Approaching Omega | |||||||||
Eric Brown | |||||||||
Infinity Plus, 312KB | |||||||||
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A review by David Maddox
This is the premise of Eric Brown's Approaching Omega. An Omega Corporation colonization ship named
the Dauntless has left our solar system in search of a new home. On board are five hangers containing one
thousand cold-storage passengers each, four tech service crew members that are to be woken every few thousand
years for maintenance, and a brilliant Central AI computer that, through the course of the ship's centuries
long journey, is supposed to locate a suitable planet for human colonization. Shouldn't be any problems, right?
Of course there are. The maintenance crew, led by Ted Latimer, our hero of the tale, finds themselves
awakened 500 years too early. It seems a collision of some sort (or a design flaw in the drive itself) has
damaged half the ship, and lost several of the colonist hangers. The crew struggles to fix as much of the
problem as they can with limited resources, then makes the decision to leave things in the hands of the
Central AI, and continue their journey.
The next time they're awakened, another good thousand years down the line, things are even worse. Having
been more damaged than they thought in the initial disaster, it seems the Dauntless' Central AI has used
the material available to insure the survival of the colonists. This material being the colonists
themselves. This is where the book comes alive; with the images Brown creates of giant cold hangers in
space, filled with the leftover meat of human experiments. It's quite horrifying.
All the service drones on the ship seem to be hunting the crew and most of the colonists are now twisted,
cyborg hybrids that speak with the Central AI's voice. It then becomes a question not only of protecting
what few colonists left in suspended animation, but whether Latimer and his crew can survive
themselves. And to what purpose would their survival achieve? After all, the Earth they knew is thousands
of years dead, and there is no rescue coming from anywhere. Is it even worth it to salvage what's
left of the mission?
Approaching Omega reflects imagery of Alien, Event Horizon and a little bit of
Hellraiser. The story is not particularly original, but the visuals of the characters, trapped in
the void of space, being hunted by merciless machines evokes raw emotion that will stick with the
reader. Couple this with an intriguing surprise twist at the end and you end up with a good
story and overall fun read.
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