Perseus Spur by Julian May

Originally published 1998; this edition 1999

Publisher: Voyager

M

(V, S, L, D)

Violence

Sexual References / Mild Sex Scenes

Coarse Language

Drug Use (Medical, Augmentative, Social Drinking)

Representations

Gender:

1st-person narration by a male character, most of the other characters are also men. The only conversations we become aware of that took place between women also concerned a man. Gender roles are superficially egalitarian.

Sex:

Story is infused with presumed heterosexuality. One character is asked if she might be in a relationship with another woman, but denies this and later engages in a heterosexual relationship.

Race & Ethnicity:

Most characters are white, those with known origins being from North America. One minor character is black, one major character is Mexican - there is Spanish sprinkled in the story from both him and the protagonist - one major character is from off-world by way of the Caribbean.

Disability, Physical Diversity and Health:

One character spends much of the novel in recovery from serious injuries.

Awards

None of note

Trying to work on being more clear with some of these details, such as how much items contribute to the final age-rating and for what. Probably won't come through with that for a while, as these are backlog from the weeks I was AFK (which I shouuuld get round to saying something about too, when I find the time). Also noting where I got them from.

This book and the next one, by the way, I bought cheap at a newsagent years ago because I'd seen them round lots and got curious. Hadn't read them until now 'cause of the half decade I spent not reading fiction. Liked them a lot despite the book making my editing fingers twitchy to fix it at first. Very trashy, straightforwardly fun space opera.

The narrator has a tendency to infodump, and recap excessively, and there aren't counterbalancing positive qualities unless you want to read a lighthearted thriller set in space, which I did. Made a nice change in tone from what I'd been reading the previous couple of months.

What else? The book features single-biome planets, but at least they are more interestingly described than e.g. "desert world". Also liked that the future depicted is a corporate colonialist dystopia, that the main character is a beneficiary of this system and committed to its abolition. Although he still definitely slips up. I find the biological liberties harder to go along with than the physics ones, but still managed for the sake of the story.

This all sounds a lot more negative than I feel, I think. It's fun! But probably only fun for people who enjoy the genre? Or maybe just me; it's hard to get copies of these now and they used to be everywhere for several years.