Escape Velocity
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- ¥1,200
発行者による作品情報
A twisty new near-future genre-bending thriller: Knives Out in space with a Parasite twist.
A decades-old murder looms over the glamorous clientele of a high-end space hotel . . . while an unforeseen threat percolates in the service corridors. The guests are about to experience the hospitality they deserve.
Space Habitat Altaire is the premier luxury resort in low Earth orbit, playground of the privileged and the perfect location to host reunions for the Rochford Institute. Rochford boasts only the best: the wealthiest, most promising students with the most impressive pedigrees. Complete with space walks, these lavish reunions are a prime opportunity for alumni to jockey for power with old friends and rivals—and crucially, to advance their applications to live in an exclusive Mars settlement. Earth is dying, and only the best deserve to save themselves.
Aboard the Altaire for their 25th reunion, finance magnate Ava pursues the truth about her brother’s murder during their senior year, which cast a dark shadow over their time at Rochford. Laz, ambassador and political scion, hopes to finally win Ava’s heart. Sloane, collecting secrets to conceal his family’s decline, angles for a key client. And Henry, heir to a healthcare empire, creates an unorthodox opportunity to get to Mars in a last-ditch effort to outrun a childhood secret.
While these erstwhile friends settle scores and rack up points, they fail to notice that other agendas are afoot at the Space Habitat Altaire, and their own futures aren’t the only ones at stake—“the best” will soon regret underestimating those they would leave behind on Earth.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Manibo (The Sleepless) ingeniously melds genres in this suspenseful sci-fi mystery set in 2089. The opening chapter offers a tantalizing hook: Henry Gallagher wakes up to find himself tumbling in space, barely able to spot his previous location, Space Habitat Altaire, and unsure of how he got there. After initially calming himself with the thought that the Altaire's orbit will eventually bring it near enough for him to reach, Gallagher panics when he realizes his space suit is out of propellant, leading him to suspect that someone deliberately tossed him off the space station. Just as his entire body is consumed with a burning pain, Manibo flashes back to Gallagher's arrival on the Altaire for his 25th high school reunion, introducing classmates, such as Tom Lazaro III, an American ambassador, whom readers will immediately view as suspects. The whodunit plot is enhanced by careful and plausible worldbuilding that digs into the intricacies of an era when the UN's Mars Settlement Agency is mere months away from accepting applications for civilian settlers. As in the best mysteries, Manibo never allows his plot twists to come at the expense of character development. Jack McDevitt fans will be especially pleased.
