THE MIMICKING OF KNOWN SUCCESSES

Science fiction, mystery, and a bit of sapphic romance intermingle sweetly in this novel set on (within?) Jupiter.

A couple of hundred years ago, humanity fled a devastated Earth and built a new home in the atmosphere of Jupiter (which they’re now calling Giant): a series of platforms connected by a railcar system. Now, a Scholar named Bolien Trewl has apparently leaped off (or was pushed from) one of these platforms. The brilliant but somewhat socially detached Investigator Mossa seeks clues about the Scholar from Valdegeld University, and, somewhat reluctantly, from her former classmate and lover, Scholar Pleiti. Pleiti finds herself pulled away from her academic work and toward both Mossa’s investigation and Mossa herself, as they pursue a case linking Bolien’s mysterious actions with the death of a street preacher and the disappearance of rare biological samples. Endless cups of tea are drunk and scones consumed in this homage to classic British mysteries, although it’s not entirely clear how a society that carefully husbands its resources is able to provide so many dainties. Nor is it entirely believable that the potential resettlement of Earth would rely so heavily on reviewing literature to understand how Earth’s ecosystems might have functioned, rather than more rigorous and direct scientific research, which isn’t taken entirely seriously. But asking too many questions might spoil this carefully constructed milieu, as delicately built as any Agatha Christie house of cards.

Obvious in its artifice, but deliberately and charmingly so.