391 pages
English language
Published Oct. 28, 2017
"A space adventure set on a lone ship where the clones of a murdered crew must find their murderer -- before they kill again. It was not common to awaken in a cloning vat streaked with drying blood. At least, Maria Arena had never experienced it. She had no memory of how she died. That was also new; before, when she had awakened as a new clone, her first memory was of how she died. Maria's vat was in the front of six vats, each one holding the clone of a crew member of the starship Dormire, each clone waiting for its previous incarnation to die so it could awaken. And Maria wasn't the only one to die recently..."--
A solid, fun, page-turning sci fi mystery. If you go looking for plot holes and scientific shortcomings you'll undoubtedly find them, but I enjoyed the book enough not to go looking.
I had some annoyances with how the fictional science worked. Some things seem to break from the characters' understandings of their universe, but also seem to be probably never possible in our universe.
One of those things came towards the end and was critical to resolving the plot.
The book was still very entertaining though. It had me turning pages and I'd probably read a sequel.
People wake up and see their dead clones floating all around them, what is not to like? I did enjoy this book. It's a murder mystery that is heavy on the characters and their back stories. It was enjoyable as the book turned into another kind of story but right at the end of it!
I feel like there was more book to be had. Maybe there is a sequel? I haven't checked it out but I will say if you like Sci-Fi, and murder mysteries this should be satisfying. There are some aspects that are telegraphed way early but in the end everything is explained to my satisfaction. But I want an ending to it.
I loved the premise of this story: 6 astronauts that wake up in a generation ship to find their past clones dead and must investigate who is the murderer. So it is a good mix of closed room thriller/mystery and sci-fi. I liked the format: chapters alternating and revealing the background of each character. And with every chapter, you discover new things, and the characters’ past and motives get more complex as you go. It was interesting, it got me engaged to the end. I didn't want to put down this book. The ending felt a little bit too rushed and convenient, but the ride was super fun.
Now THAT is the SF I didn't even know I needed. Damn fine writing, plotting, beautifully executed reveals, and just generally a fabulous damn read.
I absolutely loved this book. The characters are interesting, the plot is very original and often very surprising, and the writing really flows. I enjoyed every minute up until the last chapter, when I realized that this is probably going to be another freaking series. Do spec-fic authors ever write stand-alones anymore?
So: very clever and readable and frustrating because it doesn’t actually end.
A fun sci-fi mystery but some of the technology and world-building felt a bit too driven by plot rather than plausibility
Mind-bending posthuman murder mystery
Great story filled with enough twists to keep you reading.
This was fun. Mur takes cloning to another level, spins a murder mystery, and we end up with And Then There Were None In Space. Loved every minute of it.
Locked room murder mystery, with a clever premise change in what death/murder means due to technological advance. The story nicely flashes back and among shifting factions to piecemeal reveal and entangle our characters in that premise's logical, moral, and political implications.
Somehow both intimately suspenseful and oddly stilted, however.
A fun mystery around a generation ship that uses cloning to get to where they want to go with a minimal crew. How immortal clones who keep moving to fresh bodies will be different from normal humans and why they haven't taken over the world is the premise of this intricate murder mystery. Because the crew is murdered and they better figure out who murdered them.
This was quite a lot more fun than I anticipated. I am not a mystery expert so someone more versed in the genre might have seen things coming earlier for me it was just the right amount of mystery versus technology and world building from the SF portion of the book.
I like the fresh (to me?) take on how clones are a different species from humans altogether.
A few chapters in and I was feeling a strong sense of not quite deja vu, then it hit me, this book starts out feeling a lot like the beginning of an episode of Dr. Who.
Picture it:
opening scene: a large, generational space ship floats in space, you hear the sound of the TARDIS materializing. Cut to internal scene inside the ship, everything is quite, the grav drive is off, random things float past as the TARDIS fades into view. The Doctor opens the door and he and the companion du jour exit the TARDIS. (I like to picture David Tennant and Catherine Tate) they float about a bit, confused by the seemingly empty ship before finally finding the cloning bay where Maria, the first awake, is pulling herself out of her cloning pod, surrounded by globs of blood and the floating bodies of the crew - including her …
A few chapters in and I was feeling a strong sense of not quite deja vu, then it hit me, this book starts out feeling a lot like the beginning of an episode of Dr. Who.
Picture it:
opening scene: a large, generational space ship floats in space, you hear the sound of the TARDIS materializing. Cut to internal scene inside the ship, everything is quite, the grav drive is off, random things float past as the TARDIS fades into view. The Doctor opens the door and he and the companion du jour exit the TARDIS. (I like to picture David Tennant and Catherine Tate) they float about a bit, confused by the seemingly empty ship before finally finding the cloning bay where Maria, the first awake, is pulling herself out of her cloning pod, surrounded by globs of blood and the floating bodies of the crew - including her own, and no memories of how they got there.
But instead of frenetic acting, a bad latex-costumed monster of the week, and the Doctor there to save everyone, there is this amazing story with spectacular writing: fascinating world building and back stories, tense action, paranoia, political intrigue, hacking (both computer, DNA, and mind), slow revelation of a devious mastermind, stunning plot twists and an amazing and satisfying conclusion. there is still a lot of amazing dialog and wisecracking though, all while floating on a spaceship far from Earth with a partially functioning AI, and all the particular troubles that come with it.
Definitely an awesome book, you should go read it.
