The Outback Stars / Sandra McDonald

The Outback Stars

category: military science fiction, author:

Sandra McDonald

book 1 of three
original copyright 2007,
read in May 2011

Agamedes' opinion: 7 out of 10

There's a lot going on in this book... A lot to like, too.

First, there's the space ship. It is huge! Giant blocks of self-contained cities (or cargo holds), attached to a base, to form one enormous ship. If you have the power to push (not that there is any explanation of the power source) then why not push a lot. There's no friction in space, so no need to be neat, no need for aerodynamics.

The spaceships travel along mysterious rivers in space. Shortcuts between the stars. Created by a long-vanished alien race... Again, no explanations. The shortcuts simply exist.

One of the sub-plots is the search for better control of an alternative -- also alien, unexplained -- transportation system. A bit of mysticism here, with dream messages from Dreamtime spirits... Though that could as well be telepathic communications from the aliens, since this book is "science fiction".

Amongst all of this technology -- the real story is of the crew who work in Supply on the spaceship.

There are rules and regulations, there are the people who make it all work. There is -- and I like this -- a sense of the importance of the often overlooked back-office role of providing day-to-day necessities for the thousands of crew. This is a story of the people who maintain one of the basic systems essential to daily operations.

The people are -- mostly -- good people. There are the slackers, the trouble-makers, the turned-off. Much of the story details efforts of the new supply officer as she manages this crew of mixed, realistic, people.

There are also enough baddies to offer a criminal case to be identified and then resolved. Plus a few people who may or may not be good, or who may be good but with their own agendas to follow.

There is also the love story... Across the ranks, which is strictly forbidden.

For military fiction, this book offers very human dilemmas. As science fiction, it could as easily have been on a battleship, or perhaps an inter-city train. It's a story of a group of people with work to be done, people depending on their work, rules to be followed -- and outside interference, to make their job more difficult.

Mind you, the reader's job is also somewhat difficult...

There is jargon, there are acronyms, there are ranks and roles which are barely explained. None of this detracts from understanding what is happening. Then there are the dozens of people who keep popping up... I very quickly lost track of the names.

Identifying the person who just reappeared was my main challenge, as I read The Outback Stars. Is this person good or bad or unknown? Is this person a senior officer or a swabbie? All very confusing.

Still, I finally remembered enough names to recognise the chief goodies and baddies. And that was enough to allow me to follow the action.

Enough to allow me to understand what happened. And to think, That was a good book :-)

..o0o..

These reviews are provided by Agamedes Consulting. For an independent and thoughtful review of your processes, problems or documents, email nickleth at gmail dot com.