Alliance Unbound

The second book of the latest Union-Alliance series, the Hinder Stars trilogy, co-written with Cherryh’s long-term partner Fancher. Cherryh has a whole timeline worked out for her novels, which even includes the stuff that doesn’t, at first glance, seem to fit into her Union-Alliance universe, like the Faded Sun trilogy. But this new trilogy definitely does fit in.

There’s Earth, and Earth Company (EC), and it set up a series of stations orbiting nearby stars. Initially kept supplied by near-speed-of-light pusher ships, but then one station discovers FTL, and two breakaway polities form, one based around Cyteen and the other around Pell. The EC was unhappy with this, and this kicked off the Company Wars. All of this is covered in show more earlier novels by Cherryh.

The Hinder Stars are those stations closest to Sol. In the book preceding this one, Alliance Rising, the EC wants to reassert control, takes over Alpha (Barnard’s Star) and builds its own massive FTL troop carrier. Meanwhile, a FTL route was discovered between Alpha and Sol, meaning pusher ships will no longer be the sole link between Earth and the expanding number of stations, which by now are carrying on very happily by themselves.

Alliance Unbound is set after those events. While visiting Pell Station, the crew of Finity's End, a FTL megaship, which is on a mission to sign up all the merchant ships and stations to its Alliance, becomes suspicious of some luxury items it finds on the station. Which leads them to a supposedly mothballed station. And it turns out the EC is secretly supplying it with pusher ships, in the hope of… taking over the stations in the name of the EC.

At times, the prose felt almost like distilled Cherryh. It’s always been brusque and direct, but here more so; and yet there’s a lot of interiority, a lot of guessing and second-guessing. But the plot rolls on relentlessly, which makes for a fast read. I’ve read a lot of Cherryh’s novels, some of them so long ago the details are a little hazy… But even so, it felt like there was some retconning going on here. It’s intriguing stuff, and gives more of an insight into Cherryh’s universe, even if some of the details didn’t quite line up with what I remembered from other Union-Alliance novels.

It’s not like this has never happened before in fictional universes - cf John Varley’s Eight Worlds and Steel Beach - and it’s more or less inevitable as authors dig deeper into previously unexplored areas of their own universes. Having said that, the pusher ships as described in Alliance Unbound struck me as a fascinating concept to explore - cut off for years, while in the outside universe decades pass. And yet I don’t believe Cherryh has written a novel about the pushers. The first explicitly Union-Alliance novel she wrote was Downbelow Station, which won the Hugo in 1982, and that’s set during the Company Wars.

I think I’ve said before that I enjoy exploring science fictional universes, and will often forgive most, but not egregious, deficiencies in the writing while doing that. Happily, there’s nothing here by Cherryh to forgive. She’s an excellent writer, and still going strong, if Alliance Unbound is any indication. She has a huge back-catalogue to explore, and that’s not including the 20+ Foreigner novels, and it’s definitely worth doing so. show less

Starships and space station politics— absorbing!

Tense unforgiving times for Finity’s End starship’s crew as they endeavour to bring the last two merchant family ships into an Alliance as a third power to counter the Earth Company’s enforcer’s actions in space. The two ships leave as Infinity comes into Pell, and before Senior Captain Neihart can speak with them.
An innocent look by Jen Neihart, the Senior Captain’s niece, her partner Ross Monahan and some of his cousins at Pell Station’s Gardens and trees have the Finity Starship Captains realising that illegal Sol items are showing up at Pell. How? Such items are sanctioned. Jen is a security officer for Finity. Ross, a Navigator from the Galaxy family ship, along with his show more cousins are currently attached to Finity.
From there it’s a small thought for Finity’s End to go to two mothballed space stations to investigate.
Ross is a talented navigator who feels the stars as living entities. It’s his abilities that in the end deduce something others doubt.
When Finity’s End breaks out into space station Olympus’s orbit they are unpleasantly surprised. There’s a pusher ship from Sol attached to the station, the two family ships they’ve been looking for and a third ship that looks very different.
What began as an economic endeavour has the potential to become something else
Cherryh and Fancher build the story in abbreviated actions and talk that alarmingly keeps the tension focused.
I’m happily exhausted! Grand Space Opera at its very best!

A DAW ARC via NetGalley.
Many thanks to the author and publisher. show less

Some books are written to find an audience. Others are written to please fans who are already in place. Alliance Unbound, the second volume of The Hinder Stars series, is one for C. J. Cherryh’s fans begging for more Alliance Space stories. The merchanters Finity’s End and Little Bear leave Alpha Station and head for Olympus, a station controlled by the increasingly belligerent Earth Company. Negotiations, bargaining, and hostilities ensue. Warning: the action doesn’t pick up until the plot is well along. Cherryh fans will be undaunted.
Cherryh is one of the few authors who have written stories about the economics and politics of transitioning from slower-than-light starships to FTL. If that sounds too deep in the wormhole weeds, show more you are probably not a fan. show less

Alliance Unbound takes 600+ pages to tell less than 120 pages worth of story, and it isn't by far the most interesting story. Lots of re-repetitive speculation, angst, and conversations where all involved already have all the information. The pair of lovers demonstrate no heat or urgency; hell, they are rarely in the same space. And the only actual action is the result of a needless risk taken so there would be some action.

Cherryh is one of my favorite science fiction authors, but this one was pretty "meh!" for me. The first 40% was just tedious filler. Yes, I'm interested in the beginning of the Company Wars, but only the last part of the book was about that. I mean ... we spent a ton of pages just walking through a garden oohing and aahing about plants. Hopefully the third book will be better.

Sequel to Alliance Rising. At Pell, with the Alliance lacking only two ships to be complete, the Monahans aboard Finity's End make a discovery that upends everything. Tense politicking and great danger lead to a rollicking good read. Highly recommended.

Note: there is at least one more book in the series still to come. And now I need to reread the rest of the Alliance/Union universe books.

This is the long-awaited second volume in the Hinder Stars prequels. I reread the first book in preparation for this read and would recommend starting with book one. I love how the authors build and develop the characters and the worlds within this and their other books. Recommended.