Redline the Stars PDF
Preview Redline the Stars
Nebula Grand Master Norton and Griffin recreate the flavor of Norton's four Solar Queen books (published almost 40 years ago) while updating some concepts and quite a bit of technology. The crew of the Free Trader vessel Solar Queen , flying under Capt. Miceal Jellico, has mixed reactions to new crewmate Rael Cofort, who is plying the space lanes as a jack-of-all-trades despite her position as a physician and status as sister of the successful rival Free Trader, Teague Cofort. Upon arriving at Canuche of Halio, the most advanced planet of the sector, the Queen's crew is endangered when Rael picks up the odor of man-eating rodents used in a gruesome gem-stealing scheme. Rael earns her mates' further respect with her gem-trading skills, but her warning of another, major, disaster reveals her true worth, leading the crew to accept her and prompting her to revise her original plans. In their third collaboration (after Storms of Victory ), Norton and Griffin deliver a satisfactory read that, nevertheless, like the original series, lacks the sophistication and complexity of Norton's later works.
Copyright 1993 Reed Business Information, Inc.
Norton's four-book series about the trader spaceship Solar Queen ended in 1969 with Postmarked the Stars; this long-range continuation utilizes Norton's concepts and was written mostly by Griffin. This time, the Solar Queen (its personnel often recognizable from 1969) takes aboard a female crew member, the half-alien, empathic, multitalented medic Rael Cofort. Though problems crop up almost at once, and some of the men mutter about her being a jinx, Rael soon saves Sinbad, the ship's cat, after he gets torn up in a terrible battle with a giant rat. Later, on planet Canuche, Rael unmasks a nasty conspiracy among local bar owners, who rob and murder unsuspecting patrons and keep rats to dispose of the evidence. Next, Rael demonstrates her impressive trading abilities in earning the ship a fortune in rare textiles and gems. Finally, she warns the local ocean-shipping magnates of a potential disaster involving the handling of chemical cargoes-- and then, sure enough, a shipboard fire triggers a devastating explosion, after which Rael, heedless of her own injuries, shows off her miraculous doctoring skills. Agreeable, well-crafted adventures--the superman slant isn't as tiresome as it sounds in summary--though lacking the salty-dog realism of A. Bertram Chandler's Rim World yarns, and markedly less powerful than C.J. Cherryh's alien-trader Chanur tales. -- Copyright ©1993, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.
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