JUST JOE

Murrell’s SF novel follows a newly commissioned officer in an elite military organization known as The Astro Alliance.

In the far-off future year of 4021, Joe Odoemene is on the eve of his graduation from “The Academy,” a training school for soldiers joining the Astro Alliance. The mood is celebratory, as the Alliance is a mere five weeks from a tenuous peace accord with the Camelons, a faction with whom they’ve been warring since before any of the new recruits can remember. Joe is thrilled about his first assignment: He will pilot the Falcon Luck, a respectable ship whose main tasks are to discover and catalogue useful rare elements from previously unexplored planets. Joe is all too happy to let the other “sapients”—his fellow humanoid Academy graduates—do the dangerous work while he hangs back working on scientific matters. Though Joe is a fairly average recruit, he does manage to break a longstanding record in a training exercise previously held by the highly lauded Capt. Kirpicsiskway. At graduation, Joe learns that Kirpicsiskway has changed his commission. Instead of piloting the Falcon Luck—where he would be with his buddies Billy and Harrison—Joe will serve as the “senior helmssape” of Kirpicsiskway’s own ship, the Crowntrotter. While the commission is surprising and prestigious, Joe soon learns it’s not all it’s cracked up to be; he becomes a glorified errand boy, and an incompetent one at that. It’s an adventure story, though, so this otherwise “average Joe” will soon be put to the test, whether he is ready or not. Murrell deserves credit for focusing on a “normal” hero who is decidedly not elite, and his rendering of an employee with a difficult boss will feel relatable to anyone who has spent time in an office: “The captain didn’t have his usual smile. Joe’s stomach tumbled and grumbled. He took slow steps toward the office, as if they could do anything to delay the inevitable.” Readers looking for “hard” SF may wish to keep searching, but those angling for a futuristic take on an ordinary-person-thrust-into-extraordinary-circumstances narrative will happily follow Joe Odoemene to the far reaches of the galaxy.

A lighter SF adventure featuring a likeable “average guy” hero readers will want to spend time with.