Galaxies (1975)

http://shawjonathan.wordpress.com/2012/06/13/barry-n-malzbergs-galaxies/

Galaxies is a phenomenally multifaceted, challenging, joyous, anguished outpouring (or perhaps a carefully crafted facsimile of an outpouring). It begins, ‘To define terms at the outset, this will not be a novel so much as a series of notes toward one.’ The writer, referred to throughout in the third person, is a hack writer of science fiction and other genre, as Malzberg was, and there’s plenty of complaining about the pay levels and other drawbacks of the life. In the novel, a spacecraft carrying a cargo of 515 cryogenically preserved dead people falls into a ‘black galaxy’ and its sole crew member lives seven thousand lives, converses with a trio of mechanical Job’s comforters, and finally makes a decision. But what we get is the notes, which shoot off in all directions – lampooning the conventions of science fiction, canvassing the relationship between it and literary fiction, between it and science, discussing the craft of writing, all with tremendous energy and reflexive irony. ( )

Metatext about writing a science fiction novel. The novel is about a woman piloting a ship with a cargo of frozen dead people and how she deals with the problem of the ship falling into a black hole. Book explores all sorts of ideas about writing, religion, character development, science fiction as a genre....

I was amused that when the writer refers to an important religious group of three, he expects us to immediately think of Job's three friends---or, more precisely, acquaintances. ( )