On a distant planet called Kiln, humanity has established a small colony to study the remnants left behind by an intelligent alien civilization. The colony is run as a prison camp, using exiled prisoners to do all the hard and dangerous labor, including venturing outside the colony to uncover alien artifacts, while being exposed to the exotic, complex, and dangerous wildlife of Kiln. As the colonists study the planet, they begin to discover its secrets—and those secrets begin to discover the colonists.
The book features some decent characters, but the most interesting character, by far, is the planet Kiln itself. It feels truly alien and truly alive. It’s also genuinely creepy, creating lots of tension in the book every time the characters venture out. Tchaikovsky clearly put a lot of thought into coming up with a new type of biology, and I think he succeeded in creating a remarkable new world. It’s comparable to the world in the Netflix show Scavengers Reign, which had one of the best depictions of an alien planet I’ve seen anywhere.
The writing was at times beautiful, and touched on interesting themes, such as individuality vs community and authoritarianism vs liberty. And the central mysteries—how does life on Kiln work and what happened to the alien civilization—do a great job of driving the plot forward.
The resolution of the central mysteries was good, but not great. It did allow for a satisfying ending that tied up all the loose ends, and it felt like a good attempt to address the key themes, but I found some of the concepts a bit silly, and not overly convincing. Still, it’s a solid sci-fi read, if for no other reason than to feel like you got to explore a totally alien planet.
