Swedegeek’s Blog

Review

Rating: 7

I haven’t read an actual sci-fi book since finishing up the Golden Age series last fall. Schroeder’s first book in the new Virga space opera was a nice return to the genre. It was especially good to take a break from the more serious Delay memoir and more dense On The Road I recently finished (see the preceding library entries).

As far as science fiction stories go, this one had a bit of a different angle than what I’ve read before. Virga is a miniature, self-contained solar system. It’s essentially a giant balloon full of free-floating nations with a man-made sun in the very center. By miniature, I mean Virga is 5000 miles across, and the whole thing is filled with breathable atmosphere. The catch is that the tiny solar object in the center doesn’t reach to the out edges of Virga, so civilizations outside its reach must create their own source of light in order to grow life and fend of the chilling darkness known as winter.

As you can imagine, that creates some disparities in the outer regions that leads to these free-floating nations battling each other for control of suns, riches and the like. That’s were the protagonist Hayden Griffin comes in. He was orphaned as his home nation of Aerie is invaded just before the ignite their own artificial sun. Some years later, he is back and planning revenge. However, just as he gains access to his intended target, Hayden finds out someone else is to blame for the loss of his parents.

Choosing to ride out the infiltrated position he worked into, he learns even more about the events leading to the invasion of Aerie, as well as other aspects of Virga. He even travels to the very center of the primary sun called Vega. Of course there’s a brief love interest, and of course there’s more there than I’ll reveal here. You’ll have to read to find the details as well as the cliff-hanging end that opens things up to the universe beyond Virga.