quippe | Entries tagged with simon morden

The Blurb On The Back:

There’s a murderer amongst them, and everyone’s a suspect …

Frank is a criminal. He and a select group of inmates have been offered the same deal: die in prison or live on Mars.

They’ve been recruited to build the first Mars base, and they’ll have to learn to trust each other if they want to survive. Not easy when your crewmates are convicts.

Then the first accident happens, and the next. Until Frank begins to suspect they might not be accidents at all …

Time is running out. But how do you stop a killer when it could be any one of you?

( The Review (Cut For Spoilers): )

The Verdict:

S J Morden’s SF thriller has a fantastic set-up and convinces on both the difficulties and practicalities of setting up a colony on Mars and the rationales for using convicts but the thriller element is disappointing, partly because the supporting characters are thinly drawn so their deaths lack impact but mainly because the antagonist is so obvious from the start, which means that the book lacks necessary tension but I would still read the sequel.

The Blurb On The Back:

The world has turned.

The past awakens.

A millennium after the formidable war machines of the User cultures devoured entire civilisations and rewrote planetary geography, Earth is in the grip of a perpetual Dark Age. Scientific endeavour is strongly discouraged, while remnant technology is locked away – hidden by a Church determined to prevent a new Armageddon.

This is the world to which Benzamir Michael Mahmood must return. A descendant of the tribes who fled the planet during those ages-old wars, he comes in pursuit of enemies from the far reaches of space. The technology he brings is wondrous beyond the imaginings of those he will meet, but can its potency match that of the Church’s most closely guarded treasure?

For centuries it has lain dormant, buried in a lead-lined tomb deep beneath the flagstones of a remote Siberian monastery. But it is about to be unearthed, and the powers that will be unleashed may be beyond anyone’s capacity to control. Even a man as extraordinary as Benzamir ....

( The Review (Cut For Spoilers): )

The Verdict:

Although this is billed as YA science fiction novel, I think that it would also appeal to adult SF fans. The characters, world building and plot all come together to make a really interesting read that I thoroughly enjoyed.