One's Aspect to the Sun (Nearspace, #1) in Q&A with Sherry Ramsey

Aug 19, 2013 Nancy rated it it was amazing

This is on my "Want to Read" list WITH a five-star rating, but that's because I was lucky enough to be one of the beta-readers for this awesome book. I've read and loved it, but I can't wait to re-read it in all its final glory as soon as it's published by Tyche Books (Fall 2013.)

It's a book with a strong, believable, likeable main character, Luta, who doesn't seem to age and doesn't know why...though she has her suspicions. She captains a ship with a loyal and eclectic crew and, on this particu ...more

2 likes · Like · see review

Jan 01, 2014 Christopher Hoare rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

“One's Aspect to the Sun” Review.

It was a pleasure to read a space opera that had interesting characters and a human-scaled plot. Luta Paixon and her family may own a star trader that travels the galaxy but their issues and problems were very real in our own world that comes daily more controlled by faceless and greedy corporations.

Luta has been searching for her mother since she was 14 and in “One's Aspect...” the search reaches its climax as PrimeCorp, the de-facto ruler of Earth and many more “One's Aspect to the Sun” Review.

It was a pleasure to read a space opera that had interesting characters and a human-scaled plot. Luta Paixon and her family may own a star trader that travels the galaxy but their issues and problems were very real in our own world that comes daily more controlled by faceless and greedy corporations.

Luta has been searching for her mother since she was 14 and in “One's Aspect...” the search reaches its climax as PrimeCorp, the de-facto ruler of Earth and many more worlds, uses both legal and illegal tactics to learn the secret her mother, once a geneticist working for PrimeCorp, took with her when she became a fugitive. The secrets are hidden in the DNA of Luta and her brother, who are in their 80's but have bodies of thirty year olds. The drama of the story comes from the ruthless single-mindedness of PrimeCorp's managers who will do anything in their quest to study the secrets hidden in Luta's body.

The journey to a distant world where Luta believes she will find her mother covers all the panoply of today's science fiction, worm-hole travel, super-starships that seem to generate their own fuel, a society where the space-port is the centre of the universe, and aliens who are almost, but not quite, the same as us---but the chase is so well plotted and compelling that I followed without complaint. The crew of Tane Akai are well drawn and are as valuable to the reader's enjoyment as they are to the starship's journeys. The development of Luta's family in the story, from her ailing 90-year-old husband to her sometime infuriating daughter Maja, who balks at having a mother who is apparently younger than her, is a nice sub-plot that helps carry the story.

My own approach to SF took a hit when I used an early computer to calculate the pure energy required to travel as far as the closest star, Alpha Centuri, so my praise for space opera is not easily given. I'd like to believe the mathematical fantasy that is modern cosmology, but made-to order short cuts across the galaxy are too far from real science. But as readers, we must leave our scepticism behind when we read any and all fiction, and I will gladly silence it to read SF as worthy as is “One's Aspect to the Sun”. I thoroughly recommend it.

...more

1 like · Like · see review

Aug 14, 2016 Krista D. rated it really liked it

I really enjoyed this book. A lot of space operas feel distant from the characters; even moreso when it gets into the harder aspects of SF. This book firmly sticks with its first person POV - a nice change on its own - and keeps the family theme firmly in the plot's foreground.

Very engaging, an easy read, and rather uplifting. ...more

Like · see review