Rebecca Riall's Outer Rim

It's space opera with depth -- Mark Cashman's The Hunt realized this reviewer's expectations from a previous reading of his novel Ringclimber. The Hunt touches on the usual SF standbys -- technology, robots, utopias, alien-human relations, ships, explosions, and the related paraphernalia. Despite its broad sweep, the 376-section e-novel manages two maintain focus on its two strong main themes: individual characters and inter-civilization relations.

The Hunt begins with agents of the multiracial (in the truest sense -- the organization being comprised of many alien races) Geodesic examining a world for potential colonization. The main character, Talbot, is still wary of his alien teammates to the point of spoken hostilities. Most of the team, however, is killed by an unanticipated primitive civilization. That is when things become complicated; the new civilization has been intentionally kept primitive by a race of violent xenophobes who wish to protect their isolation. From there follows Talbot's interaction with several other alien races and the human Prometheans, as they seek to prevent an onslaught. The enovel is available from the Electronic Temporal Doorway Storefront.

One of the most interesting aspects of Cashman's writing seems to be the effectiveness of his style. He uses the present tense in this novel, as he did in Ringclimber, to increase the reader's sense of urgency. His narration is minimalist, and most of the events and individual characteristics are revealed through dialogue and actions. This is certainly a difficult style to use for lengthy writing, and Cashman uses it for almost four hundred chapters.

The most intriguing facet of The Hunt is its cast. Nearly every character (although the aliens are sometimes sadly lacking in personality -- perhaps because it is difficult for the reader, with no real knowledge of their cultures, to distinguish between racial and individual characteristics) is strongly motivated and eager to pursue whatever their "duty" might be, while maintaining some individual nuances. Of especial interest are the Prometheans; they have evolved a stable near-anarchy. Fortunately, the author only breezes over the philosophy behind this, providing enough information to interest the reader without becoming preachy. Regardless of gender or race (and The Hunt is widely inclusive), the human characters behave as strong individuals rather than according to stereotypes -- a feature still lacking in much SF -- although, at moments, the characters are so dominated by their senses of duty that they border on blandness.

Alien relations are a major theme of the novel. Generally, it hints at the possibilities of human-alien differences, but does not make the aliens too alien to understand. This is certainly a delicate balance, and the author usually achieves it well. However, many of the aliens have humanlike facial arrangements, pressure and atmosphere requirements, and hearing ranges, which occasionally detracts from the realism of the novel. The more interesting aliens are the artificial morphic races, aggregate nano-organisms originally designed as companions to a more biological race. Their chief representative -- Latimer -- manages to be stupefying in a novel full of mysterious aliens.

It would be easy to overlook the adventurous side of The Hunt, simply because there are so many things going on. However, adventure is still very present, as the characters constantly put themselves in (sometimes unnecessarily) dangerous positions, and despite its length, the novel moves quickly.

One problem I did have with the book was the tolerance most aliens showed toward Talbot, who was blantantly distrustful of nonhumans. Although this was certainly a crucial hinge of the novel -- Talbot is constantly moving toward a state where he can even call an alien his friend -- their he'll-come-around attitude did not seem adequately explained. At one point, the (alien) Director of the GeoDesic explains that this is due to her son's faith that Talbot would eventually be a great leader, and questions that faith, but the reader expects that he would be reprimanded a bit more for his behavior.

The Hunt gets Mercuric's recommendation for characterization, themes, and entertainment.