Or, at least, she needs an antagonist of comparable ability and power. My overall feeling is that, while this is a fascinating universe that could serve as the basis for many great stories, Alice Long’s just isn’t one of them.
But, while this is currently a stand-alone book, it also has too many loose strands left dangling at the end.
There’s absolutely no shortage of action, in particular a final third where Alice has to fight her way off a massive, derelict starship after betrayal by the people they are supposed to be helping. Brown spent so much time on the dazzling infrastructure, he forgot to come up with the equally dazzling threats necessary, in a world whose inhabitants calmly discuss the possibility of them surviving a multi- gigaton nuclear blast. That seems to be the situation which we have here. It’s an issue of which the author does seem to be aware, with a mention in one of the appendices of “post-scarcity society”. And even if she were to be killed, it’s established that people can get restored from backups into a new body. Then there’s her heritage, best described as unique. She’s certainly the smartest person in the book, and may well be the strongest, fastest and most lethal as well. No matter what the situation, it seems she has an app for that. For example, this is a universe in which fabricators can be used to make anything for which there’s a recipe, and Alice becomes increasingly over-powered due to all her enhancements. Her rise is, in fact, super easy, with any impediments barely an inconvenience. I was greatly looking forward to seeing Alice rising from a lowly cabin girl to… well, wherever her skills might take her. That’s clear from the multiple appendices, explaining technical aspects of how everything from interstellar travel to artificial intelligence works in this setting. Initially, I really liked this, appreciating the enormous amount of thought which has gone into the universe here. However, as Alice blossoms, it becomes clear her obscure heritage has blessed her with artificial talents far outstripping Alice’s new colleagues. Running away from the orphanage, she rescues a woman from attack, and in exchange for her help, becomes one of the crew of the slightly grey-market Square Deal, under Captain Sokol. Alice Long is an orphan on the strait-laced planet Felicity, but clearly doesn’t fit in, possessing an unusual range of those enhancements, to go with her leaning towards delinquency.
This section of the galaxy has become a vast cosmic melting pot of cultures with worlds occupied by everything from religious cults to yakuza gangs. In the future, humanity has spread across much of the universe, but has also adopted all manner of enhancements, with androids and other artificial creations likely outnumbering the people.
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