Diving into the Wreck (original 2009; edition 2009)

This was pretty enjoyable space opera. Fast-moving, well-written, but still with good characterisation. ( )

Amazon preorder,Amazon received

This is close to a hard sci-fi book. It is an interesting cross between [a:Alastair Reynolds|51204|Alastair Reynolds|http://photo.goodreads.com/authors/1244781695p2/51204.jpg]' [b:Revelation Space|89187|Revelation Space (Revelation Space, #1)|Alastair Reynolds|http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1306807253s/89187.jpg|219037] series and [a:Jack McDevitt|73812|Jack McDevitt|http://photo.goodreads.com/authors/1225722326p2/73812.jpg]'s Alex Benedict novels. While good, it's more superficial than either of those works, which leaves a bit to be desired.

There are tons of old wrecks of space ships and stations around, and "divers" to exploring them, sometimes for money, sometimes for history, and sometimes just for the thrill. Over the past 5,000 years, humanity has created all manner of dangerous technologies, and then lost or forgotten most of them.

One of these that humanity is eager to get back is true stealth technology, which is thought to rely on multidimensional drives of some sort, taking the ship out of phase with normal space or out of our universe entirely.

Not surprisingly, exploring wrecks that have such tech on board often result in disappearances or strange occurrences. The main character, who we know relatively little about, finds a wreck by chance, where no such ship should be able to be (since it lacked the drive technology to make it that far in the 5,000 years since it was built), and assembles a team to dive it with her.

They rapidly begin to realize that something strange is on board, and a variety of stealth tech adventures ensue. All in all, this is a somewhat dark book, with believable though lightly sketched world building and characters. It's a good, fast read, but not as fulfilling as the reader may like. ( )

I've made some mistakes in my life, but not many I regret. One that I do is waiting so long to read a Kristine Kathryn Rusch novel. I've read many of her short stories and enjoyed them, but this book blew me away. I couldn't put it down. Read it over a weekend, basically. It hooks you from the start and won't let go. Great, well drawn characters, especially the lead. Just the right amount of world building. A good deal of mystery and surprise twists to the plotting. Believable science, space ships, and even action sequences. The book has it all. At its core it has a story about a person who was lost and is still figuring out how to come to terms with it. Boss needs closure and suddenly she finds a way which just might provide it. Her discovery of an ancient Earth war ship with long forgotten stealth technology opens a can of worms, bringing her back into contact with her long lost father, and others who desire that technology. Their possession of it could lead to a war, so Boss has to stop them. And the price paid to do so involves risking her own lives and those of others she cares about. A great read. I can't wait for the sequel to arrive in May! ( )

An interesting plot, and Rusch is very good here at a couple of items that many SF writers fail at: She manages to give us an approximation of rules for her tech without going into tedious detail, and there's always a sense that backstory is there, even when she doesn't detail it. It's just unfortunate that I didn't actually enjoy reading it more than I did. I put that down to two factors: first, a story told in first-person present tense just grates on me a bit, but more importantly, I just don't like the protagonist all that much, so I don't enjoy spending time with her. A worthy effort, but not a favorite. ( )