Artifact Space

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Cameron has also filled Artifact Space with a wide range of intriguing and likeable supporting characters who the protagonist engages with during her adventures. There is a fairly large collection of supporting characters in this book, especially as Nbaro makes friends and collections throughout the entire greatship and beyond. I had a lot of fun getting to know some of the characters throughout this novel, and I was a particular fan of the weird and brilliant Dorcas, Nbaro’s friendly roommate Thea, and the ship’s clever and sarcastic AI, Morosini. All these characters, and many more, added a lot to Artifact Space’s story, especially as most of them form a unique relationship or friendship with Nbaro. While a few interesting supporting characters don’t survive to the end of the novel, the remaining swath of fun characters should help to make the next entry in this series very special. I enjoyed seeing several of these characters develop alongside the protagonist, and they were great additions to this fantastic novel. Oumuamua is headed out of the solar system now, so it’s unlikely more will be learned about it. And with its odd shape and features, it clearly remains something of a mystery. Miles takes what is basically Star Trek’s idea of a Wagon Train to the Stars – the Greatships form a supply line for the rare xenoglas – and add to it all the things that made Star Trek work – likeable characters, strange planets and alien encounters. Their five-year lifespans have stretched to 41 years, making Voyager 2 NASA’s longest running mission ever.

artifact space? - Genshin Impact How do you manage your artifact space? - Genshin Impact

Nearly ten years on – and eight Fantasy books later – Miles has now turned to Space Opera. And it’s brilliant. Artifact Space is set about 8 centuries into the future and humanity has largely left Earth in a great diaspora. While there are several independent systems and in fact, entire human 'empires', the story starts in New London, one of the original space colonies and the heart of far flung trading empire connected via huge armed merchant ships that (surprise!) look like gigantic 14KM long swords.Can't wait to see that next novel in "The Long War". Thought that series was finished. Nice surprise. I have been a fan of space operas for many years and this is one of the best that I have ever read. It's on a par with some of my favourite authors; Iain M Banks, Alistair Reynolds, John Scalzi.

Artifact Space by Miles Cameron | Gollancz - Bringing You Artifact Space by Miles Cameron | Gollancz - Bringing You

Estevar cursed himself for failing to notice the smaller piece of parchment tight against the inside of the case. He had to dig it out with his fingernail before unfolding what turned out to be an elaborate sketch of a naked man such as one might find in a medical text. What made it unusual were the strange markings covering the body: esoteric sigils in designs unrecognisable to Estevar despite his years of research But my opponent is a man of war, Estevar reminded himself, trained to slash the throat of his enemy’s mount first to counter his advantage. And now what shall we do, Imperious?’ he asked the mule. ‘We’re under no obligation to heed the abbot’s request for judicial arbitration between his unruly monks. As Venia so reliably reminded us in his letter, Isola Sombra does not consider itself subject to the King’s Laws. Why should we tarry here when we could already be on our way home?’ First off, this is much more military SF than space opera. Sure, it's not technically military, but the tropes are there. There are a lot of training sequences, and we get a lot of day in the life of person aboard a ship sequences. Also, there's a lot of navy jargon, traditions, and interactions (which are really, really well done, BTW. So if you like military SF with realistic interactions, I highly recommend this book.)

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Summing up then, Artifact Space made my inner Spacer beam. It starts fast but held my attention throughout, bringing new ideas to traditional SF. This is a paean to all the old SFnal tropes of old but with a brand spanking new upgrade. I couldn’t put it down. Simply brilliant and easily one of my books of the year. Cease, you avaricious beast,’ Estevar growled, yanking the crushed tube from between the mule’s teeth. ‘Save your appetite for the abbey, where we shall shortly be feasted as befits visiting dignitaries.’

Arcana Imperii Series by Miles Cameron - Goodreads

Midshipper Marca Nbaro has achieved the near-impossible. She’s made it from an orphanage to the Athens—one of the incomparable Greatships—escaping her upbringing and seizing a new life for herself among the stars. With their vast cargo holds and a crew that could fill a city, the Greatships are the lifeblood of human occupied space, transporting an unimaginable volume - and value - of goods from City, the greatest human orbital, all the way to Tradepoint at the other, to trade for xenoglas with an unknowable alien species. Longtime SETI scientist and advocate Jill Tarter, for instance, wondered if the signatures of intelligent civilizations could be imprinted on neutrinos. She said that a leak of the radioactive isotope tritium, which has a short 12-year half-life, could also signal the presence of advanced life because (unless it’s near a supernova) it would have to come quite recently from a nuclear reactor. Immediately after its discovery, telescopes around the world were called into action to measure the object’s trajectory, brightness and color. Combining the images from several large telescopes, a team of astronomers led by Karen Meech of the Institute for Astronomy in Hawaii found that Oumuamua varies in brightness by a factor of 10 as it spins on its axis every 7.3 hours.Artifact Space is THE premiere epic space opera to have on your summer reading list. Cameron pulls no punches with razor-sharp prose, fast-paced storytelling, universe-scale world-building, and a cast of characters you can’t help but root for. Cameron fans and sci-fi fans alike are in for a real treat. Gunny says you saved everyone’s ass … or maybe you’re too wet behind the ears to know what you’re doing.’ Akunje’s grin was huge and infectious.

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Because I’m not a frequent reader of sci-fi (not because I don’t like the genre but because I often don’t quite get it due to my own ineptitude), I often find myself shunted out of a book because the science is either so sparse as to be magic or so lovingly rendered as to be a textbook about things that don’t work in the real world. Kind of like when you read a fantasy novel with four thousand houses, countries, shires, and whatever else and realize you’ve just memorized a history that won’t actually help you at all in your daily life. Artifact Space manages to find a path for the reader in which the science of space travel is balanced against an equally enticing and complex culture and economy. Yes, I meant that: the economics are actually interesting here. More importantly, Cameron never piles on so much at once that you find yourself lost amidst figures and facts about either space travel or the intricate human culture that’s achieved it. This is one of my reading highlights of the year so far – and I can safely say that this one is definitely going to make my Outstanding Reads List of 2021. Marca is an engaging, sympathetic protagonist, who has had a tough time of it and makes a desperate break for a chance at a decent life. With help from someone else whose chances have already been ruined…I’m a bit ambivalent about this one. I love Christian Cameron’s Greek novels and this seemed a good opportunity to branch out into his science fiction/fantasy ones. A lot of speculative fiction authors dabble occasionally in historical fiction. Why shouldn’t the process go both ways? One of Cameron’s best skills is his ability to reproduce the feel and lived experience of the period, so here where he gets to create the whole universe it should give him a real chance to be creative. The world he’s created is suitably complicated, though I’m not wholly clear on the government’s operation. It’s based loosely on the Italian city-states of the Middle Ages, as you can tell by the fact that most of Venice is aboard the ship we start off with. The navy is really a glorified merchant fleet, with trading rights being part of why you sign up. I thought that was interesting. Space traders was not something I expected to see in a military scifi novel. The book also handles LGBTQ+ people pretty well, in my opinion. People are gay or asexual and it gets just as much attention as the straight people get. There are also “androgynes”, who are androgynous people, as you may be able to guess. I was a little bit confused over whether they were born as a result of living upon the orbitals within Human Space or if it’s part of the gender spectrum as we know it, but either way, it was neat to see a lot of gender-neutral language for a few of the characters.