Well, this book was good, but I think the characters need a little work. The story is actually pretty believable if you’re a confirmed conspiracy believer. It seems the US Government wasn’t telling us all it should have about that Roswell crash back in 1947. In fact, it was also hidden from the public that a gigantic space ship was also found floating near the asteroid belt in 1964 by the Mars probe, Mariner 4. Naturally, NSA now wants to go visit this huge space ship and found out why it’s just sitting there.
Dr. Jane Holloway, is a linguist teaching at a prestigious Texas university, when Alan Bergen shows up to try and recruit her for a very, very, very long mission. The two don’t exactly hit it off right then and there, but Jane does agree to come to Houston and get briefed on the mission and her part. She’s an extremely smart linguist. They figure that if, if there are aliens on-board the space craft, she would be the one to figure out their language and be able to translate for the rest of the crew.
Now, I couldn’t find out exactly what year it currently is, but since the space ship was first spotted in 1964 and Bergen said they had been observing it for the last 60 years, it must be around 2028. He tells her that the closest the ship comes to Earth is 185 million miles. It will take at least 10 months to get there and the space craft NASA has built for them is the size of a small RV. There will be a crew of 6 so their space craft will seem very, very small. They have to go now since there is an asteroid coming in that will merge with the alien ship resulting in its destruction.
Ok, so the story has this tiny Earth space craft going out to meet this huge alien ship. Wouldn’t you think that NASA or somebody would have a bigger spaceship built by 2028? Additionally, I don’t think the crew was vetted very carefully. After 10 months together, they are all crazy. Their Commander, Colonel Walsh seems to be a megalomaniac, dumps the mission objectives at the mere hint of danger, and wants to go home on-set of danger. Jane Holloway, the main character, does so much internal thinking that it’s a wonder she every says anything to anybody. She comes into first contact with an alien entity on the alien space ship, but she doesn’t tell anyone about it until they have to drag it out of her! Dr. Varma isn’t military, but she sure acts like it, although she’s slow to make decisions about the crews health.
In short, the characters for the crew are just weirdly done. You won’t be able to relate to any of them, because they all act so weird including the main character Jane Holloway. I found it very distracting. One minute she’s doing nothing but cringing in a corner, then the next she’s ordering people around. And then there’s the alien. I don’t know what to make of it.
I don’t know right now if I’ll read the next book in the series or not. It just doesn’t seem that interesting. Otherwise, it’s still a pretty good book, but too much internal thinking about this or that to really make a sensible read.