Review: Almost a frontier story in a sci-fi setting
Rating: 4 out of 5
Date: 10 30, 2011
I read the short Seedy Business first (available for free from the site of the author and from Goodreads), which centers around something which happened to Ox - one of the protagonist - before we meet him in this book, even if he is just mentioned,and I still don't know if I was happy for having read it or not, so I can't give you any meaningful advice. On one hand it helped me understand a little bit of Ox's mystery, but on the other hand I would have enjoyed to discover Ox's secrets little by little like Runt does.I also agree with other reviewers which felt that there was little happening in the middle of the book. I enjoyed the slower pace and also the little things which made us see how Runt and Ox got closer. I think it would have been difficult to convey this approaching proximity in another way without loosing the sweetness of Runt and Ox's friendship. What was lacking, in my opinion, was an external conflict. In the last third of the book, there is a dramatic moment which helps bring the characters finally close, but it was still something within their world, while I was expecting the real menace from the outside (probably because I had read the short story). This is my only criticism for a book which has a lot of good qualities: heart, imagination, humor, excellent writing.Runt is living on a planet he has to colonize. He is alone, since his female companion was killed while they were being shipped to their destination planet. It's hard for Runt to achieve the goals set by the company who owns the planet. The planet is a mixture of penal colony and frontier: Runt has lead a difficult life in the fringes and he hopes to achieve citizenship and therefore a social status through his farming on the planet assigned to him.When a cargo is shipped to him, instead of a wife, he finds Ox, a titanic mute man with an unknown past. Maybe because of this frontier feeling and almost mail-order-bride theme, it was like I was reading a historical romance in a sci-fi setting. Ox and Runt work hard to mold nature to meet the specs of the company that has sent them there. Runt is a bit unsettled by Ox, at the beginning, because the two have a limited way to communicate, but Ox is an easy man to work and live with. Slowly Runt starts to feel comfortable with Ox, to understand what upsets or relaxes his co-worker, they share meals, jokes and finally the bed, but only to sleep. Ox's masculinity registers since the beginning with Runt, but as time passes, it becomes more and more evident to Runt that there's attraction between them.The world building is very interesting, but there's no info dumping, in a way information is almost scarce. Runt is so involved in what he's doing, that he has a very limited vision. Ox carries inside himself more information, but on one hand he can't speak, on the other hand he probably carries knowledge he doesn't want to share.I liked the contrast between the two men and the contrast in Ox himself. Ox is scary in his hugeness, he is strong and probably deadly, but he is also sweet and caring, generous, a mountain of a man who needs to be petted and tended now and then. An adorable-ugly guy who slowly becomes handsome to the eyes of his friend.There was something that I really liked in the writing. The author often writes, either at the beginning of a chapter or at the end of it, a short sentence which in a single line anticipates what will happen in the next chapter. It's something that gives a sort of rhythm and structure to the reading and that I learned to expect during the reading and it made it hard for me to put the book down.I am looking forward for more stories in this world.