#1 Species Imperative

Third Person

Fiction

288

19

Czerneda opens the Species Imperative series with a somewhat original variation on the theme of alien invasion. Dr. Mackenzie Connor heads the Norcoast Salmon Research Facility and is completely immersed in her work. She and Dr. Emily Mamani are just settling in to monitor the year’s salmon run when Norcoast is visited by Brymn, the first member of the Dhryn species to come to Earth. An archaeologist, Brymn is studying a region of space called the Chasm. All of the worlds in it are empty of life forms but contain traces of life, and even civilizations, that once existed on them. Brymn needs the help of a biologist, but biology is a discipline forbidden by his culture. Mackenzie isn’t interested in obliging him--until Emily disappears. Czerneda has created convincing future Earth and space cultures, and her characters, though archetypal, pass muster. The novel suffers from extremely uneven pacing, however-- very slow in the first half, then bouncing along in the second to a series-auguring finale.

Atria Books

9781416599012

~$1.99

2024-07-19

2018-06-26 18:07:50