The Icerigger Trilogy: Icerigger, Mission to Moulokin, and The Deluge Drivers

Icerigger #1-3

by Alan Dean Foster

Stranded on a frozen and remote planet, Ethan Frome Fortune searches for a way back to civilization



Icy, desolate, and sharply carved by hurricane-force winds, Tran-ky-ky is a terrible place to crash-land. But a botched kidnapping aboard the interstellar transport Antares sends Ethan Frome Fortune and a handful of his fellow travelers tumbling toward the stormy planet. Stranded and cut off from civilization, the castaways struggle to survive. In this page-turning trilogy, Fortune confronts vicious predators (even the plants want to make a meal of him) and forges an alliance with a native Tran. As he searches for a way off Tran-ky-ky, he helps the Tran gain admission to the Humanx Commonwealth and learns about their troubled history. Just as Fortune accepts that he’ll never escape the harsh planet and acclimates to its relentless winter, he learns that scientists have detected rising temperatures in the atmosphere. This sinister change leads Fortune to a thrilling and unexpected final adventure.

Genres: Science Fiction, Fiction, Ebooks, Fantasy, Collections, Space Opera

926 pages, ebook

First published December 1, 1995

About the author

Bestselling science fiction writer Alan Dean Foster was born in New York City in 1946, but raised mainly in California. He received a B.A. in Political Science from UCLA in 1968, and a M.F.A. in 1969. Foster lives in Arizona with his wife, but he enjoys traveling because it gives him opportunities to meet new people and explore new places and cultures. This interest is carried over to his writing, but with a twist: the new places encountered in his books are likely to be on another planet, and the people may belong to an alien race.

Foster began his career as an author when a letter he sent to Arkham Collection was purchased by the editor and published in the magazine in 1968. His first novel, The Tar-Aiym Krang, introduced the Humanx Commonwealth, a galactic alliance between humans and an insectlike race called Thranx. Several other novels, including the Icerigger trilogy, are also set in the world of the Commonwealth. The Tar-Aiym Krang also marked the first appearance of Flinx, a young man with paranormal abilities, who reappears in other books, including Orphan Star, For Love of Mother-Not, and Flinx in Flux.

Foster has also written The Damned series and the Spellsinger series, which includes The Hour of the Gate, The Moment of the Magician, The Paths of the Perambulator, and Son of Spellsinger, among others. Other books include novelizations of science fiction movies and television shows such as Star Trek, The Black Hole, Starman, Star Wars, and the Alien movies. Splinter of the Mind's Eye, a bestselling novel based on the Star Wars movies, received the Galaxy Award in 1979. The book Cyber Way won the Southwest Book Award for Fiction in 1990. His novel Our Lady of the Machine won him the UPC Award (Spain) in 1993. He also won the Ignotus Award (Spain) in 1994 and the Stannik Award (Russia) in 2000.

Reviews

[Julie · Rating 4 out of 5]

What a great adventure trilogy. I debated with myself over whether to rate it a 4 or 5. Perhaps I should split the difference and call it a 4.5. See the problem is I have read many solid 5 star books and compared to them this trilogy, which is sold as one "book" on the Kindle store, just doesn't quite compare to the 5 star books I have previously read. In other words, if I had read this when I was younger and had not read all the 5 star books I have read over the years, I would certainly rate it a 5 star.

The writing is solid, no fancy flourishes of prose. Characterizations are good, even the bad guy in book 3 is a fully fleshed out character and not a cookie-cutter character. Fun factor is high! These books were just great fun to read. The only problem I had is that I'll be reading from one character's POV for quite a while, then suddenly there will be a page from the bad guy's POV or some other character's POV. And with no break in the text to indicate that there is a change in POV. I don't know if it was written that way or if the ebook formatting messed up the breaks but it was a little confusing at first.

The story is about a handful of humans who crashland on an ice world where the temperature is always below freezing and a strong wind is always, always blowing from one direction. The native Tran are covered in fur and have a sort of flesh sail going from wrist down to side in a triangle which helps them catch the wind, they also have a claw which helps them "chivan" across the ice. Thankfully for the humans the writer has given them a temperature adjusting suit so that they don't have to worry about freezing to death (though, no mention of how they er...do their business without having to undo the suit and freeze to death). The Tran are unsure of the new arrivals until they notice all the metal of the ship (which was just an emergency transport type of ship) and because their world is a metal-poor world the Tran are bug-eyed at all that metal and want it for themselves and are therefore friendly to the newcomer humans.

Difference in language is overcome by a sort of fast learning tape that two of the characters had taken prior to the circumstances which landed them in the small ship that crashed. Over time the rest of the characters learn the language the hard way.

Unfortunately the humans picked a bad time to crashland because the local Tran who live on a small island of rock amid the ice sea are preparing for war against the barbarians who roam the ice in a huge mass and are basically pirates plundering the various villages and towns they come across on their endless journey across the ice sea.

There are many adventures ahead of the Tran and Humans who become fast friends through their travails (sorry, I can't resist a bit of alliteration from time to time).

The trilogy consists of three books: Icerigger, Mission to Moulokin, and The Deluge Drivers. Originally sold separately they are now sold as one book in the Kindle ebook store.

[John R Cobb · Rating 4 out of 5]

Yet another wonderful ADF sci-fi/fantasy adventure!

I admit I’m a big ADF fan, and my great admiration is built upon the author’s exceptional legacy of written works. With all that fanboy crap out of the way, Mr. Foster delivers another well written sci-fi/fantasy adventure series set upon an icy world called Tran-ky-ky. As usual, the author creates another fascinating alien world with vivid passages describing its geology and wildlife.

The main protagonist, Ethan Frome Fortune, is an interstellar salesman, who crash lands on the planet along with an eclectic group of survivors. Although barren, the world holds an abundance of flora and fauna, avian natives, and human interlopers all in varying degrees of conflict. Guided by natives called the Tran, the humans traverse a frozen sea whipped by ceaseless winds. Along the way, they encounter fearsome predators and battle Tran pirates before finding refuge. Afterwards, they make an epic journey to the nearest Humanx Commonwealth where federation and corporate entities vie for the world’s natural resources.

And, with this trilogy, you not only get one, but three novel length stories. And, as an Amazon prime member, it’s not only a deal, but it’s a steal. One of the few true perks of my Prime membership.

Anyhow, if you’re looking for a long winter read, I recommend this trio of novels. I also suggest you wrap yourself in a thick blanket because it’s freakin’ cold on Tran-ky-ky.

Regards,

John R. Cobb

[Darryl · Rating 3 out of 5]

I wavered on whether this was a 3 or 4 star review, and settled on 3.5 stars due to the lack of detailed female characters. Obviously the first 2 books were written in the 1970s, so that's to be expected. The stories itself were enjoyable, with my favorite being the first one. I wish that Foster had delved into the characters more, as opposed to focusing on a non-stop adventure story. It seems like the third novel was a little abrupt, and seemed to leave a few loose ends throughout the story. Since I only paid $1.99 during a Kindle Daily Deal you can't go wrong. Overall it's a nice sci-fi story that breezes by, but just don't look for too much depth in the Humanx Commonwealth universe.

[Emily · Rating 1 out of 5]

DId not finish. I could not get through the first chapter. I did not like his writing style, and the scene was annoying.

[Chris Jags · Rating 3 out of 5]

Mission to Moulokin, the second entry in this series, is an enormously nostalgic book for me. I found a battered old copy in a garage sale when I was about waist-high, and I hoped it would be like my favorite film at the time, Star Wars. I read it, became captivated by the idea of the medieval ice world and its strange flora and fauna, and wound up loving it.

In any case, having lost my copy many, many years back, I was thrilled to pick this trilogy up recently for Kindle and to read Moulokin again with adult eyes (not to mention getting the chance to read the other two, Deluge Drivers for the first time).

Icerigger, the first in the series, is decent. It suffers from strange and stilted dialogue and is obsessed with how overweight the heroine is to the point of being cringe-worthy. Other than that, it's a worthy enough adventure from a less cynical age of writing.

Mission to Moulokin - and this may be nostalgia speaking - is still a blast, a silly, rollicking high adventure that managed to entertain me even a couple decades after my first go-around with it.

The Deluge Drivers, however, barely needed to be said. It reads like a drawn-out post-script and many of the major characters from previous installments are kind of just shunted to the side and go through the motions. There isn't enough for the large cast to do. It's readable, but not memorable.

All in all, I enjoyed my time with this collection. It hasn't entirely aged well, but at its best, it was still able to recapture a little of the adventurous magic I remember when I poured over it as a kid.

Icerigger: ***
Mission to Moulokin: ****
The Deluge Drivers: **

[Mark Zodda · Rating 2 out of 5]

Started slow but I should have stopped reading after the second book. The third book was the worst of the lot as the author seems to have forgotten part of the story from the second book and put the characters into situations where they were completely unprepared despite having been in the same exact situations in the previous book.

[Jeffrey French · Rating 4 out of 5]

I enjoyed the first two books in the trilogy immensely, the third, while written many years after the first two, just didn't hold my interest nearly as well. It was a story with a reasonable plot ... but it just didn't feel as polished as the other two.

[Gabriel Pagan · Rating 3 out of 5]

He wouldn't get away with portraying overweight women like that in a modern book. Other than that, not a bad juvenile adventure book with sci-fi elements

[Dasha · Rating 4 out of 5]

Good alien-world adventure.

[D Calco · Rating 4 out of 5]

Really more of a 3.5, better than average but still a tad simple and uninspiring. Generally a good story, but I liked it better when I was a teenager. The 3rd book in the series wasn't out then, so when the trilogy was on sale as a single kindle book, I snagged it for nostalgia's sake. It didn't keep me thrilled or on the edge of my seat, nor did it blow my mind with new sci-fi far-outness, but the characters are likable enough, the world is just fun enough to host the adventure, and the action:introspection ratio was balanced, if predictable.

The whole premise of the accidental arrival of advanced humans among the less developed natives is cool, a lot can be done with the trope, and this trilogy does a bit with cultural impact, prime directive type stuff. The alien flora/fauna is diverse and mostly reasonable in the context of the ice world, and whatever seemed "unlikely" was still not too far-fetched to enjoy and fit the plot. The characters were stable, reliable, but really didn't evolve much and were perhaps a bit ... not stereotypical exactly, but not of great depth or surprise.

Respect to Alan Dean Foster. I'll probably always consider him a favorite though I've read only 15 or so of his many books, and most of us have seen and enjoyed many of his book/movie tie-ins, so you know, what's not to love? But I think I need more intense/enveloping books nowadays, to really grab my interest, like Iain M Banks Peter Hamilton Dan Simmons Gene Wolfe Neal Stephenson China Miéville...

I still have Alan Dean Foster's _The Damned Trilogy_ that I downloaded during the same kindle sale, so I'll give that a shot, but I think I won't be reading much more of the classic 70's like this, Heinlein Niven Adams.., Maybe I will though. After all, I was off classic rock for a while too, but then went back to that!

[Su · Rating 4 out of 5]

Read from Kindle Unlimited I believe. So do I 'own' it or not? Hmmm...

Yes it's old (many of you young sprouts wouldn't even have been born yet), yes it was written a long long time ago, yes Foster was not quite as skilled when he started, and yes, a lot of the cultural themes seem incredibly backward and dated now even though it is a science fiction story of the future.

Regardless of that this is still a fine story of castaway survival against huge odds, with the crew marooned on an inhospitable world where icy death waits at every turn. m Foster does well in the first book meticulously detailing how they escape the island they've been marooned on, build their own landship the icerigger) and their adventures across the ice towards civilisation (the second book) rounding out with some some more worldbuilding in the third volume. He does all this with panache and a dynamic storyline keeping the action flowing.

While we can look back with jaded eyes, reclining on far more erudite, sophisticated and detailed examples of the genre and tropes, at the time this was actually really quite advanced, pretty much cutting edge at the time with a lot of forward-looking content. Dare I use the word seminal? Well I just did, and I'm not afraid of it.

Obviously if you read this as a youngster this will be chock-full of early Foster nostalgia and the energy of SF of the time, but for later audiences will seem a bit dated and simplistic. It's still worth reading (the first book anyway) for the fun of it and to visit happier, simpler times before Grimdark and Dystopian became de rigueur in speculative fiction.

[Jordan Bethea · Rating 4 out of 5]

A fun set of action stories, in a good interesting sci-fi setting. The setting is probably the strength of the series, taking place on an 'ice world', but one that is fully explained and fleshed out, and is a vibrant living world unlike Hoth. The thought and creativity put into it makes it feel very real. The characters are fine, protagonist Ethan Fortune is fairly generic, but Skua September is very memorable, as are the Tran. The biggest issue especially with the first book is how limited the women's roles are, there are only two and they both act as love interest stereotypes, though they do get better in later books.

The plot feels vaguely John Carterish, as space travelers crash on a technologically limited world, though with less out and out violence than in John Carter books. It can feel fairly colonialist especially at the start, as they teach the tran all about new technologies, but as it goes on they do a better job of making the tran not seem as primitive, and their low technological level becomes a major plot point. Where the story excels is in the individual action setpieces - the different chase sequences, battles with various enemies and monsters, traps, and bizarre animals and locales they go to. I'm pretty surprised this isn't a movie already, because it feels like it could make a really good action series with some adapting. Overall it's a very fun read, and I wouldn't mind a new set of stories that take place on Tran-ky-ky.

[Dennis Zimmerman · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.5 stars

Icerigger
Mission to Moulokin
The Deluge Drivers

As with many of Foster's other books, the best part of the Icerigger trilogy is the journey, not the destination. The protagonists encounter many interesting situations that contribute very little to the overall plot.

To summarize the plots, in Icerigger a small group of commonwealth citizens are stranded on an ice world with a primitive civilization, thousands of miles from the commonwealth outpost. This is their story of how they interact with the natives and make their way to the the outpost.

In Mission to Moulokin, the group of humans works on creating a world government so the natives can apply for an elevated membership in the commonwealth.

In The Deluge Drivers, they encounter and deal with a plot by other humans to terraform the planet and make it suitable for human occupation.

These three novels were written over a significant number of years, and it shows. The first two books came fairly early in Foster's writing career, and subsequently lack some of the awesomeness that characterizes his later works. I enjoyed The Deluge Drivers, written in 1987, much more than the earlier works.

[Rodney Dunn · Rating 3 out of 5]

This was a good series. Foster creates fantastic worlds with interesting characters. The world of Tran-Ky-Ky is dangerous, interesting, and exciting. The cast of characters take the reader on a large scale adventure across this world and it really has some exciting moments. They are constantly placed into dangerous situations that require some clever way out. It is a really fun story.

That being said, it is also a "safe" science fiction story. No character is ever really at risk. So in that regard it is relatively predictable. It is also littered with spelling and grammatical errors. This complaint MAY be the result of the Kindle edition. I have been noticing spelling/grammatical errors since I began reading on a Kindle exclusively about 5 years ago. It is still annoying and I had to re read passages several times due to an out of place period, quotation mark, or oddly formatted sentence.

Overall, it is a good book for fans of Science Fiction. Worth a look.

[Booth Babcock · Rating 3 out of 5]

I loved the Commonwealth books (initially the Flinx books) when I first read them back in the 1980s when I was young...so seeing this turn up on the Amazon free Prime reading books was cool, a chance to re-visit that space opera environment for the first time in decades. The language seems strangely dated for something written in the 70s and 80s, but I still like the universe of these novels, which is a fun mixture of the exotic and a slightly less optimistic view of the universe than, say, Star Trek.

This particular release is a combination of three novels written over the span of decades set on the ice world of Tran Ky Ky. The story clips along well enough and the characters are likeable if not especially deep. All three could probably have been edited down and combined into a single better novel.

[SOTERO RIVERA · Rating 5 out of 5]

Very entertaining. Lighthearted science fiction.

All three books are entertaining with different stories for each. You get to revisit the same characters and places throughout the series. This makes it so that you become attached to the characters. Creating an emotional bond between you and the characters.
The alien people are interesting to imagine both in how they look and their social manners.
I highly recommend these books. There is some violence but no sexual depravity.
Allan Dean Foster is an exceptional world-builder and character creator, not to mention a great storyteller.

[Bruce Pitz · Rating 3 out of 5]

After the first installment (Icerigger), I was ready to pack it in... but not being one to quit in the middle of a read, I continued. After installment two (Mission to Moulokin), I swore that I had had enough... but, again, ... not being one to quit in the middle of a read, I suffered through. I gave myself a two-week vacation and dove into installment #3 (The Deluge Drivers) hoping my attitude had improved, ... It did not. At this point I can only say that I am ecstatic that there was not a fourth installment. Just not my cup of tea I guess...

[Read Ng · Rating 4 out of 5]

I rated the three books individually.

But I read these stories in a Kindle Trilogy version. I rate the trilogy higher on the whole than the three books individually. The tale of the icy planet came together much better when read as a whole. Foster may have taken more than a decade to write the stories (with little intention from the start to have them become a trilogy) but the storyline reads much better for me, if taken in one sitting.

Have a GoodReads.

[Jonathan · Rating 5 out of 5]

Just as good as I remembered

I first read the Icerigger books when I was a teenager. They were good then and they are good now.

After crash landing on an ice planet, a few humans work with aliens to cross half the planet and get home. In the process they have many adventures.

Once back at home base they find more to do, from helping their alien Tran friends get fair trade agreements to saving their planet.

[Allen McDonnell · Rating 4 out of 5]

Still Good

I first read each of these novels as they were published in paperback. Rereading this trilogy in May 2025 I feel the same as I did decades ago. The first novel is great, creative concept very well developed. The second novel builds on the first and is very good. The third novel is still a disappointment, to me at least, and draws the series score down from a five star to a solid four.

[Drew Kerlee · Rating 5 out of 5]

It's not often... No, I've never read a trilogy straight through - except for this one. I really really enjoyed it! I'm going to hold off on more Foster books, but I'm already looking forward to swinging around again!

[Jeannine · Rating 4 out of 5]

These were a great deal of fun. Nothing profound, but interesting characters and situations, and lots of action moving the story right along. These are technically SF, but read more like fantasy, rather like Anne McCaffrey's Pern series. And every bit as entertaining.

[James Foster · Rating 3 out of 5]

Good conclusion to the triology

Though this was the weakest of the three books it's a good way to wrap up the trilogy. Enjoyed how Foster put a fitting end to each character and away forward for the world he created.

[George Polansky · Rating 4 out of 5]

Another new world added to Foster's universe. Diverse characters are isolated on an ice planet far from human help.They combine their talents in order to survive. They are helped by local natives and in turn help the natives to advance their culture. An interesting and enjoyable read.

[Paul Berner · Rating 5 out of 5]

Overnight Trilogy

I have read the Trilogy when they first came out. I read all the Pip and Flinx books also. Good sci go writer from the beginning. He always keeps you books into his books

[Rob Kuyrkendall · Rating 5 out of 5]

Great Trilogy

Alan Dean Foster has always been one of my favorite authors. The icebreaker trilogy has always been one of my favorite since it was first published.

[Theresa · Rating 5 out of 5]

Another great series

Excellent, as is most everything he writes. A very engaging and interesting read, with characters you come to care about and whose mission you cheer for

[Allen Thomas · Rating 5 out of 5]

The Icerigger Trilogy

Fantastic three books. A wonderful story line with great characters. A very fast paced read. Enjoy this reading experience today.

[Darkhon · Rating 4 out of 5]

Interesting world, good story and characters, nice dry humour.

[Robert Gilson · Rating 5 out of 5]

A fun little re-read. Still a great series. Wish they would do an audio version.