Tag Archive for: science fiction

You Sexy Thing by Cat Rambo

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In the final few hours before the space station where she lives is blown up, Niko Larsen receives a mysterious package. Not a shipment of supplies, which would be addressed to her restaurant. The box is large and heavy; the shipping label has been torn off. There is no indication where it came from or who sent it.

But Niko has bigger problems right now. Last Chance Restaurant is about to be visited by a food critic and Niko’s staff – the remains of her former military regiment – are beside themselves trying to prepare.

Her former sergeant, now head chef, is requesting permission to acquire an eggplant, by any means necessary. For some reason, her comms officer has seen fit to accept a reservation from a large party that claims to know Niko. And their front-of-house host, part of an alien race with the ability to see the future, is making predictions of doom.

All seems to be going well by the time the food critic, Lolola Montaigne d’Arcy deBurgh, arrives. Although she is quickly followed by an unexpected guest.

Arpat Takraven is a famous racer and apparent food connoisseur, and he is willing to pay top dollar for the privilege of dining in the same room as Lolola. Niko agrees, but before the meal can begin, the station is attacked.

With Takraven offering them shelter, Niko, her crew, and Lolola leave the restaurant. Along the way, Takraven is killed by debris. Like many of the extremely wealthy, he has a clone body that his consciousness will transfer to. In the meantime, he gives Niko a password to get the rest of them onto his ship.

Once aboard the You Sexy Thing, the ship informs Niko that the password she was given is one used to indicate to it that Takraven was under duress. The Thing has been directed to take everyone aboard to a prison planet and turn them in for theft.

As they gather themselves, Niko is surprised that a member of her crew brought along the mysterious crate from her office. Within the box is a young woman in cryosleep. She is an imperial heir with no memory of why she was sent to Niko.

The crew sets about making themselves at home on the ship, for what time they have there. They even seem to be making some headway gaining a rapport with the Thing. However, they soon find out that Lolola is not who she seems, as she forcibly takes control of the ship and changes their course to the Intergalactic Association of Pirate Havens.

Cat Rambo’s YOU SEXY THING is the first book in their Disco Space Opera series. It is full of well-developed characters and extensive lore. This book only scratches the surface of the world that Rambo has built. I found it to be a fun read, well-deserving of the phrase “space opera.”

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Review by Alyssa Berry, Technical Services Librarian

I Who Have Never Known Men by Jacqueline Harpman

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I Who Have Never Known Men was my last read of 2025 and one of my most interesting reads of the year. The post-apocalyptic science fiction novel explores themes of survival, female friendship, and purpose in life in under 200 pages with no chapters and no name given to the main character. This unique novel has an equally special author. Jacqueline Harpman published I Who Have Never Known Men in 1995 in French. Born in Belgium in 1929, Harpman and her parents were Jewish and fled Belgium in 1940 when the Nazis invaded. They spent 5 years living in Morocco, where Harpman faced institutional antisemitism, before moving back to Belgium in 1945 after war ended. As an adult Harpman became a celebrated Belgium author and a professional psychoanalysis. I think Harpman’s background as a psychoanalysis and Holocaust survivor made her uniquely qualified to author one of the most profound and disturbing science fiction novels I’ve read. And I think the internet agreed. Harpman’s novel was translated into English in 1997 by Ros Schwartz. It was then recently re-released in 2022 when dystopian novels were very popular and TikTok users took it from there. The novel went viral, and I was among the many that learned of it. 

The novel is written from the point of view of our main character, a teenage girl when the novel opens, and it follows her life from there. The novel is written like her journal entry, looking back on her strange life experience and recording what she lived through. Her story opens as the youngest in a group of 40 women, kept in a locked cage underground, guarded by a rotation of six men. The men never speak to the women, the women don’t know why they are being kept there and they never leave, and the main character has no prior memories before the cage. The older women aren’t able to tell the young girl much anymore about life before the cage, partly because they have a hard time remembering, and partly because the guards crack a whip menacingly when the women begin asking too many questions. The women used to try harder to get out, pleading with the guards, attempting escape, but enough time has passed that they have resigned themselves to this fate. This existence is all our main character has known. The limited education she does possess is thanks to the women in the cage with her.

One day the routine is broken when, as a guard puts the key into the lock of the cage, a siren the women have never heard before goes off. The guard turns and runs, leaving the key. This is it, a miracle they didn’t think possible. They unlock the cage and our main character is the first one to exit, venturing towards the door with the other women trailing behind. What they find is a staircase that leads them outside to hills of grass in every direction, but no other buildings or people are visible. The women are at first elated – they are free! They gather supplies from the storage closets they found where they were being kept and slowly begin to explore the area. It does not take long for the women’s hope to drop as they discover there is nothing else around, they even wonder if they are on a different planet than Earth. The guards are nowhere to be found, nor is any type of technology. The only thing they do find is other bunkers with cages like their own, some filled with 40 women like theirs, others with 40 men. Sadly, these captives didn’t have the luck of a guard happening to unlock the cage at the right moment: they’ve all died locked inside. 

Years pass like this. The women build a small community of homes, find more empty bunkers, and most accept this is all there is; no one is coming for them, no one is here with them, they are alone and will always be so. Years go on and they all pass away until only our main character is left. She was the only one that still questioned maybe something is out there to find, something that will explain why this has happened, why they are all there. She leaves the homes they built and begins walking, exploring further than ever before. Everything is the same, grassy hills, until she eventually finds an underground bunker clearly designed for someone in charge: endless amounts of food, a kitchen, a bed with nice bedding, and a bathroom, all things she’s never experienced. This is also where she finds paper and pen, and after years spent alone in this bunker, decides to write everything down should anyone find it after she is gone. 

I read a review of this book that described it as “quietly devastating” and I think that is the best way to sum up this novel. Harpman created a story that had me saying wow, just…wow. This isn’t a typical read. The premise of the main character knowing very little creates a reading experience where the reader likewise has the same questions she does, but they never get answered. Instead the reader spends time in the main character’s head, absorbing her thoughts and emotions, and also wondering what happened here to create this situation, but there is never the satisfaction of knowing. The novel spends years with the main character as she tries to create some semblance of a meaningful life with the situation she has been dealt. This is a haunting speculative fiction novel specifically focused on women and I recommend it to anyone wanting a moving read that won’t be easy to forget. I think the fact that this 30-year old Belgium novel went viral on one of the biggest social media sites says a lot, and I’m glad for it because I ended 2025 with one of my favorite reads of the year.

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Review by Sarah Turner-Hill, Adult Programming Coordinator

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Automatic Noodle by Annalee Newitz

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During the months of December and January Joplin Public Library runs the Adult Winter Reading Challenge. Starting December 1, 2025 and ending January 31, 2026, the challenge aims to provide a fun challenge that encourages participants to read something new or outside their comfort zone. It’s also a great way to get ahead on New Year’s resolutions and spend cold winter months with books. The challenge is comprised of 15 reading categories and to complete the challenge a reader must do at least 5 of them. The reader chooses which 5 they’d like to do, and what books to read that fit those categories. Titles may only be used once. This challenge is open to anyone 18 years of age or older, and a Joplin Public Library card is not required to participate. Challenge forms can be found at the library and on our website calendar. There is also an option to participate electronically. I enjoy participating in the challenge each year, and I also enjoy the prizes, which are a specialized ceramic mug and three tickets for a raffle drawing. If you are a reader and enjoy a reading challenge every now and then, I encourage you to visit the library or our website calendar to take a look at the challenge to see if it might be of interest! 

The first category I tackled is “Nonhuman character” and for that I have read the recently published Automatic Noodle by Annalee Newitz. A science fiction novel set in future San Francisco, California, the four main characters are all sentient robots (nonhuman characters). The novel opens with the bots awakening months after their last stored memory, abandoned in the restaurant they used to operate for the human owners. The restaurant is in shambles due to flooding and storms in the city, and the bots are unsure of what to do at first. The novel does a nice job of revealing the bots and this future world’s history a bit at a time, and it doesn’t take long to learn that the bots had been through a war in which they fought for their own independence and the separation of California from the rest of the United States. 

The bots – Staybehind, Sweetie, Hands, and Cayenne – don’t take long to decide to do what they know best: operation and functionality. They work together to bring the restaurant back to life. The restaurant used to serve a wacky combination of foods (tacos, hamburgers, pastas) due to low overhead costs, but Hands (the cook of the group) decides they need to make one thing, and make it well. He decides they’ll make hand-pulled noodles. Each taking up their own role, the bots piece together the restaurant and their new found purpose. Like any small business operators, they encounter bumps in the road which are made more complicated by anti-robot sentiments. Staybehind, Sweetie, Hands, and Cayenne really have pure intentions and make delicious food, and the novel creates a plot in which the reader will find themselves empathizing with them versus some of the humans.

This novel feels very timely for the world today. It examines technology and AI and the role it plays in society, and where it could go. This novel was also fun and a short, snappy read (I chose the audio version which has a 4 hour runtime). It has an equal rights undertone and the post-war the bots live in made me think of the challenges historically faced by marginalized groups. Newitz creates lovable, fun characters that come across quite innocent, and the novel is rooted in friendship. I think this is a good read for science fiction readers that are looking for something more on the lighthearted side. Also, it accomplishes one of the Winter Reading Challenge categories! Join the challenge anytime in December or January to feel the self-satisfaction of completing a challenge and the joy of reading, plus get your own special mug for those warm winter drinks!

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Review by Sarah Turner-Hill, Adult Programming Coordinator

Klara and the Sun by Kazuo Ishiguro

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Klara is an Artificial Friend. She lives in a store with other AFs, waiting for a child to come in and choose her to be their companion. Every day the AFs are given a place in the store to stand as customers come in. The best part of the store is the area behind the big front window, where Klara is able to observe people passing by and feel the Sun.

AFs are solar powered, so the sun is important to all of them. But Klara sees the sun as a presence, with feelings and emotions like her.

She observes the Sun’s happiness when two people reconnect on the street in front of the store. She also sees the Sun’s special ability to heal when a homeless person and his dog are miraculously revived by the sun’s rays.

Not long after that experience, Klara is chosen by a girl named Josie. Josie and her mother have a house out in the countryside, but her mother commutes to work every day. Klara will be there to spend time with Josie and help keep her happy.

Like many children in her peer group, Josie has been “lifted” – genetically modified to improve her intelligence. Unfortunately, Josie suffered some side effects from this procedure and is frequently ill.

The illness is unpredictable, forcing Josie to stay in bed for weeks at a time. It is also very serious. Some children who exhibit these symptoms do not survive.

As Klara gets to know Josie and her world, she presents anecdotes largely without opinion. But she does possess deep insight into what people are feeling or thinking. When she lets these insights slip, it is a reminder to the reader not to underestimate her abilities – her intelligence may be artificial, but it is well-honed.

The focus of KLARA AND THE SUN is on interpersonal relationships between the people in Josie’s limited world. Klara is able to interact with each of them and develop her own relationships with them.

Readers only get a sense of the larger world: glimpses of persistent anti-robot sentiment and the ways that people’s lives have adjusted in this version of the future. Josie’s friend Rick is very smart, but he is not lifted. As Josie and Rick grow up, Klara observes how that affects what he can expect from his future.

Throughout the novel, Klara is looking back on her life. She is reminiscing about her own history. She lets the reader know that these events have all passed, but keeps the outcome to herself until the end.

Klara herself is a very interesting character. She uses unusual speech patterns when speaking to other characters, but her internal monologue flows very smoothly. Although she is not human, she feels real. The reader never questions the validity of her experience, even when confronted with the facts of her artificial nature.

 

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Book review by Alyssa Berry, Technical Services Librarian

A Psalm for the Wild-Built by Becky Chambers

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Becky Chambers’ A PSALM FOR THE WILD-BUILT is a small book, but it means a lot to me. I’ve actually read it twice: once when the library bought it back in 2021 and now a second time. I love its optimistic view of the future and the ways that Chambers’ world incorporates nature and technology simultaneously.

The main character, Sibling Dex, is a tea monk whose role in society is to travel from settlement to settlement. At each stop, Dex sets up their tea service and invites people to come tell their troubles over a cup of tea. Sibling Dex can offer advice or simply listen to their concerns, whichever the patron prefers.

Dex has been living this life for a few years, but suddenly they have an uncontrollable urge to change everything. To leave their routine behind and explore the wild – hoping to find crickets.

The book is set in the distant future on a lush, forested moon called Panga. The ecology is very similar to Earth, but crickets have gone extinct in all of the inhabited areas of Panga, so Dex has never experienced them firsthand.

When Dex learns of an abandoned monastery that once had a cricket population, they decide to go see for themself if the crickets are still there.

Panga is covered in roads left over from the Factory Age, a time in Panga’s history similar to our modern Earth. Those roads have not been maintained in hundreds of years and Dex is riding a pedal-driven cart with their house on the back. Needless to say, much of the journey is difficult.

After a few days of traveling alone, Dex encounters a robot named Mosscap who asks them “what do you need, and how might I help?”

Dex and Mosscap’s meeting is an event with historical significance. Robots and humans have not directly interacted since the Parting Promise.

In the distant past, the robots of Panga woke up – they suddenly gained consciousness without any human intervention; no one knows why. After that awakening, the humans and the robots came together and it was decided that they would separate from each other until such time as the robots chose to return.

Mosscap is acting as a representative of the robots. Its plan was to enter human society, ask the questions it has asked Dex, and see if the robots returning now would improve all of their lives in a meaningful way.

The two travelers decide to travel together, but the trip does not get any easier. Because they were raised to believe that robots should not be used to do menial labor, Dex has a hard time accepting Mosscap’s help at first. Eventually, the two are able to find a balance and work together to complete their journey.

As I said in my introduction, A PSALM FOR THE WILD-BUILT is a very optimistic book. The people living on Panga have found ways to thrive without destroying the ecosystem of the planet. They focus on repairing the things they have and preserving the wilderness around them. Dex is very unusual for deciding to stray from the path and journey out into the wider world.

 

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Book review by Alyssa Berry, Technical Services Librarian

Beautyland by Marie-Helene Bertino

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Adina Giorno is born in September 1977 at the moment that the Voyager 1 spacecraft is launched into space. Voyager 1 is a probe designed to record data about the outer Solar System and transmit that data back to Earth. Adina has been sent to Earth with the opposite mission.

When Adina is four years old, three important things happen to her. First, her mother discovers an abandoned fax machine in a neighbor’s trash can. Second, her parents separate — leaving Adina with her single mother and only a vague impression of her father. And third, she is activated.

Adina is an extraterrestrial, she was sent to Earth to gather information for her alien species. Upon her activation, she begins to dream of a classroom where these aliens can teach her things and request information from her. Adina also begins sending and receiving faxes from her alien superiors.

They want information about Earth; about the ways that humans behave and interact. They tell Adina that she was designed to appear as normal as possible and that she should report to them all of her observations about life.

Adina has an unusual way of looking at the world. She thinks deeply about the things that many humans ignore: the fish at the aquarium, the reasons humans have for smiling at one another, the volume of popcorn chewing in a movie theater. She relays all of these observations to her superiors.

As she grows, she continues to send these faxes back and forth. Giving information and receiving cryptic messages or non-answers back. Especially when she asks about the planet that she is from. She keeps her mission a secret from everyone.

When she graduates high school, Adina gets a part-time job working at a diner. She loves the repetitive work and her coworkers. She stays at the diner for years, continuing to live at home with her mother and sending observations through her fax machine.

When she suddenly gets the urge to change her life and move to New York City, her supervisors’ only response is “oh Nelly.”

Adina spends most of her twenties and thirties living in New York. She gets a job in an office and adopts a dog. It being the nineties, she also joins a workout studio with a high-intensity, motivational-phrase-using coach named Yolanda K.

Adina is working in her Manhattan office during the September 11 terrorist attacks. She gets off the island without incident, but it makes her reevaluate all of the relationships in her life. Afterward she reconnects with her high school friend, Toni, who has also been living in New York.

Toni is the only person who has ever seen Adina’s faxes. She now works at a publishing company and believes that Adina would have an audience for her unusual takes on human behavior if she would be willing to publish.

The book is a remarkable success, much to Adina’s dismay. The publishers ask her to do public readings of increasing size and the book goes through multiple print runs. As Toni suspected, Adina’s views on the world resonate with a lot of people.

For her book, Adina goes public with her alien identity. Although her audience likes the book, they are divided about whether or not they believe she is an alien.

Marie-Helene Bertino’s BEAUTYLAND refuses to make it clear if Adina is an alien or not. Readers debate the point, mirroring Adina’s audience in the book. A friend of mine recommended this book to me; she is convinced that Adina is a human who falls somewhere on the autism spectrum. While I do see that many of her quirks could be explained with an autism diagnosis, Adina never wavers from her certainty about her extraterrestrial origins. So I choose to believe her.

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Book review by Alyssa Berry, Technical Services Librarian

Arch-conspirator by Veronica Roth

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In ARCH-CONSPIRATOR, Veronica Roth puts a futuristic spin on Sophocles’ Antigone. Roth transfers the ancient Greek tragedy to the last city on Earth, which stands as the lone haven in a desolate wasteland created by humanity.

The city is ruled over by Antigone’s uncle Kreon, the High Commander, a militant man obsessed with order and maintaining the status quo. Kreon took the throne after a riot – that he instigated – killed the former High Commander, Antigone’s father Oedipus.

Antigone and her siblings are set apart from the population not because their father was deposed and replaced as High Commander, but because their parents chose to have them independently. In this future, children are created using the ichor stored in the Archive, a gene bank containing the cells from generations of the dead.

It is considered unnatural to have biological children. Those children are looked down upon as being soulless, because the soul lives in a person’s ichor and is passed down to the next generation when new life is created.

Humanity is kept in check by Kreon’s marshal rule as well as this strict pseudo-religious dedication to humanity’s future.

After taking the throne, Kreon allowed Antigone and her siblings to live in the High Commander’s residence with his family. Over the years, the four of them integrated themselves into these new lives with varying levels of success.

Antigone grew stoic and stubborn. She has since been unwillingly betrothed to Kreon’s son, Haemon.

Antigone’s twin, Polyneikes, has chafed against his uncle’s rule. He has joined a group of revolutionaries from the city who seek to overthrow Kreon.

Ismene, their sister, abides by Kreon’s rules, for the most part. She is quieter and meeker than the twins, but she does rebel in her own ways.

Their brother, Eteocles, has assimilated almost completely into the new High Commander’s regime. He has become a member of Kreon’s personal guard.

As the book opens, Antigone joins Polyneikes at a café in the city. Her brother alludes to dangerous plans he has for that evening. He ends their conversation by giving Antigone and Extractor – the metal instrument used to harvest ichor from the dead. Polyneikes makes Antigone promise that she will use it on him if things go badly.

Late that night, Antigone and Ismene hear a fight taking place in the courtyard of the High Commander’s residence. When they arrive at the scene, they find Polyneikes and Eteocles, who have shot and killed one another. One brother on his way to kill Kreon and the other protecting him.

Kreon labels Polyneikes a traitor and decrees that his body is not to be touched – or Extracted for the Archive – as a warning against insurrection. To honor her brother’s wishes, Antigone has twenty-four hours from his death to get to him and use the stolen Extractor.

Veronica Roth’s novella is a quick but intense read. She narrates chapters from many of her key characters, allowing readers a glimpse at the inner turmoil faced by each of them. Alongside this story of revenge and familial love, ARCH-CONSPIRATOR also offers a variety of perspectives on life at the end of the world.

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Book review by Alyssa Berry, Technical Services Librarian

Station Eternity by Mur Lafferty

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Mallory Viridian spends her life keeping people at arms distance, trying to keep them alive. Death has  followed her for as long as she can remember.

When she was very young, her mother died. Then one of her teachers was murdered, followed by her guidance counselor. Just before she dropped out of college, an annoying classmate and a room service attendant were both killed during a class trip – in two unrelated murders. The final straw came when the guest of honor was murdered at a birthday party Mallory had been forced to attend.

After that, she was done with humans. Thankfully, alien life had just made first contact. Mallory made her case and was granted sanctuary aboard a sentient space station called Eternity.

Life aboard Eternity isn’t always easy. The station is outfitted to care for a variety of alien lifeforms, from the giant rock people called the Gneiss to the ever-present blue and silver wasps of the Sundry hive mind.

With only three humans on board, the station has more pressing matters to deal with than catering specifically to their needs. Mallory has been left to find out which of the alien foods her body is capable of digesting – including a semi-molten liquid rock that could conceivably be called “coffee.”

Her only remaining human contacts are Adrian, the self-important Ambassador of Earth, and Xan, a fellow sanctuary-seeker/stowaway.

Life aboard Eternity has been pleasantly murder-free, but Mallory has just gotten word that everything is about to change. An Earth shuttle is headed to Eternity, and with those human passengers will come a murder. Mallory is certain.

Mallory has a sixth sense for impending death; first she begins to notice unusual coincidences. At the birthday-party-turned-crime-scene, she was almost guaranteed to only know the person who brought her. Instead she finds Xan.

The two had been friends in college, before she dropped out to avoid more murder and he dropped out to join the military. Seeing him out of the blue is not a good sign. Sure enough, after reconnecting with her old friend for a few minutes, the party-goers’ game of Werewolf turns into an actual murder.

With the certainty of this experience, Mallory knows that more humans on Eternity will mean another death. And when her premonition turns out to be correct, the murder ripples out through the station – and no one on Eternity will be safe.

STATION ETERNITY by Mur Lafferty is a well-plotted murder mystery encased in a science fiction shell.

It takes place in the near-future, which helps make the world feel familiar. Human technology and motivations have not changed much in Mallory’s time and it is easy to understand the distrust some humans have for their new galactic neighbors.

The book can occasionally seem choppy, cutting back and forth between Mallory’s present and quick vignettes to the other murders she has solved. These vignettes do not always tell the whole story. Mallory reserves the right to skip details and bring the murders up again before the reader gets the whole picture.

The book’s perspective shifts around between characters, deeply exploring the world that Lafferty has built while still keeping the urgency of the unsolved murder front and center. STATION ETERNITY’s aliens are unusual but relatable, and I would say the same for its humans.

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Review by Alyssa Berry, Technical Services Librarian

Sea of Tranquility by Emily St. John Mandel

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Emily St. John Mandel is a name that many readers may already be familiar with, as the Canadian born writer has been gaining notability (and awards, television adaptations, Best Seller list recognitions, among others) for the last several years. Mandel’s fourth novel Station Eleven, received a nomination for the National Book Award (alongside other accolades), and HBO Max released a limited mini series adapted from the book. Mandel’s fifth novel The Glass Hotel likewise garnered award nods and television adaptation interest. Mandel’s newest novel, Sea of Tranquility, examines the idea of time travel and reality, and is no exception to popularity. Debuting at number 3 on The New York Times Best Seller List, and winning the 2022 Goodreads Choice Award for Science Fiction, Sea of Tranquility was a great way to end my 2022 read list. 

Now that I’ve thoroughly swayed you on the impressiveness of Mandel’s oeuvre, moving on to the book itself…

Mixing science fiction with speculative fiction, Mandel examines what it is to find meaning and beauty in a life that is always changing, and when time is always passing. One of my favorite aspects of the novel is its structure: Sea of Tranquility follows the storylines of four main characters, their lives taking place hundreds of years apart. The novel first introduces Edwin St. John St. Andrew in 1912. An English native, Edwin is sent away to Canada by his family at 18 years old following an ill-timed truth shared at a dinner party. Traveling alone to the Canadian wilderness, Edwin ponders what has become of his life and what he is to do now. On a walk in the forest Edwin experiences a simultaneous flash of darkness, the sound of a violin, and a whooshing sound that is like nothing he has experienced before, and it truly unsettles him. Shortly after this experience Edwin meets a man that introduces himself as Gaspery Roberts, who disappears before Edwin can satisfactorily speak with him.

The novel next moves to Mirella in the year 2020. Mirella is in a relationship she isn’t sure she wants following the suicide of her husband. Much like Edwin, Mirella seems lost and searching, but for what, she isn’t sure. Mirella is unable to move past the reason for her husband’s death, an investment that turned out not to be an investment at all, but fraud that ruined his life and savings. The wife of the man responsible for this fraudulent case, Vincent, is an old friend of Mirealla’s whom she was previously unkind to, and now wishes to rectify her misgivings. Mirealla tracks down Vincent’s brother, only to learn Vincent is dead. She also meets Gaspery Roberts, who is interviewing Vincent’s brother about a flash or darkness, the sound of a violin, and a whooshing sound Vincent caught on tape. 

It is now the year 2203 and the novel introduces Olive Llewellyn. Olive lives on the second moon colony but is visiting Earth on a book tour for her most recent and popular book. Olive seems to be only half invested in her tour, her mind on her daughter back home and the fact that she can’t remember her current hotel room number, as there has been so much change happening. Is this tour what she wants, and how does she handle all of the change her most popular book is bringing about, both for her and her family? Olive then does an interview with Gaspery Roberts, who is interested in a particular scene in her new book: a flash of darkness, the sound of a violin, and a whooshing sound. 

The final character the book shifts to is Gaspery Roberts himself. Gaspery lives in the Night City in the year 2401, and works as a hotel detective. Gaspery is tasked with investigating a series of strange anomalies, individuals that have experienced a flash of darkness, the sound of a violin playing, and a whooshing sound. Gaspery, like the other characters, is grabbling to find peace and comfort in a life that has been shaken and is changing, and not necessarily for the better. “But what makes a world real?” Gaspery ponders, often exploring the idea of living in a simulation, “If we were living in a simulation, how would we know it was a simulation?”

While time travel and details like the habitation of the moon definitely lend this book to Science Fiction, Mandel focuses on these aspects as much as one might say Kazuo Ishiguro does in Never Let Me Go, or George Orwell in 1984. Mandel has a way of utilizing lyrical, thought provoking prose when least expected, and presenting big questions relatable to her characters and readers alike.

Review written by Sarah Turner-Hill, Adult Programming Coordinator

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