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Title: Extremes: A Retrieval Artist Novel (Retrieval Artist Novels) by Kristine Kathryn Rusch ISBN: 0-451-45934-2 Publisher: Roc Pub. Date: 01 July, 2003 Format: Mass Market Paperback Volumes: 1 List Price(USD): $6.50 |
Average Customer Rating: 4 (7 reviews)
Rating: 5
Summary: A dangerous scientist's ongoing experiment with human lives
Comment: Combine a detective story revolving around a detective who always gets the worst assignments and a fellow investigator who is just feeling his way after buying the business of investigating and you have an engrossing story revolving around a murderous scientist's dangerous experiment during a moon race. The Moon's Extreme Marathon is an event which draws thousands - and the perfect setting for a dangerous scientist's ongoing experiment with human lives. It's up to two renegade investigators to stop her in this engrossing story.
Rating: 3
Summary: Sturdy, readable, not memorable
Comment: Extremes is an SF mystery set on the Moon, a sequel to Rusch's 2002 novel The Disappeared. It's competent, readable, but on several grounds not quite convincing and somewhat disappointing in resolution. It's a sturdy commercial work but nothing memorable.
Extremes is told in three narrative threads. One follows Miles Flint, the Retrieval Artist of the overall series title. His job is to track down people who have "disappeared" -- basically, people who have taken on new identities. Flint is approached by a law firm to track down one Frieda Tey, a human Disappeared accused of killing some 200 people by introducing a genetically-engineered virus into an outsystem dome. However, she and her father (who engaged the law firm) claim that the deaths were accidental and she is being railroaded.
Another thread follows Noelle DeRicci, a cliché "maverick" cop (i.e. she's really good but her career is stalled because she won't play politics) who is assigned to investigate a death at the annual "Moon Marathon", a standard length marathon run on the Moon's surface in environment suits. The third thread follows Miriam Oliviari, a "Tracker" looking for Frieda Tey. Miriam has tracked Frieda Tey over several years, and she has decided that Tey is one of the Moon Marathon competitors.
No prizes for guessing who the murder victim at the Moon Marathon is identified as.
The three threads begin to coalesce once the principals realize that besides the murder the Moon Marathon is being disrupted by an outbreak of a virus very much resembling the virus that killed all the people Tey was accused of killing. Oliviari realizes the same thing, and as her cover identity is one of the marathon medical team, she is forced to deal directly with the virus outbreak -- an outbreak she may know more about than anyone because of her research into Tey's past. So the novel continues, with DeRicci dealing with a very unusual murder and an epidemic to boot, and Oliviari forced to compromise her chance to catch Tey in order to save lives; while Flint is also forced to compromise his Retrieval Artist ethics. All ends in a thrilling space chase.
On one level, it's exciting stuff. The ending is pretty scary and well set up. The basic mystery is interesting. The novel is a whole is fast moving and good reading. But nothing really makes much sense! Part of my problem is just economics -- I simply cannot believe there are enough Disappeared and enough associated legacies and stuff to support the apparently thriving business of Retrieval Artists, and the incredible fees they charge. (Flint, for example, is set for life as a result of a previous case.) Part of it is the overblown villainy of the eventually revealed bad guy. Part of it is the strained setup of the original crime, depending on just too many coincidences. Part of it is the mechanics of the whole thing -- Flint's computer security skills, for instance, which as presented might as well be magic. Part of it is the structure -- the novel is supposed to be a Retrieval Artist Novel, but Flint's Retrieval Artist skills basically never come into play. Read the book quickly without thinking much and I think you'll be entertained -- but pull on any of the dangling threads and the whole thing collapses.
Rating: 2
Summary: I really wanted to like this book.
Comment: This was my first Rusch novel. I was all set to like it, based on the good comments I have heard about her work. The ideas certainly are good, but the writing, pacing and characterization are only competent, at best. Promising story lines start out and then fade away without a second look (the first lawyer, the law firm and the two brothers). Events in the second half read as though she were writing directly from an outline in order to meet a deadline. While I respect anyone who has been able to create a successful writing career, as a reader I had one question after finishing - "what does this book add to my reading experience, or science fiction as a whole?" My answer, I'm sorry to say, is "not much."
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Title: The Disappeared by Kristine Kathryn Rusch ISBN: 0451458885 Publisher: Roc Pub. Date: 02 July, 2002 List Price(USD): $6.50 |
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Title: Consequences by Kristine Kathryn Rusch ISBN: 0451459717 Publisher: Roc Pub. Date: 06 April, 2004 List Price(USD): $6.50 |
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Title: Fantasy Life by Kristine Kathryn Rusch ISBN: 0743456319 Publisher: Pocket Star Books Pub. Date: 01 November, 2003 List Price(USD): $7.99 |
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Title: Contact Imminent by Kristine Smith ISBN: 0060503580 Publisher: Eos Pub. Date: 28 October, 2003 List Price(USD): $7.50 |
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Title: Wyrmhole by Jay Caselberg ISBN: 0451459490 Publisher: Roc Pub. Date: 07 October, 2003 List Price(USD): $5.99 |
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