What do you think?
Rate this book
Mindjammer
In the seventeenth millennium, the New Commonality of Humankind is expanding, using newly-discovered faster-than-light travel to rediscover lost worlds colonised in the distant past. It's a time of turmoil, of clashing cultures, as civilizations shudder and collapse before the might of a benevolent empire ten millennia old.
In the Solenine Cluster, things are going from bad to worse, as hyper-advanced technologies destabilise a world in chaos. Thaddeus Clay and his special ops team from the Security and Cultural Integrity Instrumentality are on the trail of the Transmigration Heresy. But what they find is something beyond even their imagining - something which could tear the whole Commonality apart!
In the Solenine Cluster, things are going from bad to worse, as hyper-advanced technologies destabilise a world in chaos. Thaddeus Clay and his special ops team from the Security and Cultural Integrity Instrumentality are on the trail of the Transmigration Heresy. But what they find is something beyond even their imagining - something which could tear the whole Commonality apart!
436 pages, Paperback
First published August 3, 2011
28 people are currently reading
87 people want to read
About the author
Sarah Newton
32 books26 followersSarah is a writer of science-fiction and fantasy roleplaying games and fiction. Her works include the cosmic fantasy novel "The Worm Within", the transhuman space opera novel "Mindjammer", and the Award-winning RPG line of the same name using the Fate Core system; the "Zero Point" campaign for the Achtung! Cthulhu RPG; the "Monsters & Magic" RPG; the “Legends of Anglerre” roleplaying game; the "Burn Shift" post-apocalyptic setting for Fate Core; and numerous short stories. She has recently completed her first novel in French (and is in quest of a publisher) and is currently working on an English-language version of the French RPG "Capharnaum" while writing her second French novel. She lives in a field in rural France, from where she occasionally manages a blues-rock band, surrounded by numerous farmyard animals.
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 15 of 15 reviews
February 18, 2022
Science-fiction set in a future with powerful post-human intelligences has to thread a narrow needle: central characters need to be relateable; but the entites likely to drive outcomes in the story are the powerful post-humans. This book has great world building, and some interesting action sequences, but - to my mind - ultimately founders on that problem: the human characters are flotsam scattered on the surface, while the real conflict builds and resolves deep below. Two other shortcomings of the book: it adheres religiously to the ‘I alone escaped to tell thee’ trope, in which the main characters get out from scrape after scrape while every single supporting character around them dies horrribly. Occassional details added to give the story color descend into technobabble.
All that said, this book is closely related to the Mindjammer role playing setting published by the author. It’s definitely a cut above most books set in role playing game universes.
All that said, this book is closely related to the Mindjammer role playing setting published by the author. It’s definitely a cut above most books set in role playing game universes.
August 12, 2016
I wanted to love this book, but I just couldn't. As an introduction to the Mindjammer RPG setting it succeeds admirably, but as a novel it suffers from several serious problems.
Firstly, for me - and, I suspect, for most people - books are about the characters. The characters here get mind blasted sixty-four different ways, but they don't let the reader into their heads once. The narrative doesn't follow any of them for long enough to build up a sense of the person, or an empathy for them. There's not a lot of reason to care about them.
Secondly, pacing - there isn't any. This feels like one extended battle scene for almost the entire book. That's really tiring.
This appears to be the author turning an rpg game log into a book. That just doesn't work without A) picking some consistent points of view, and B) taking a few breaths to understand why the characters are doing what they're doing.
Still, I fully intend to enjoy the RPG.
Firstly, for me - and, I suspect, for most people - books are about the characters. The characters here get mind blasted sixty-four different ways, but they don't let the reader into their heads once. The narrative doesn't follow any of them for long enough to build up a sense of the person, or an empathy for them. There's not a lot of reason to care about them.
Secondly, pacing - there isn't any. This feels like one extended battle scene for almost the entire book. That's really tiring.
This appears to be the author turning an rpg game log into a book. That just doesn't work without A) picking some consistent points of view, and B) taking a few breaths to understand why the characters are doing what they're doing.
Still, I fully intend to enjoy the RPG.
October 11, 2014
I picked up this book with the Bundle of Holding some months ago, and reading it only occasionally. I can't say it has captivated my attention and I am slogging through the last 25% when I don't have anything else to do (which is rare).
The writing is sometimes difficult to follow and not without errors. I wouldn't recommend this to anyone unless they were specifically looking for a comparison book about interstellar travel or something with a whole lot of cybernetics.
The writing is sometimes difficult to follow and not without errors. I wouldn't recommend this to anyone unless they were specifically looking for a comparison book about interstellar travel or something with a whole lot of cybernetics.
April 7, 2013
Just couldn't get into this...the characters seemed to be walking through their roles, the cursing sounded affected, the protagonists had these superpowers that allowed them to take ridiculous amounts of damage and recover quickly, and there was no logic to the bad guys' delight in torturing their victims.
March 7, 2019
The underlying ideas are quite deep but are hidden behind a series of unrelenting action scenes that aren't particularly original. I suppose this comes from its RPG background. It would make a good campaign setting but needs a little less combat to make a good novel.
November 20, 2012
It is the second age of Space…
In the seventeenth millennium, the New Commonality of Humankind is expanding, using newly discovered faster-than-light travel to discover lost worlds colonised in the distant past. It’s a time of turmoil, of clashing cultures, as civilisations shudder and collapse before the might of a benevolent empire ten millennia old.
In the Solenine Cluster, things are going from bad to worse, as hyper-advanced technologies destabilise a world in chaos. Thaddeus Clay and his SCI Force special ops team are on the trail of the Transmigration Heresy. What they find is something beyond even their imagining – something which could tear the whole Commonality apart…
Centuries have passed since a huge galactic diaspora that scattered the human race across the far flung reaches of the universe. In fact, so much time has passed that when the descendants of these civilizations begin to reconnect with one another they have diverged quite considerably. The plot of Mindjammer uses this as a jumping off point to explore the problems that arise when conflicting ideals/philosophies meet their polar opposite.
The four members of the SCI Force team are a veritable who’s who of sci-fi action hero archetypes. Their leader. Dr. Thaddeus Clay, is intelligent, just a little enigmatic, driven and curious. Jackson Stark is a highly disciplined killing machine damaged by the mysteries in his murky past. Max Proffitt (I do love these names) is a combat pilot/loudmouth and finally Lyra Da Luz, the team’s resident tech wizard. I immediately warmed to them all, their characters were pitched just right. I have to confess a bit of soft spot for Max in particular, always fun to have a bolshie, roguish type along for the ride. Can’t go wrong with a lead character that is all about the attitude and doing things his own way. Especially if his own way tends to invariably be wrong and cause more trouble than anything else.
There are some blistering action set pieces in this novel. At various points throughout the narrative the members of SCI Force find themselves in the midst of epic planet-spanning battles as well as violent encounters in the depths of space. When it comes to galactic power struggles this is exactly the sort of thing I’m looking for. I want an awe-inducing sense of scale, I want explosions so large they make my head spin, I want to be wowed. I’m glad to say that Mindjammer certainly delivers when it comes to spectacle. Put it this way, entire cities, and in certain cases planets, get absolutely trashed.
I don’t read a huge amount of science-fiction and being casual reader of the genre leads me to my only real criticism. Some of the exposition was quite technical and a bit too in-depth for my personal taste. I have to admit that certain terminology was lost on me. That said I’m sure a more seasoned sci-fi fan would likely have no trouble with this at all.
That relatively minor quibble aside, I had a lot of fun with this novel. The settings are all suitably exotic, and the group dynamic between the various team members keeps things moving alone at a good pace. Newton excels when it comes to capturing the frenetic chaos of warfare. Acting as a nice counterpoint to this, the SCI Force investigation into the corruption in the Solenine Cluster adds some extra depth to the plot. Mindjammer reads like a solid introduction into something much larger. There is a suggestion towards the novel’s end that there are more tales of SCI Force still to tell. I certainly wouldn’t be averse to reading more adventures set in this particular universe.
Mindjammer is published by Mindjammer Press and is available now
In the seventeenth millennium, the New Commonality of Humankind is expanding, using newly discovered faster-than-light travel to discover lost worlds colonised in the distant past. It’s a time of turmoil, of clashing cultures, as civilisations shudder and collapse before the might of a benevolent empire ten millennia old.
In the Solenine Cluster, things are going from bad to worse, as hyper-advanced technologies destabilise a world in chaos. Thaddeus Clay and his SCI Force special ops team are on the trail of the Transmigration Heresy. What they find is something beyond even their imagining – something which could tear the whole Commonality apart…
Centuries have passed since a huge galactic diaspora that scattered the human race across the far flung reaches of the universe. In fact, so much time has passed that when the descendants of these civilizations begin to reconnect with one another they have diverged quite considerably. The plot of Mindjammer uses this as a jumping off point to explore the problems that arise when conflicting ideals/philosophies meet their polar opposite.
The four members of the SCI Force team are a veritable who’s who of sci-fi action hero archetypes. Their leader. Dr. Thaddeus Clay, is intelligent, just a little enigmatic, driven and curious. Jackson Stark is a highly disciplined killing machine damaged by the mysteries in his murky past. Max Proffitt (I do love these names) is a combat pilot/loudmouth and finally Lyra Da Luz, the team’s resident tech wizard. I immediately warmed to them all, their characters were pitched just right. I have to confess a bit of soft spot for Max in particular, always fun to have a bolshie, roguish type along for the ride. Can’t go wrong with a lead character that is all about the attitude and doing things his own way. Especially if his own way tends to invariably be wrong and cause more trouble than anything else.
There are some blistering action set pieces in this novel. At various points throughout the narrative the members of SCI Force find themselves in the midst of epic planet-spanning battles as well as violent encounters in the depths of space. When it comes to galactic power struggles this is exactly the sort of thing I’m looking for. I want an awe-inducing sense of scale, I want explosions so large they make my head spin, I want to be wowed. I’m glad to say that Mindjammer certainly delivers when it comes to spectacle. Put it this way, entire cities, and in certain cases planets, get absolutely trashed.
I don’t read a huge amount of science-fiction and being casual reader of the genre leads me to my only real criticism. Some of the exposition was quite technical and a bit too in-depth for my personal taste. I have to admit that certain terminology was lost on me. That said I’m sure a more seasoned sci-fi fan would likely have no trouble with this at all.
That relatively minor quibble aside, I had a lot of fun with this novel. The settings are all suitably exotic, and the group dynamic between the various team members keeps things moving alone at a good pace. Newton excels when it comes to capturing the frenetic chaos of warfare. Acting as a nice counterpoint to this, the SCI Force investigation into the corruption in the Solenine Cluster adds some extra depth to the plot. Mindjammer reads like a solid introduction into something much larger. There is a suggestion towards the novel’s end that there are more tales of SCI Force still to tell. I certainly wouldn’t be averse to reading more adventures set in this particular universe.
Mindjammer is published by Mindjammer Press and is available now
January 20, 2015
Amazing book, the story goes up in a crescendo, all logically following the consequences of the clues it's planting along the story. So you can actually predict some of the consequences and also be surprised by some that you understand the clues were there after the fact.
This is solid science fiction, hard space opera, a thrilling ride and amazing cast of characters that are being changed throught the story, that suffer and struggle in their transhuman way. A twinting maze of deceptions, a flurry of conspiracies, sides within sides.
Has some preety violent scenes that are not for the faint of heart, it even has some philosophical hints running throught the story, that have more meat in them that what I previously thought. So good I'll probably read it again next year.
This is solid science fiction, hard space opera, a thrilling ride and amazing cast of characters that are being changed throught the story, that suffer and struggle in their transhuman way. A twinting maze of deceptions, a flurry of conspiracies, sides within sides.
Has some preety violent scenes that are not for the faint of heart, it even has some philosophical hints running throught the story, that have more meat in them that what I previously thought. So good I'll probably read it again next year.
January 6, 2015
Those who know me are surprised to find that I am, in fact, not a particularly big fan of the cyberpunk style vision of the future. That's probably why it took me so long to really get in to this book. However, I'm glad I stuck with it. The character development and plot turned out to be much better than I expected, based on the first part of the book. If you're a fan of this style of science fiction, I expect that you will probably enjoy this novel from the start. But even if you aren't, give this book a chance. You might be surprised.
July 23, 2012
I really enjoyed this book. The action was fast paced, the science was believable without being too "crunchy", and the approach to defining the "human condition" was excellent.
In many ways the seeing its reminiscent of the Iain M Banks culture series, but is in some ways an easier, less challenging read. I love Mr Banks work, but do always feel like I've had to work for the enjoyment I've derived. This was a much more relaxing read.
In many ways the seeing its reminiscent of the Iain M Banks culture series, but is in some ways an easier, less challenging read. I love Mr Banks work, but do always feel like I've had to work for the enjoyment I've derived. This was a much more relaxing read.
July 17, 2013
Mindjammer has the feel of a first novel. The character's motivations are only weakly explored leading the reader to wonder why they are involved in the situation. The story travels along the railroad inexorably with the protagonists learning one piece of information at a time. The progress is frustrating when every character at every point knows just a little bit more than the protagonists.
December 28, 2015
This is a very interesting transhumanist seventeenth millennium amid the New Commonality of Humankind. The story moves quickly and posits some worth while notions. It is worth picking up for all fans of transhumanist SF and particularly for those interested in the RPG!
November 14, 2014
A great SF-setting for Fate Core and also a massive SF-toolkit. Well worth the money if you're into Fate and Science Fiction.
July 31, 2014
My review at SF Signal:
http://www.sfsignal.com/archives/2014...
http://www.sfsignal.com/archives/2014...
February 1, 2014
A whirlwind of ideas, fun, but much not explained. RPG origin shows.
April 9, 2016
A very interesting novel, lots of action-adventure.
Displaying 1 - 15 of 15 reviews