The Outback Stars

This one was close to being a real winner, as I very much enjoyed the more-merchant-marine-than-military space adventure, mixed as it was with a mystery. Three things got in the way of my liking though.1) The use of Aboriginal belief was quite unsettling - it was treated respectfully (in that the massive injustices done to native peoples weren't overlooked), but I'm just not sure it should have been there at all.2) More in my mind as actually wrong, was the line, repeated several times, about ho

Indigenous Australian issues are pretty fraught, and difficult for white Australians to portray accurately and sensitively, let alone Americans. McDonald doesn't even come close, and some of her misses are downright offensive. Setting aside the extent to which this book is basically Outback Steakhouse in space, a lot of the plot -- the parts that deal with bureaucracy and the day to day management of a stores department on a starship -- is good, interesting lower decks stuff, but marred by a sub

Actual rating: 1.75 - didn't "hate it" but it's not really "OK"Yawn...just, yawn.There's nothing terribly "wrong" about this book but there's nothing awfully "right" about it either. The story takes place in an indeterminate future where the Earth has suffered a largely unexplained ecological catastrophe (the Debasement). Humans have discovered what appears to be an alien transportation system (the Alcheringa) that connects seven inhabitable worlds. Team Space, a quasi-military organization, mon