story of survival and the power of friendship—nothing short of a science-fiction masterwork.Pub Date: May 4, 2021
ISBN: 978-0-593-13520-4
Page Count: 496
Publisher: Ballantine
Review Posted Online: Feb. 9, 2021
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 2021
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
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