Amateur detective Mallory Viridian’s talent for solving murders ruined her life on Earth and drove her to live on an alien space station, but her problems still follow her in this witty, self-aware novel that puts a speculative spin on murder mysteries, from the Hugo-nominated author of Six Wakes.

From idyllic small towns to claustrophobic urban landscapes, Mallory Viridian is constantly embroiled in murder cases that only she has the insight to solve. But outside of a classic mystery novel, being surrounded by death doesn’t make you a charming amateur detective, it makes you a suspect and a social pariah. So when Mallory gets the opportunity to take refuge on a sentient space station, she thinks she has the solution. Surely the murders will stop if her only company is alien beings. At first her new existence is peacefully quiet…and markedly devoid of homicide.

 But when the station agrees to allow additional human guests, Mallory knows the break from her peculiar reality is over. After the first Earth shuttle arrives, and aliens and humans alike begin to die, the station is thrown into peril. Stuck smack-dab in the middle of an extraterrestrial whodunit, and wondering how in the world this keeps happening to her anyway, Mallory has to solve the crime—and fast—or the list of victims could grow to include everyone on board….

Mallory attracts murders. She solves them but the authorities don’t trust her and mostly think she is involved in some way. Even when it is proven she just sees clues they missed the authorities refuse to allow her to become a police officer or even a private investigator. After each murder she moves on as the people around her start to avoid her and fear her presence. Since First Contact has opened up relations, of a sort, with a variety of aliens, Mallory requests and is granted asylum on the sentient space station Eternity. Xan Morgan is also on Eternity having been kidnapped by some joy-riding aliens. Even if he wanted to return to earth there is the matter of him being suspected of murder as well having classified information which the military will kill him to prevent it from becoming known. So Xan and Mallory are peacefully two of three humans on board until a shuttle bearing more humans to visit or live on the space station is announced. Before they can decide what to do - stay or run - the shuttle is partially destroyed and the sentient station goes into an angry fit over the death of its symbiote, Ren, and is slowing destroying the station piece by piece. When the survivors from the shuttle are recovered it turns out most of them have a past link to either Xan or Mallory. The murder of Ren is just the beginning of the most intricate murder Mallory has ever tried to solve.

This is a murder mystery and a space romp rolled in to one. We learn that aliens have been popping in to visit earth for years, that most abductions of humans are the equivalent of drunk college kids deciding to take home that cute stray dog from Rocky Point and that there are dozens of different alien races. Mallory’s closet non-human friend is Stephanie, a Gneiss rock creature about eight-feet-tall, other aliens are blue flying insects, the chameleon-like Phantasmagore and, of course, the sentient space station Eternity and her daughter the sentient shuttle Infinity. Standout alien characters are Stephanie and her cousin Tina if you can imagine a rock creature with the personality of a valley girl.

This was an enjoyable read, I adore the character and want to see more of them. Luckily book two, Chaos Terminal, is due out in November. Highly recommended. ~~ Stephanie L Bannon

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