When a satellite spots an alien spaceship approaching Saturn, the opportunity to meet aliens and to discover advanced technologies is so irresistible that the US and China start a race to see who can get there first. It’s a fun take on first contact, with an exciting space race, but it falls short of greatness due to uninteresting characters.
The premise of the story is great. It’s a classic tale of an item of immense power that drives those who seek it to madness and destruction: e.g., Lord of the Rings, Pandora’s box, the Necklace of Harmonia. But unlike all those myths, this story bases it in something that feels more realistic: the lure of extremely advanced alien technology.
In general, many aspects of the book feel realistic, as this is largely a hard sci-fi story. I particularly appreciated the design of the different engines used by the US and Chinese spaceships, and the trade-offs between them. The book probably nerds out a little too much on the cooling systems, but the engineering details are relevant to the plot, and it doesn’t go nearly as overboard as, say, The Martian.
Unfortunately, while the book seems to work out every detail of the physics of interplanetary travel, it pays far less attention to the characters. Most of them are two-dimensional tropes: the brilliant engineer, the wise anthropologist who is somehow also an expert on aliens, the tough security guy, etc. The worst is Sandy, who is an irritating ALL-THE-THINGS trope: he’s a handsome, athletic, mega rich, surfer guy, but also a scientist and brilliant, but wait, he’s also secretly a super badass special forces soldier. Ugh.
Overall, if you can get past the occasionally cringey dialog and relationships, it’s a decent book, with a fun premise, hard sci-fi tech, and a fast-paced, exciting, space-race plot.
