The Deep Sky is an intriguing mystery set in a space ship, giving it an isolated setting, locked-room style that served to build tension nicely. The ship has left a struggling Earth in pursuit of a new Earth-like planet to set up a colony world and continue the human race. In support of this effort, the ship is crewed entirely by people who can carry pregnancies and each crewmember is required to carry at least one pregnancy during the journey. This setup stretched my suspension of disbelief just a bit. Though I have not experienced pregnancy and do not have the capacity to, from what I understand it is hugely impactful on one's physical abilities and state, and at worst it can be downright debilitating. Here we see crewmembers going into labor at inconvenient times, or simply being ineligible for tasks due to their pregnancies. On top of this questionable choice by mission control, all crewmembers experience the ship's environment through a system called DAR - an augmented reality system that masks their environment to whatever they prefer to see. Our main character sees forested pathways filled with a variety of birds, and the ship AI recites bird facts to her to soothe her anxiety. Because of DAR, no two crewmembers see the same ship and when things start going wonky there's an added layer of confusion and uncertainty caused by the DAR that often broke the tension of a situation for me.

Crewmembers were trained from childhood through application to an elite private school, followed by years of eliminating those who weren't top performers, who had any sort of illness that may impact them or their ability to carry a pregnancy, or were too politically active. When we see them on the ship, they are young twenty-somethings, but much of their behavior and interaction feels juvenile. I will say it was mostly believable given the setup, but it still grated a bit on me. Complaints aside, the mystery was compelling, and the story does touch on the eugenic-like selection process, the traumas the school put them through, and some interesting political imaginings given the state of the world. I enjoyed a lot about this book, and it proved to be an engaging read overall.