Marina J. Lostetter (2017)

A voyage-to-another-star novel that embraces the distances travelled, and all that entails. A set of missions are sent out that will take generations to reach their destinations and return. On the way their society evolves in ways that the original missions planners both expect and don’t.

This is a book focused on the evolution of human groups and the ways that space travel and dislocation would affect them – and indeed would affect the society left behind. There are unmistakable echoes of Marion Zimmer Bradley’s short story The Climbing Wave in how the stay-athomes forget (and refuse to be impressed by) returning space travellers; and of Joe Haldeman’s Forever War in how those travellers would be left behind by technological progress, cementing their perceived irrelevance.

4/5. Finished Friday 21 December, 2018.

(Originally published on Goodreads.)

Graeme Macrae Burnet (2015)

A work of fiction so convincing that the first question the author is asked is, “Is it real?” It tells the (imaginary) story of a murder in a history of (allegedly) found objects, manuscripts, evidence statements and trial reports. The fact that it’s set in a real place (Culduie in Wester Ross, looking out towards Skye and Raasay) adds a further layer of realism. It’s a classic anti-hero styling, with the protagonist becoming more sympathetic the more is revealed about his less than complete honesty and the enormity of his crimes, that go way beyond what he himself admits. A gripping read.

5/5. Finished Saturday 24 November, 2018.

(Originally published on Goodreads.)

Darren McGarvey (2017)

3/5. Finished Saturday 17 November, 2018.

(Originally published on Goodreads.)

David Graeber (2011)

2/5. Finished Saturday 17 November, 2018.

(Originally published on Goodreads.)

Rob Manning (2014)

A boy’s-own adventure in space travel. Howe do you design, build, fly, and debug a rover the size of a bus that’ll have to endure a landing more fraught than any other vehicle ever constructed – and then operate completely remotely, without repair, for years? That this happened at all is a tribute to NASA’s planning and management skills; that Curiosity has lasted years longer than ever anticipated is nothing short of spectacular. The book gives as much technical low-down as any space-obsessive could want, with pointers to more.

5/5. Finished Saturday 17 November, 2018.

(Originally published on Goodreads.)