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oleksandr 's review for:
The Doors of Eden
by Adrian Tchaikovsky
This is a SF by [a:Adrian Tchaikovsky|1445909|Adrian Tchaikovsky|https://images.gr-assets.com/authors/1282303363p2/1445909.jpg], one of the most interesting authors in current SF (according to me). It is a story connecting possible evolutions, parallel universes and multiple references, which should endear the fandom. I read is as a part of monthly reading for October 2020 at SFF Hot from Printers: New Releases group.
The story starts with two teenage girls, Lee and Mal, who weren’t much liked by their classmates (Lee is of Pakistani origin as was seen as other, Mal is from a rich family, who “come over from a very posh school that had told her she was better than everyone else. Being thirteen, she’d told her new peers that too, and had been surprised to discover they hadn’t agreed”), but founds a common interest in science (a book [b:The Nature of Things: The Secret Life of Inanimate Objects|461600|The Nature of Things The Secret Life of Inanimate Objects|Lyall Watson|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1405259878l/461600._SY75_.jpg|450053] was their first common ground). A friendship growth to love (nothing racy) and joint interest in seeking cryptozoological creatures. In one of their expeditions (they do it for fun, not really believing in cryptozoology, but wanting to be different) they got more than they expected.
A few year later another line starts: forty-something man, working for domestic security, and with some (unsuccessful) attempts to style himself as James Bond, with a help of a woman data analyst, found that a far-right group with links high up, plans to “teach” a transgender mathematician, who works on Her Majesty government.
All chapters are starting with Excerpts from Other Edens: Speculative Evolution and Intelligence by Professor Ruth Emerson of the University of California, a work that describes how sentience and sapiens could have developed, from Cambrian period onward, with quite a diverse versions of sapient lifes from trilobites to felines. These inserts are real gems, well thought off and often rather unexpected.
All characters actively make homages to other SF and fantasy, from checking wardrobes for doors into other worlds to teaching non-humans to cite from famous movies.
While I guess both a lesbian pair and the transgender were added to be in line with current fandom, it was done quite gracefully and naturally, unlike a lot of works that make it for wokeness sake.
This is definitely a worthy nominee for the next year SFF awards.
The story starts with two teenage girls, Lee and Mal, who weren’t much liked by their classmates (Lee is of Pakistani origin as was seen as other, Mal is from a rich family, who “come over from a very posh school that had told her she was better than everyone else. Being thirteen, she’d told her new peers that too, and had been surprised to discover they hadn’t agreed”), but founds a common interest in science (a book [b:The Nature of Things: The Secret Life of Inanimate Objects|461600|The Nature of Things The Secret Life of Inanimate Objects|Lyall Watson|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1405259878l/461600._SY75_.jpg|450053] was their first common ground). A friendship growth to love (nothing racy) and joint interest in seeking cryptozoological creatures. In one of their expeditions (they do it for fun, not really believing in cryptozoology, but wanting to be different) they got more than they expected.
A few year later another line starts: forty-something man, working for domestic security, and with some (unsuccessful) attempts to style himself as James Bond, with a help of a woman data analyst, found that a far-right group with links high up, plans to “teach” a transgender mathematician, who works on Her Majesty government.
All chapters are starting with Excerpts from Other Edens: Speculative Evolution and Intelligence by Professor Ruth Emerson of the University of California, a work that describes how sentience and sapiens could have developed, from Cambrian period onward, with quite a diverse versions of sapient lifes from trilobites to felines. These inserts are real gems, well thought off and often rather unexpected.
All characters actively make homages to other SF and fantasy, from checking wardrobes for doors into other worlds to teaching non-humans to cite from famous movies.
While I guess both a lesbian pair and the transgender were added to be in line with current fandom, it was done quite gracefully and naturally, unlike a lot of works that make it for wokeness sake.
This is definitely a worthy nominee for the next year SFF awards.