In The Black by Patrick S. Tomlinson

In the Black by Patrick S. Tomlinson

My rating: 5 of 5 stars


This book is billed as "Hunt for the Red October in Space," a billing I found very accurate. Set an indeterminate number of years in our future, spacefaring humanity is locked in a cold war with the alien Xre. The Combined Corporate Defense Fleet, a name which tells you a lot about the worldbuilding, has stationed a cruiser on a routine patrol in the 82 G Eridani system.

Weird things happen, and then things get kinetic. Interspersed with this, we get some at first apparently unrelated corporate maneuverings down on the human-colonized planet. We also get to see how things are progressing on the Xre side of the border. I did like his aliens - they were sufficiently alien and clearly had a well-thought-out backstory.

Tomlinson does a very good job of both keeping things exciting and tying all of these loose threads together at the end in a believable manner. He's also created an interesting and realistic cast of characters. Although not billed as such, it feels like the beginning of an interesting series. I found it highly entertaining and devoured it in one sitting.



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