Book of the Month - July 2023
Day 115 on an Alien World
Book of the month this month is Day 115 on an Alien World, the first book in the Settler Chronicles series.
Years ago I read Ice Station Zebra by Alistair McLean—The story is a cold war thriller set on a submarine operating under the Arctic ice. I read the novel long enough ago that only one thing sticks out in my mind about it—the submarine had a saboteur on board, a terrifying thing in a confined space.
This idea only percolated to the surface after I read The Martian by Andy Weir, science fiction set in the not so distant future. I already harboured a fascination about biodomes, closed ecosystems cut-off from the outside. Why not put a saboteur on a dome on a far-off world?
The result is this hard science fiction thriller.
A barren world. A crashed colony ship. A saboteur at work.
After a tarnished military record leaves her unable to find work on Earth, Margo is hunting for a fresh start. A colonizing mission heading to a new world creates the perfect opportunity—or at least that’s what she thinks.
Strapped into a crashing colony ship, she realizes how wrong she is.
On the ground of their destination planet, the straight forward colonizing mission becomes a scramble for survival. Her new world is harsh and unforgiving. Accidents keep happening. Too many to blame on bad luck alone. The trail of evidence leads Margo to a startling conclusion—one of her fellow colonists is a saboteur.
Tomorrow is the colony’s first communications window with Earth and their only chance to send a message home.
With the fate of the colony at stake, will Margo stop the saboteur before it’s too late?
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