This one has call backs to A Spy in Europa, Diamond Dogs, and Chasm City, so if you missed reading any of those then you really need to go and read them first.

And it’s such a good short, like, really good.   The ending is brilliant.

Available in the collection, Galactic North.

And now, finally, at long last, we get onto the title work, Revelation Space.   Yes peoples, it’s finally the big books’ time to be read, so it may be a while between future reviews.

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In this book we go off to the planet Turquoise, so named because it’s an ocean planet covered in turquoise oceans.

Within the oceans are the Pattern Jugglers that got a mention in Diamond Dogs, and in this book we get a much deeper introduction to them.

So yeah, a really enjoyable novella adding yet another alien layer onto the growing alien layers of the Revelation Space universe.

Available in the duology, Diamond Dogs, Turquoise Days.

And the next book in the series is Grafenwalder’s Bestiary.

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The Lachrimosa is an Ultra vessel whose captain has bought some information which he believes will make him a lot of profit.   And so the ship ends up at a planet exploring a place the crew really don’t want to explore.

This has hints of the wars between the maggots and the machines that was mentioned in Chasm City, and it seems we’re getting info dumped for the big books at the end of the series.   Info dumping aside, it’s an enjoyable novella to whizz through in a day or so.

Available in the collection, Beyond the Aquila Rift.

This is folllowed by Turquoise Days.

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Wow, now that was an epic sci-fi journey.   My Kindle showed it at 11495 Loc points, which makes it easily longer than some trilogies, and it’s all just one book: great value for money.

In this book we begin by following a character, Tanner Mirabel, who is a mercenary of sorts.   Tanner seems to have been infected with an indoctrination virus that gives him a historical/religious figure’s memories as dreams and flash backs.   On top of this Tanner has also wound up leaving the planet he was on, Sky’s Edge, and gone off on a lighthugger to Yellowstone, not realising the Melding Plague has destroyed everything.   Then, to add insult to injury, Tanner is also suffering reefer-sleep amnesia, although he does remember some things, like the fact that he came to Yellowstone to kill the man who killed his boss’ girlfriend.

But everything is not quite as it seems, people are waiting for Tanner, people are hunting Tanner, and some people just want to kill Tanner — or whoever he might be.

Brilliant!   This book has so many twists and turns as a fucked-up Tanner takes us on a fucked-up guided tour around Yellowstone’s Chasm City, a post Melding Plague Chasm City that’s just totally fucked-up.   Alastair does the most amazing writing job.

Scores on the doors: to quote from Spinal Tap, “Look, right across the board… 11, 11, 11…”

Next up is The Last Log of the Lachrimosa.

Alastair’s Page

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