Cosmonaut Keep
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4.0 • 3 Ratings
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- $2.99
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- $2.99
Publisher Description
"A portal to a deeply imagined future history that parlays X-Files paranoia about Area 51 and alien Greys into a vast interstellar community." —Paul McAuley, Interzone
A Hugo Award Nominee for Best Novel
Ranging from a gritty near-future Earth to a distant alien world, Ken MacLeod's Cosmonaut Keep is contemporary science fiction at its highest level. A visionary epic filled with daring individuals seeking a place for themselves in a vast, complex, and enigmatic universe.
Matt Cairns is a twenty-first-century outlaw Programmer who takes on the shady jobs no one else will touch. Against his better judgment, he accepts an assignment to crack the Marshall Titov, a top-secret orbital station operated by the European Space Agency. But what Matt will discover there will propel him on an extraordinary and quite unexpected journey.
Gregor Cairns is an exobiology student and descendant of one of Terra Nova's first families. Hopelessly infatuated with a lovely young trader's daughter, he is unaware that his research partner, Elizabeth, has fallen in love with him. Together, Gregor and Elizabeth confront the great work his family began three centuries earlier—to rediscover the secret of interstellar travel.
"MacLeod handles the strands of the plot deftly, weaving one beautifully realized world with the other and highlighting the parallels between the two. Rarely does a book demand so much of the reader and then deliver." —Publishers Weekly
"One of the more original sf writers at work today." —Booklist
Customer Reviews
The First Book in the Engines of Light Trilogy
“Cosmonaut Keep” is an engaging novel by Ken McLeod and the first book in his Engines of Light Trilogy. It should be noted that it was nominated for the Arthur C. Clarke Award.
It’s really two narratives in one, which occupy alternate chapters. One is set in the near future on Earth and later in our Solar System. The other is set in a farther future, mainly on the planet Mingulay, where the titular ancient castle is located.
It’s an interesting story, with a variety of sentient species, three of which are hominids. There are also intelligent giant squids commonly known as Krakens, and intelligent and long lived dinosaur-derived bipeds simply known as Saurs. All of these species originated from Earth, and were removed from there and transported to other worlds by advanced and enigmatic aliens known as The Gods. All except for the human Cosmonauts, who traveled to the stars themselves.
This is a complex story, and sets the stage for his next book in the trilogy, “Dark Light.” I’ve put it on my “want to read” list!