Mjhancock's Reviews > Transcendental

Rumors have hit the civilized galaxy that someone or something has cracked the secret of transcendence, and a crew of desperate pilgrims have set off on a voyage to find it, not knowing if their co-ordinates are true, or their colleagues can be trusted. The easiest way to describe this story is that it's Cantebury Tales with aliens (Which is also the description of Dan Simmons' Hyperion, which is nothing like this book besides also being Cantebury Tales with aliens. But never mind). Chapters on the beleaguered voyage into the unknown and attempts to sabotage the ship are interspersed with the characters providing their life stories, which in the case of the alien species in particular also generally double as an overview of their race. We also get the backstory to the galaxy in general: most of the galaxy was at peace when humans came to their attention, and our rambunctious ways disrupted existing alliances and started wars until a new uneasy peace including humans was made. It's kind of similar to Mass Effect's approach to human/alien relations; we're the scrappy upstarts everyone wishes would settle down a bit and respect their elders. The POV character is Riley, a human who's been tasked with finding the leader of the expedition, and implanted with a cybernetic pedia to give him information and make sure he does that. Gunn is very good at deadpan humor; what comedy there is in the book comes out of the aliens' laconic exasperation with humans and vice versa, and the randomness of the pedia's advice. I don't know if the pedia was meant as a satire on such devices in satire, but if it was, it works. Unfortunately, the book is less than the sum of its parts. The short stories are generally pretty good, but Riley is a reasonably underwhelming protagonist, and a story promising transcendence ends in a place that might be intended as ironic, but comes off as disappointing. It was a fun read, but I honestly think I might have been more entertained by a series of short stories describing these aliens' homeworld.