Bookworm Speaks!- Into the Hinterlands by David Drake and John Lambshead

Bookworm Speaks!

Into the Hinterlands 

by David Drake and John Lambshead

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Acquired: Amazon.com

Series: Citizen Series (Book 1)

Publisher: Baen; Reprint edition (September 25, 2012)

Paperback: 544 Pages

Language: English

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The Story: A young hero comes of age in the crucible of war and galactic struggle.

When Allen Allenson, scion of a noble family that has fallen on hard times, gets a mission to roust the power-hungry Terrans from a “wild” star sector where they’re encroaching, he jumps at the chance to show his individual worth, improve his family’s fortunes – and gather enough lucre to make a good marriage.   But the wily Terrans are not so easily persuaded by a young colonial they think of as a rube.

Worse, Riders, the beings who naturally ply the wilderness between the stars, are playing their own deadly political games – against the Terrans, against the colonials, and against one young greenhorn commander in particular: naïf young Allen, whom they figure they can manipulate to do their bidding.  The one thing nobody has counted on is the fact that Allen, while young and inexperienced, and much to his own amazement, happens to be a hero in the making. 

The Review: While reading this book, Bookworm felt a lot of channeling from the science fiction authors of the Golden Age: Heinlein, Asimov, Clarke and others. While he is not intimately familiar with the works of David Drake, he has indeed heard of him and is a fairly prolific author. However, he does not think this is not the best example of his work. Back to the Big Three though, this book channels the Golden Age in many respects, the main characters are all well-to-do white men with few female characters spread around. They are self-sufficient and intelligent and admirable as characters. The story is big…the actions of the characters have far reaching implications. We are essentially talking about actions that will affect an entire interstellar nation. 

The world building is where this book stands out for the science fiction reader and its attention to detail. The author’s obviously did their homework in crafting this story as an analogue to early American history. This is clearly a technologically advanced society but from a cultural standpoint, it feels like a Victorian Era setting, complete with accompanying societal structures and caste systems. 

Let’s get to the most persistently annoying aspect of this entire novel: the fact that this interstellar civilization gets to and from distant planets using bicycles. Think on that for a moment. Just say that sentence aloud… 

If this was a book for eight year olds, an author might be able to pull of “Biker…In Space!” In a serious science fiction setting, it is just too much!

Suspension of disbelief is part and parcel of speculative fiction and FTL travel is the most egregious offender but this is just…silly. If the book, as a whole, were silly, then it could work but in a story that is clearly a space opera facsimile of pre-Revolutionary War George Washington, this bike breaks its chain or a least busts a tire a few too many times. 

Is it possible that one or both of the authors is one of those pretentious bicycle riding types who wear the skin tight clothing and forever espouse the virtues of bike riding a’la Calvin’s Dad from Bill Watterson’s comic strip? In any case…it was a poor choice on the part of the authors. Bookworm thinks that their goal may have been to emulate the Earth time period in that transportation technology was crude, slow, and required a lot of effort. One can see the parallels between the Riders and Native American horse masters. If that were the case, perhaps they should have gone all out and make space faring galleons as the way to get around but pedaling does not get the story anywhere. It was a poor choice. 

The authors made a strange choice in naming their outer space nation Brasilia. Was the planet colonized by people from Brazil? There is no South American culture to be seen here, not that Bookworm could ascertain. Were the authors just trying to throw in a little bit of multiculturalism? This was yet another persistent problem that was difficult to ignore. It also feels like a bit a cop out in naming the place after a location that already exists in the real world. Brasilia is the capital of Brazil for the uninformed. 

Final Verdict: If one is a fan of classical science fiction literature and/or American history, this book may have a lot to offer with parallels to early America but for others it may be a bit to dense and have too many flaws to be particularly enjoyed. 

Three Exercise Bikes out of Five

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