*NEW RELEASE SPECIAL* Review of NETGALLEY arc Earth Retrograde – Book 2 of the First Planets series by R.W.W. Greene #BrainfluffNETGALLEYbookreview #EarthRetrogradebookreview

I generally enjoy sci fi books published by Angry Robot – and when I saw this one was available, I immediately requested it. Especially when I realised I could get hold of Mercury Rising easily. So I read that one first, before embarking on this offering – and I’m very glad I did. I’d recommend you do the same, as we’re following the same intriguing protagonist on a real roller-coaster journey…

BLURB: The United Nations is working to get everyone off Earth by the deadline – set by the planet’s true owners, the aliens known as the First. It’s a task made somewhat easier by a mysterious virus that rendered at least fifty percent of humanity unable to have children. Meanwhile, the USA and the USSR have set their sights on Mars, claiming half a planet each.

Brooklyn Lamontagne doesn’t remember saving the world eight years ago, but he’s been paying for it ever since. The conquered Earth governments don’t trust him, the Average Joe can’t make up their mind, but they all agree that Brooklyn should stay in space. Now, he’s just about covering his bills with junk-food runs to Venus and transporting horny honeymooners to Tycho aboard his aging spaceship, the Victory.

When a pal asks for a ride to Mars, Brooklyn lands in a solar system’s worth of espionage, backroom alliances, ancient treasures and secret plots while encountering a navigation system that just wants to be loved…

REVIEW: This duology is a quirky read that hits many main tropes within the genre, yet this turns out to be a memorably different read. Take our plucky hero, for instance. Brooklyn Lamontagne is a disaster magnet that never went looking for major trouble or adventure. After all, he ended up being a computer specialist – and yes… other protagonists claim to hate the adventures they undergo. But Brook really, really does. He self-medicates with alcohol a lot of the time – which was an aspect of the book I did find a bit annoying. I’m teetotal, so all the descriptions about the variety and quality of the strong stuff he was quaffing didn’t really do it for me. In contrast, many of the adventures he has undergone don’t get that much attention, because Brook can’t recall them.

We have a highly evolved alien species – the First, who now no longer need physical bodies. They claim to have visited Earth millions of years ago, before Humanity were around, and after centuries of watching us, they’ve decided to evict us. And they have the technology to persuade our angry politicians that agreeing to their terms isn’t such a bad idea, after all. They regard us with all the compassion we show an ant infestation. Fortunately, Brook doesn’t spend all that much time on Earth, as his disturbing reincarnation has all sorts of important people convinced that he’s an agent for the First. There are such entities working amongst the human population, after all…

I liked Brook and his instinct to try and help out those around him. But I didn’t ever feel I really knew him. It’s a book full of incident and unexpected twists, which drive the plot forward, rather than Brook having any agency. And that’s fine – it is, after all, a staple of classic science fiction. And Greene is good at keeping the pace up and the plot driving forward. However while I enjoyed the ride, I kept getting the sense that I was missing chunks of the story. And I’ve come away with a feeling that this series, while enjoyable, could have been so much better if there’d been three books instead of two. That said, the ending is fabulous and highly memorable. And so very clever. I’ll be thinking about it for a long time to come. Highly recommended for sci fi fans who enjoy alien encounters – apart from anything else, this is one I’d love to chat about with others who’ve read it. While I obtained an arc of Earth Retrograde from the publisher via Netgalley, the opinions I have expressed are unbiased and my own.
8/10