Michael Barnes
Ever since our protagonist Mallory Viridian was a child she has been around when murders happen, weirdly she sees clues and hints overlooked and can usually solve these cases. But outside of a classic mystery novel, being surrounded by death doesn’t make you a charming amateur detective, it makes you a suspect and a social pariah. Given the chance to stowaway off planet in an attempt to further isolate herself. She petitioned a sentient spaceship known as Station Eternity to allow her passage and surprisingly, Eternity did. The whole aliens are real thing happened a few years ago, different people and groups on Earth are reacting as well as you'd expect. When the station agrees to allow additional human guests, Mallory knows the break from her peculiar reality is over. After the first Earth shuttle arrives, and aliens and humans alike begin to die, the station is thrown into peril. Stuck smack-dab in the middle of an extraterrestrial whodunit, and wondering how in the world this keeps happening to her anyway, Mallory has to solve the crime—and fast—or the list of victims could grow to include everyone on board….
It's a murder mystery in SPAACCCCEEEE. Okay that’s a disservice. It might be why I picked it up but I grew to really enjoy this story and its fascinating worldbuilding, interesting and varied aliens (not just humans with ears and noses modified) All the alien races aboard Eternity are much more advanced, and humanities uniqueness we don't form symbiotic relationships on the scale that other sapients do is not something they find impressive. Also humans are considered gross – too many liquids is the general consensus.
I also was amused by some of the other human characters - not the ambassador Adrian, but Xan whilst I thought was okay but worth it to meet his brother Phineas (always great to include a trans character) but his ex-army buddy the Korean woman Calliope Oh was my favourite.
The disparate facts, characters, and even the ridiculous connections that we see in these murder mysteries do come together with a kinda explanation that I found satisfying - experience will vary.
Its pacing is varied and can seem slow at the beginning but towards the end the narrative 'rockets' along (sorry, not sorry) and I enjoyed this so much I will be buying the rest of the trilogy on Kobo since my local library doesn't carry the next two books.
Ever since our protagonist Mallory Viridian was a child she has been around when murders happen, weirdly she sees clues and hints overlooked and can usually solve these cases. But outside of a classic mystery novel, being surrounded by death doesn’t make you a charming amateur detective, it makes you a suspect and a social pariah. Given the chance to stowaway off planet in an attempt to further isolate herself. She petitioned a sentient spaceship known as Station Eternity to allow her passage and surprisingly, Eternity did. The whole aliens are real thing happened a few years ago, different people and groups on Earth are reacting as well as you'd expect. When the station agrees to allow additional human guests, Mallory knows the break from her peculiar reality is over. After the first Earth shuttle arrives, and aliens and humans alike begin to die, the station is thrown into peril. Stuck smack-dab in the middle of an extraterrestrial whodunit, and wondering how in the world this keeps happening to her anyway, Mallory has to solve the crime—and fast—or the list of victims could grow to include everyone on board….
It's a murder mystery in SPAACCCCEEEE. Okay that’s a disservice. It might be why I picked it up but I grew to really enjoy this story and its fascinating worldbuilding, interesting and varied aliens (not just humans with ears and noses modified) All the alien races aboard Eternity are much more advanced, and humanities uniqueness we don't form symbiotic relationships on the scale that other sapients do is not something they find impressive. Also humans are considered gross – too many liquids is the general consensus.
I also was amused by some of the other human characters - not the ambassador Adrian, but Xan whilst I thought was okay but worth it to meet his brother Phineas (always great to include a trans character) but his ex-army buddy the Korean woman Calliope Oh was my favourite.
The disparate facts, characters, and even the ridiculous connections that we see in these murder mysteries do come together with a kinda explanation that I found satisfying - experience will vary.
Its pacing is varied and can seem slow at the beginning but towards the end the narrative 'rockets' along (sorry, not sorry) and I enjoyed this so much I will be buying the rest of the trilogy on Kobo since my local library doesn't carry the next two books.