(2021) Miles Cameron, Gollancz, £18.99, trdpbk, 568pp, ISBN 978-1-473-23260-0
This is a solid military SF novel. The author has spent time serving in the navy and military intelligence and this shines through the novel.
Marca Nboro has been raised in a military sponsored orphanage under brutal conditions. She escapes to join the crew of a Greatship: the Athens. Greatships are vast, armed transports that form the backbone of human space economy. Central to this, is the exchange of goods with strange aliens at a far off trade point for xenoglas: a tough, versatile material.
However, news comes in of a Greatship being destroyed by unknown agents and it is feared that The Athens will be the next target.
Meanwhile, Nboro is finding her place in the Athens crew and soon proves herself with early success.
Then, in one of the star systems on the way to Trade Point, the attack comes. Being key in the Athens defence, Nboro is taken into confidence by the ship's intelligence officer as well as winning her the ear of the ship's controlling artificial intelligence. She begins extra duties keeping an eye out during the ship's day-to-day operations: it appears there is a spy and saboteur onboard…
This is Miles Cameron first foray into SF but he has an established backlist of espionage novels, historical fiction and sword & sorcery fantasy. He also has a degree in BA in Medieval History and this undoubtedly enables his historical and sword & sorcery novels accrue some authority and sure footedness.
It has to be said that while the military dimensions to Artefact Space are told confidently, the SFnal dimensions – such as they are – are neither fully developed nor underpinned with science. Indeed, at one point a seasoned crewman muses that some aliens' natural environment might be 17 gravities! This, of course, is nonsensical it being many times the gravity experienced at the 'surface' of a main sequence star: Artefact Space is not really for fans of hard SF.
Conversely, Artefact Space will appeal to die-hard military science fiction readers, and its youthful protagonist further lends the novel to young adult readers.
Artefact Space is half of a diptych with Deep Black to complete it. Here, completion is needed as there are a number of plot lines that require wrapping up, and not least something of a cliff-hanger cum chapter opener ending, but readers should not have to wait long as I understand it is due out next year (2022).
Jonathan Cowie
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