I’m trying balance my reading of new fiction, for all the review requests I get from indy authors, with enough classic fiction to keep my perspective crisp.

Although I had tried in High School to work through Delany’s  door stopper Dhalgren a few times, it never really seemed worth the effort to me. It would have made an excellent weapon should the aliens from “Project Blue Book” really have invaded through our Bramalea bedroom window as my sister was certain they would.

I picked up Nova at a cottage we rented last summer and was instantly hooked.

Mouse is an 18 year old Gypsy from the planet Earth in the year 3172. He’s sweet, talented, has travelled the world, and just finished training as a spaceship pilot. It’s hard to find work though, when you have never actually piloted a spaceship before.

Captain Lorq Von Ray is the son of one of the most wealthy families in the universe. Lorq has had his face torn in two in a fight with the horribly spoiled son of the family that controls the Earth and most of space, Prince Red.

Captain Von Ray owns a spaceship and needs a crew to fly into the center of a dying sun. He’s racing against Prince Red, for love, for honour, and for his life.

Lucky Mouse found himself a job on Von Ray’s ship.

I get super attached to characters in any book and absolutely adored the crew Delany creates here. Good people who are good to each other, fighting against super rich evil peeps.

There is a fair bit of space politics and history explained. If you don’t really like that kinda stuff, it’s probably not your kinda book. Written in the hippie years of 1966 and 1967, there is some drug use by the characters. The violence is pretty tame and the technology exists to heal everyone up after a battle if they chose so. Although written before the actual moon landing, the science in this novel has weathered remarkably well. It’s a nice future, where people value machienes and music and family and friendship. Yes, I really liked this book!

When I really like a book I feel like I need to grab a pencil and draw all the characters in it. To let them out. To give the pictures in my head some kind of permanance I can share. To honour these friends with shape and form and kickass clothes. Nova made me want to draw, and drawing is always good.

Currently casting my film adaption of Nova…(Ooooo, fun this is!)

Bwahahaha! Edward Elric as Prince Red

And of course L as the Mouse.

Ichigo Kurosaki as Katin Crawford