For fans only.
Prolific author Modesitt returns to science fiction with a tale of space exploration.
On a version of Earth about a century from now, Dr. Alayna Wong-Grant, a researcher at a remote radio telescope site, discerns a distant object in the sky. Although she initially believes it to be a comet, as it approaches, she finds it’s a massive asteroid, made of nickel and iron. On Earth, resources have dwindled to nearly nothing, and nations jostle for their share of what remains. Capturing and refining this asteroid would ensure the dominance of whoever reaches it first, and the North American Union selects Capt. Christopher Tavoian, Alayna’s friend, for a solo space mission. But as the asteroid races toward our sun, Alayna discovers it’s no naturally occurring phenomenon—whatever’s coming was definitely created by someone, somewhere. Much of the novel unfolds in an almost epistolary style, relaying messages between Alayna on the ground and Tavoian in space, while the alien artifact draws ever closer and begins to affect life on Earth in unexpected ways. Even by the standards of hard science-fiction novels, which cherish the technical aspects of their worlds, every page of this book is heaving with needless details. From the opening paragraph, which recounts a radio telescope’s full capabilities as well as its construction history, to the uninspired and unneeded epilogue, nothing about the world or how it works has been left to the reader's imagination. Even the spaces between chapters are taken over with fabricated news articles which impede the flow of the story far more than they add to it. For all the realistic detail, the people come across as inauthentic, barely human. Despite subplots centering on their families, characters’ inner thoughts go largely unexplored, leaving them to express feelings through a baffling semaphore of facial expressions, such as “she smiled wryly, but fondly” or “she frowned for a moment, then smiled, if ironically.”
For fans only.Pub Date: Nov. 3, 2015
ISBN: 978-0-7653-8195-8
Page Count: 464
Publisher: Tor
Review Posted Online: Aug. 17, 2015
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 1, 2015
With its bug-eyed monsters, one might think Dune was written thirty years ago; it has a fantastically complex schemata and...
This future space fantasy might start an underground craze.
It feeds on the shades of Edgar Rice Burroughs (the Martian series), Aeschylus, Christ and J.R. Tolkien. The novel has a closed system of internal cross-references, and features a glossary, maps and appendices dealing with future religions and ecology. Dune itself is a desert planet where a certain spice liquor is mined in the sands; the spice is a supremely addictive narcotic and control of its distribution means control of the universe. This at a future time when the human race has reached a point of intellectual stagnation. What is needed is a Messiah. That's our hero, called variously Paul, then Muad'Dib (the One Who Points the Way), then Kwisatz Haderach (the space-time Messiah). Paul, who is a member of the House of Atreides (!), suddenly blooms in his middle teens with an ability to read the future and the reader too will be fascinated with the outcome of this projection.
With its bug-eyed monsters, one might think Dune was written thirty years ago; it has a fantastically complex schemata and it should interest advanced sci-fi devotees.Pub Date: Oct. 15, 1965
ISBN: 0441013597
Page Count: 411
Publisher: Chilton
Review Posted Online: Nov. 2, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 1, 1965
BOOK TO SCREEN
BOOK TO SCREEN
BOOK TO SCREEN
Imperfect, but well constructed and engrossing nonetheless.
Cerúlia recovers from her wounds and decides it’s finally time to take back her throne in Kozloff’s (The Queen of Raiders, 2020, etc.) penultimate Nine Realms novel.
Badly burned and laid up in a Healing Center, Cerúlia is losing faith in herself. She misses the various friends she’s made along her journey, misses her home, and resents her limitations as she heals from injuries sustained in the previous novel. In the past, her magical “Talent” for talking to animals has helped her make friends with local creatures, but she’s worried that something has happened to her ability and fears using it. As she slowly recuperates and learns from the fellow residents in the healing center, Cerúlia comes to understand that she must face her responsibility to her people and find a way to become the Queen of Weirandale. To that end, she returns home to her nation’s capital, Cascada, only to discover that her long-lost foster sister, Percia, is about to marry the kindly son of the maniacal and power-hungry Regent Matwyck, the very person keeping Cerúlia from her throne. Reunited with her beloved foster family, Cerúlia decides it is time to stop hiding under aliases and disguises. But with no army to support her, how is she supposed to save herself from Matwyck’s clutches? And now that she’s seen more of the world and understands the lives of regular people, does she even believe in the idea of monarchy at all? Kozloff finally brings the action back to Weirandale in a compelling setup to the last novel in her series. Like Book 2, this one struggles a bit with standing on its own, but Kozloff uses these pages to make Cerúlia a more complex and compelling character. Threads following other characters from other nations are easy to follow and add dimension to the world, but as of now they still feel a bit too detached from the main plotline.
Imperfect, but well constructed and engrossing nonetheless.Pub Date: March 24, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-250-16866-5
Page Count: 448
Publisher: Tor
Review Posted Online: Jan. 12, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 2020
© Copyright 2026 Kirkus Media LLC. All Rights Reserved.
Follow
Popular in this Genre
We can’t wait for you to join Kirkus!
It’s free and takes less than 10 seconds!
Already have an account? Log in.
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
Welcome Back!
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
