Carried along by the bumptious rollick of its language, this tale is full of sound and fury, signifying literally everything.
Odd-couple asteroid miners Quiver and Mic—a manufactured human and her artificial companion—explore the post-Earth universe in this surrealist SF tour de force.
Quiver is a “transitional prototype...gestated in a dynamic carbon envelope” back on the moon. Mostly human but for the small detail of her chemical incubation, she nevertheless feels an acute sense of alienation. Mic, her fully robot AI companion, has been programmed both in the science of interstellar “rare mineral reconnaissance” and in the art of soothing Quiver when she “flips her fuses.” Mic is also highly schooled in the cultural mores of the gone Earth, erased in “a cascade of catastrophes” which flung the remnants of the human race to Elsewhere, where they attempt to regroup. Via frequent data-dumps from Side Wheel, a virtual database of all things terrestrial, Mic has trained himself as a geisha, memorized the entire discography of “diva[s] from the distant past” like FKA twigs or Nicki Minaj, and developed a deeply erotic obsession with all things Al Pacino. Meanwhile, Quiver spends her time in The Lights—their spaceship’s version of Star Trek’s holodeck—immersed in a Jungian Eden that is co-inhabited by a mysterious redheaded woman. When an argument between the two miners escalates into name-calling (“ 'You forking self-righteous GIZMO!' [Quiver] shrieks….'You maddening THINGAMABOB' ”), Mic comes to a realization about his own selfhood. In the resulting existential backwash, the two badly bungle a rare mineral retrieval. At this, Mic and Quiver decide to go rogue and set a course for the planet Trafik, a fabled place of intergalactic free spirits where all their fantasies (even the Al Pacino ones) just may come true. What follows is a winsome space picaresque in which surreality piles upon surreality as the ill-matched soul mates navigate the unknown universe in their search for identity, belonging, and the sensual pleasures of the flesh, even if that flesh is actually machine. A longtime master of the extraordinary sentence, Ducornet has outdone herself here, blending SF’s penchant for invented jargon with her own queer linguistic egalitarianism in which all adjectives describe all nouns (even such unlikely couplings as “profiterole lasers”) in a primordial soup of possibility. This slender book captivates with its ferocious curiosity, quick wit, and ultimately tender generosity.
Carried along by the bumptious rollick of its language, this tale is full of sound and fury, signifying literally everything.Pub Date: April 13, 2021
ISBN: 978-1-56689-606-1
Page Count: 128
Publisher: Coffee House
Review Posted Online: Feb. 9, 2021
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 2021
A laugh-out-loud “why choose?” romance of intergalactic proportions.
What’s worse: to be killed by a lion or dropped on a strange planet and forced into an alien breeding program?
Dorothy Valentine had a happy career in wildlife biology, studying meerkats in their native environment and living on her own terms. That is, until a hungry lion decided to make her into lunchmeat. Abducted from Earth at the moment of her death—along with the lion who attacked her—Dory becomes Subject 4 in an alien research project. The goal: to extend the life of the Sankado species, whose females were left behind on their dying home planet. With "a few modifications," Dory is a prime candidate for Sankado breeding…except for the secret birth control implant in her arm. To make matters more complicated, she hooks up with two Sankado men, Sol and Lok, while under the influence of an alien love serum, becoming their Zhali—a mate for life. Luckily, they don’t mind sharing Dory or one another. Just when their three-way honeymoon is about to kick off, however, Lok’s old enemy rears his ugly head, putting all of their lives in peril. Lemming’s characterization really shines here. Sassy Dory, sensitive and whip-smart Sol, and the dominant, flirtatious Lok all feel fully realized, as do Toto and Intern—the lion who tried to eat Dory and the birdlike alien responsible for observing her. The sex scenes are spicy, if perhaps too few and far between, and the dialogue is snappy and realistic.
A laugh-out-loud “why choose?” romance of intergalactic proportions.Pub Date: Feb. 18, 2025
ISBN: 9780593818633
Page Count: 304
Publisher: Berkley
Review Posted Online: Dec. 28, 2024
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 2025
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
An ambitious but plodding space odyssey.
Having survived a disastrous deep space mission in 2038, three asteroid miners plan a return to their abandoned ship to save two colleagues who were left behind.
Though bankrolled through a crooked money laundering scheme, their original project promised to put in place a program to reduce the CO2 levels on Earth, ease global warming, and pave the way for the future. The rescue mission, itself unsanctioned, doesn't have a much better chance of succeeding. All manner of technical mishaps, unplanned-for dangers, and cutthroat competition for the precious resources from the asteroid await the three miners. One of them has cancer. The international community opposes the mission, with China, Russia, and the United States sending questionable "observers" to the new space station that gets built north of the moon for the expedition. And then there is Space Titan Jack Macy, a rogue billionaire threatening to grab the riches. (As one character says, "It's a free universe.") Suarez's basic story is a good one, with tense moments, cool robot surrogates, and virtual reality visions. But too much of the novel consists of long, sometimes bloated stretches of technical description, discussions of newfangled financing for "off-world" projects, and at least one unneeded backstory. So little actually happens that fixing the station's faulty plumbing becomes a significant plot point. For those who want to know everything about "silicon photovoltaics" and "orthostatic intolerance," Suarez's latest SF saga will be right up their alley. But for those itching for less talk and more action, the book's many pages of setup become wearing.
An ambitious but plodding space odyssey.Pub Date: Jan. 24, 2023
ISBN: 978-0-593-18363-2
Page Count: 464
Publisher: Dutton
Review Posted Online: Oct. 25, 2022
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 15, 2022
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