Artifact Space

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Marca Nbaro has always dreamed about venturing into space aboard a greatship and escaping her harsh upbringing in the notorious Orphanage. However, after getting on the wrong side of the corrupt Dominus, Nbaro is forced to flee with few possessions, scandals dogging her step and an incomplete education. Pawning everything for some forged records, Nbaro boards the greatship Athens as a junior officer as it prepares to depart on the multi-year journey to Trade Point. The Abbey of Isola Sombra is less than half a mile across the causeway,’ Estevar observed. ‘The monks are known for their gracious hospitality to all who arrive at their gates. Why await me here? Unless it was to prevent me from reaching them myself?’

Artifact Space by Miles Cameron – SFFWorld Artifact Space by Miles Cameron – SFFWorld

Weird to say as Miles and I have been social media pals for what feels like forever, but this is actually the first book of his that I have read. I have heard numerous amazing things about his Traitor Son Cycle and most recently Masters & Mages, and of course all of the historical fiction he writes under Christian Cameron, but just have not had the chance to take a stab (pun intended). Artifact Space is what fans of Star Trek the Next Generation who’ve longed for something updated and more reflective of a diverse human society yet still holds to that same core of optimism and idealism about human beings have been waiting for. It’s filled with intriguing space ship troubles, conflicts large and small, the spirit of camaraderie one would hope we’d achieve when going into space, and yet with all the intricacies of our human foibles intact rather than glossed over. Fool of a fool of a fool, Estevar’s mother would have chided him – which was nothing compared to the lashing he could expect to receive from the preposterously young First Cantor when this last stop on his judicial circuit was dealt with and he returned to Castle Aramor.Looking towards the abbey in the sea, contemplating what chaos awaited, he murmured, ‘I am curious.’ Seven days?’ Estevar had to suppress a groan when the young man’s exuberant squeezing aggravated his wound. He shoved the fellow away, not quite as gently as he’d intended. ‘You expect me to believe you’ve been out in this storm for an entire week?’ One slight warning, though – the ending is a real cliff-hanger moment, which will either annoy or make you want to read the next book straight away. Sadly, it is not out until next year, I understand. My recommendation comes with three caveats: one, you have to be okay with a seriously heroic protagonist. I know; it's the age of flawed heroism (which could be precisely why it works).

Artifact Space by Miles Cameron - Goodreads Editions of Artifact Space by Miles Cameron - Goodreads

When Corrigan got a look at the silk-­robed, grey-­bearded scarecrows standing up there, he was pissing himself laughing so hard his tendril spell almost collapsed. Gently, he loosened the younger man’s fingers. ‘I thank you, Sir Knight. You have delivered your message, fulfilling this part of your mission. No one could fault your courage or your loyalty to your liege.’ He slid his rapier into the sheath ingeniously designed into the leather panel on the left side of his greatcoat, wincing at the sudden sting that was surely his stitches coming apart. Neither the galleries above nor the cheaper rows of benches on the floor were full that day, and those in attendance had clearly paid their visitor's fees in hopes of witnessing more fulsome duels than the one awaiting Janva. On hearing that the victim of her heinous crime was a child, they booed in a sort of weary acquiescence.At the on-going American Geophysical Union annual meeting, NASA project manager Suzanne Dodd said she believed that Voyager 2 can keep functioning for 5 to 10 more years in this new region of space, though not with all its instruments operating. The story centres on Marca Nbaro, a new midshipper on the Greatship Athens – a massive space faring vessel run not by a purely benevolent government but by a consortium of business interests inspired (one suspects) by Venetian mercantile culture. Marca has a troubled past, and the things she's had to do to get a position on the Athens frequently leave her vulnerable to those out to get her. But she also finds friends aboard the ship, and a growing sense of purpose even as the near-calamitous situations she winds up in reveal her strengths.