Velocity Weapon is the start of a new sci-fi series from Megan E. O’Keefe, whose fantasy works I’ve talked about enthusiastically before. And I have to say, O’Keefe has hit the bullseye; this is a top-notch piece of science fiction. It has adventure and drama aplenty, and asks big questions, couching them alongside well-crafted character relationships in a pairing which seizes the attention, and keeps hold of it until the last page.
In case you can’t tell, I rather liked this one.
I’ve just deleted an entire paragraph, because it was perhaps a bit spoilery about the narrative, and that's something you'll want to discover on your own. So, let me say this instead. This is a space opera. It’s filled with human drama, clever tech, and lavish, well-realised word building. But it’s also a wonderfully crafted story. There are moments here that took my breath away. Twists that I didn’t see coming, sure. But then, those twists fold back on themselves escher-like, to reveal new and different truths. It’s bloody clever, and I’d do you a disservice to talk about it except in general terms. But believe me when I tell you that this is a story that is going to baffle and delight, devastate and enthral in equal measure. It’s one you’ll be reading until four in the morning, and one you’ll be thinking about for longer than that.
So, if I’m not going to talk about the story, I should talk about the characters. And they are the stars of the show, that’s a fact.
The one closest to my heart is Sanda. A conflict survivor, she’s wounded both physically and mentally in that survival. But Sanda is a force on the page regardless, in both cases. She has real depth of presence, and speaking on the page, commands respect from the reader as wel as other characters. Sanda’s internal monologue is tightly focused, driven, sometimes beautifully contemplative. All that, and she’s several cans of whup-ass mixed with determination, heroism and a soupcon of compassion. There’s a genuine passion to Sanda’s search for her family in the aftermath of war, and a sharp edge to her grief, a cold pain searing off the page and into the reader with every word. A complex person, is Sanda, and that’s high praise. Not a character, not words, but a person, living, breathing, refusing to be broken, moving forward and living despite the world she finds herself in – with the assistance of a somewhat unreliable ship A.I.
We also get to spend time with Sanda’s brother Biren, whose own story is subsumed in politics and in looking for his sister. Biren is young when we join him, a whip-smart individual, for sure. But naïve, perhaps dangerously so. Still, he has a clarity of vision and a purpose which make for refreshing reading, and their potential to be occluded by events is one viewed with a mixture of triumph and trepidation. Biren is shaping himself each action putting him into positions which give him what he wants, maybe what he needs, but also help tie him in, bind him to the society which he’s somewhat suspicious of. A nice young man, Biren, someone with potential. Whether he’ll realise or squander it is something the text explores, and it gives him room to maneouvre, to become a person we can sympathise with, empathise with – even while questioning how far he’s willing to go to achieve his goals.
While Sanda is finding strength in adversity, and Biran is treading gently in the corridors of power, Jules is something else entirely. A small time thief, mostly. A person in over their head? Quite possibly. Jules’ sections are fast paced adventure, as she tries to evade the law, as well as various shadowy forces that appear to want her and the crew she runs with, dead. I really enjoyed Jules’ sections. She’s fierce, passionate, ruthless, and a force to be reckoned with, even if she’s starting from something of a disadvantage. Still, there’s an energy driving Jules that’s infectious. And who doesn’t love a heist, evading the cops, dodging death on every corner, unravelling the threads that are bringing chaos to her life, and tracing them back to source in the finest noir tradition.
I do each of the protagonists a disservice here with my description; they’re absolute gems, every one. Their grudges, their loves, their defeats...all of their stories will take hold of you and not let go. Each has something to add to the story, and each is more than the story they’re wrapped up in.
Strangely, the world is part of what makes the story, and its reveals, so compelling. But I’ll say this. O’Keefe can write. There are sprawling civilisations here, diverse worlds that are ore than just caricatures of our own experience. There’s slowly simmering history behind each action, and that simmer is slowly brought to the boil as the story crackles forward. There’s a darkness of space so vastly absolute that it’ll leave you gasping, and starship interiors so wonderfully claustrophobic that you may feel your own walls getting a little closer together. The world, like the people in it, is richly detailed and convincing, its broader strokes filled with the wonder and terror of a wider world. It’s real.
That’s Velocity Weapon. It’s whip-smart. Its characters are people. Its world is lavish with detail, rich with the grit and grime of human history. Its story is fantastic.
So yeah, you want to read this one. Get on it.
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