This review is about a science fiction novel titled Tyche’sFlight. Why I’m writing it is covered in the Introduction, which follows. But if
you just want to read the review, feel free to skip the Introduction.
Introduction
In the late
1960s and into the 1970s, Hollywood’s Big Studio system began to collapse under its own
weight and changing fashions as the French film fashion of auteur worship spread and young renegades and
small, independent producers began more and more to scrounge together funding and make films
on a shoestring budget that made money at the box office.
Something similar
started happening in mainstream publishing not long after, as publishing houses
began growing by acquiring other houses, so that nowadays what was once a
stand-alone publisher is now just an imprint of a larger international
conglomerate, and a publisher’s name is now a string of names separated by
slashes or hyphens. Here are just two examples to illustrate the corporate complexity common to mainstream publishers:
·
Hachette Book Group imprints: Hachette Books
(formerly Hyperion Books, acquired in 2013), Little, Brown and Company (bought
by Time Inc. in 1968), Grand Central Publishing (formerly Warner Books, which
was part of Time Warner Publishing, which had bought MacDonald & Co. in
1992, Popular Library in 1982, and Paperback Library in 1970), Yen Press,
FaithWords, Center Street Books, Windblown Media, Perseus Books (acquired 2014),
DaKapo Press, Basic Books, Seal Press, Orbit
·
Penguin-Random House imprints: Penguin, Random House, Vintage Books,
Crown Publishing Group, Modern Library, Bantam, Ballantine, Del Rey Books, The Dial Press,
Knopf Doubleday (remember when they were separate businesses?), and more
All this acquiring and conglomerating meant, in
some cases, economies of scale could be achieved. In other cases, it meant a
loss of smaller companies’ editorial idiosyncrasies as the larger corporations’
expectations percolated through the editorial and marketing and acquisition
departments.
It also meant a greater dependence
on big sellers. Mid-list writers found it harder to gain or maintain a toehold,
and their books eventually went out of print.
Fortunately, improvements in Print
On Demand technology and the rise of small and independent publishers—usually
focused on a single or two genres—and the ease of self-publishing have led to
an explosion of books being published and easily available outside the traditional
mainstream publishers’ catalogs.
This is a good thing.
Unfortunately, there’s so much to
choose from, it’s sometimes difficult to know what to read next, unless you happen
to know the author or have a reliable word-of-mouth network. Have you ever gone
to the grocery for bath soap only to discover one entire aisle of the store is
devoted to different brands and types of bath soap? It’s kinda like that.
Marketing is important for
getting your books noticed. But marketing can be an expensive proposition—in time
and money—which is valuable for indie writers and publishers: if they’re spending
their time marketing their books, they’re not writing and producing the next
book; and if that next book doesn’t exist, no readers can buy it, which makes balancing
the writer’s budget an even harder job.
There are a few scattered blogs that
review indie books, but tracking them down isn’t always easy, and their
approach may be scattershot.
So, to support indie writers’
efforts, I started this year with the intention of reading more indie books. (I
didn’t make a New Year’s Resolution—“resolve” sounds very formal, and that
makes me twitch a little. Also, resolutions have a reputation for being broken.
So I’ll stick with intention. Much more casual-sounding word.) I’ll also write
some reviews for these books. Some will be for books by my pals. Some will be
for books I don’t know anything about, but thought I’d just jump in and try ‘em.
This first indie review, for Tyche’s Flight, is in that latter category.
Tyche’s Flight is the first in at
least two Space Opera trilogies - part of a larger story cycle, the Ezeroc Wars - about the ship and its crew. It’s Space Opera of
the sort for those who like the Firefly TV series. If you like the camaraderie
of the Rocinante’s crew in The Expanse novels without the macropolitical and
socio-cultural discursions, you’ll like Tyche’s Flight. If you like the action
in Jack Campbell’s Lost Fleet novels, you’ll probably enjoy this book.
Grace Gushikenis on the run. She is
an esper, a creation of the Empire—now known in the Republic as the Old Empire—and
her kind are hunted down and destroyed. So Grace is on the grift, running cons
to get from one planet to the next so she can stay at least one step ahead of
the Republic’s Men In Black. Her efforts lead her to insinuate herself onto the
crew of Tyche, an independent cargo runner. (Think the Star Wars’ Millennium
Falcon with a captain--Nathan Chevell—a little less rogue-ish but just as
headstrong as Han Solo.
Author Richard Parry doesn’t
counterfeit characters from other series, but they are recognizable types. And the characters are interesting and likeable. The
Tyche’s crew includes Hope, a young but highly competent engineer who keeps the
Tyche running, and who has a secret that’s keeping her hiding from the
Republic, just like Grace is. But the rest of the crew knows Hope’s secret. Grace is a newcomer, and hasn't yet earned the level of trust that will let them share that sort of family secret Grace doesn’t let anyone in on her reasons for running.
Elspeth Roussel—El to the rest of
the crew—is a top-notch (of course) pilot who zigs and zags and punches it
whenever the need arises for Tyche to evade or escape or rush into harm’s way.
October Kohl is both muscle and
juggernaut. When there’s a fight, he’s first in line for the fun. (It’s also
likely that he started it.) Think Amos Burton (from The Expanse) with a shorter
fuse and a great capacity for holding a grudge. He's not simply a two-dimensional character, and his skill at being in the center of dust ups means he has a strong cadre of fans among Parry's readership.
Tyche’s Flight explores the
dynamics of this crew’s relationships—among each other and with the greater universe
around them—as they learn Grace’s secrets and as she learns theirs. The plot
focuses on the Tyche’s mission: the Republic hires the crew to deliver a
replacement to a distant star gate that’s stopped working and whose station has
gone silent.
Perfect set up for bad stuff to
happen.
Parry creates tension and real
thrills—not just when Tyche reaches its destination, but along the way. Hope
demonstrates that she’s indeed a crackerjack engineer, saving the ship and her
crewmates more than once. Grace’s esper abilities—though abhorred by everyone
around her—allow the crew to discover the secret behind the threat once they reach
the disabled star gate. (The Bugs from the film version of Heinlein's Starship Troopers are probably a distant cousin to these villains.)
If you like the alien mysteries
and space battles that push the narrative in Jack Campbell’s Lost Fleet books,
you’ll find plenty of elements in Tyche’s Flight to enjoy.
This story stands alone as an
enjoyable SF adventure. It also opens up possibilities for the subsequent
novels. The characters are interesting. The incidents are entertaining, and the
action is engaging. I’ll be reading the next book in the series, Tyche’s
Deceit.
