The Wreck of The River of Stars

Michael Flynn

The River of Stars is (was) a luxury liner, best in its class. Similar to the Titanic of Queen Mary in their time, The River of Stars was the biggest and most decadent of all space travel vehicles. It was also the last of the big magnetic sailing ships. Shortly after its launch, the fusion propulsion systems became the cheaper, more reliable, more modern method of outfitting ships. We pick up the story with The River of Stars classified as a hybrid (retrofitted with fusion engines) and operating with a minimal crew as a tramp ship with a cargo load headed for Jupiter. The crew is a collection of misfits and rejects personally collected by the Captain... who happens to die in the first chapter. So the misfit crew, no longer held together by their captain, struggles through a series of mishaps along their voyage. Flynn's excelling here is in using this plot to explore who these misfits are. Told in third person, and successively focusing on each crew member individually, as a reader we are privy to background and thinking from each individual point of view, knowing things that even the individuals are often not aware of about themselves. Flynn, after telling what a particular character concluded, would often follow it with the parenthetical (although they don't know it yet, they might be wrong about that conclusion). So we have a great story, good technical sci-fi, and interesting/novel characters. What I am not sure about is if the novel was satisfying. What do I require for an enjoyable, or thought provoking novel? My current thinking is that is was trying to be more thought provoking that it actually was, ultimately wasting the great story, good technical sci-fi and interesting/novel characters.

Wait