The Sails of Tau Ceti - 2020 Edition

by Michael McCollum

Starhopper was humanity's first interstellar probe. It was designed to search for intelligent life beyond the solar system. Before it could be launched, however, intelligent life found Earth. The discovery of an alien light sail inbound at the edge of the solar system generated considerable excitement in scientific circles. With the interstellar probe nearing completion, it gave scientists the opportunity to launch an expedition to meet the aliens while they were still in space. The second surprise came when Starhopper's crew boarded the alien craft. They found beings who, despite their alien physiques, were surprisingly compatible with humans. That two species so similar could have evolved a mere twelve light years from one another seemed too coincidental to be true. One human being soon discovered that coincidence had nothing to do with it…

Genres: Science Fiction, Audiobook, Space Opera, Fiction

288 pages, Paperback

First published June 22, 1992

About the author

Michael McCollum was born in Phoenix, Arizona, in 1946, and is a graduate of Arizona State University, where he majored in aerospace propulsion and minored in nuclear engineering. He is employed at Honeywell in Tempe, Arizona, where he is Chief Engineer in the valve product line. In his career, Mr. McCollum has worked on the precursor to the Space Shuttle Main Engine, a nuclear valve to replace the one that failed at Three Mile Island, several guided missiles, Space Station Freedom, and virtually every aircraft in production today. He is currently involved in an effort to create a joint venture company with a major Russian aerospace engine manufacturer and has traveled extensively to Russia in the last several years. In addition to his engineering, Mr. McCollum is a successful professional writer in the field of science fiction. He is the author of a dozen pieces of short fiction and has appeared in magazines such as Analog Science Fiction/Science Fact, Amazing, and Isaac Asimov's Science Fiction Magazine. Mr. McCollum is married to a lovely lady named Catherine, and has three children: Robert, Michael, and Elizabeth.

Reviews

[Randy Mcdonald · Rating 2 out of 5]

There have been many mentions of past appearances of worlds of Tau Ceti in science fiction , but so far as I know, few have have brought up Arizona-based science fiction writer Michael McCollum 's 1992 The Sails of Tau Ceti .

I read the book again wanting to really like it. McCollum was a very active hard SF writer in the 1980s and 1990s, at least from my young perspective as I bought interesting-looking new titles in used book stores on Prince Edward Island. His bibliography in his German Wikipedia article is extensive. (Curiously, the article has no English-language counterpart.)

(Spoilers follow!)

The ideas behind The Sails of Tau Ceti is certainly audacious. Centuries after the mysterious nova destroyed Tau Ceti that 25th of August, 2001, the inhabitants of our industrialized solar system detect a light sail craft apparently pushed into interstellar flight by the light of the nova. Starhopper, the first prototype starship, is repurposed to intercept the craft before it enters our solar system. Carrying, among others, the software engineer Tory Bronson, they rendezvous with the craft only to discover that it is a crewed vehicle, an O'Neill-type habitat housing tens of thousands of hexapodal Phelans fleeing the ruin of their home system and seeking succor in ours. Bronson is convinced to represent the refugees and their case to humanity.

This habitat is just the vanguard of tens of thousands of more habitats light-months behind, carrying with them a total of three billion Phelan refugees. If they're refused settlement rights in Sol system, then they'll leave reluctantly. Humans wouldn't want them to leave, though. The Phelans had to flee Tau Ceti in the first place because a radical faction among them accidentally triggered their star's nova. In order to avoid the stranding of the fleet deep in interstellar space and the extinction of their portion of the Phelan species, they will make Sol go nova. Can Troy Bronson bridge the gap between the two species and prevent this catastrophe?

A minor kibbitz. The Phelans are noted as sending ships not only to our solar system but to Epsilon Eridani, Epsilon Indi, and Alpha Centauri, in other words the three closest Sun-like stars to our own planetary system other than lost Tau Ceti. Looking at the Internet Stellar Database , the Phelans had other options: Omicron 2 Eridani, or 40 Eridani, is closer to Tau Ceti than Epsilon Indi (10.2 light years versus 11.5), while 82 Eridani is just two thousand astronomical units further from Tau Ceti than Sol (both roughly 11.9 light years from the Phelans' home system). Especially if the pre-nova Phelans were aware of humanity through our radio pollution and uncertain about our attitudes towards alien refugees, in-universe wouldn't the Phelans have explored other, potentially safer, options. (I'm guessing that the data on the location of Sun-like stars in the neighbourhood of Tau Ceti that's a simple Google search in 2013 was more problematic 21 years ago.)

One review says that The Sails of Tau Ceti is "[n]ot exactly a usual first contact story, not exactly a usual alien refugee story, not exactly an alien invasion story." This is true, I suppose, but I don't think it's as distinctive as all that. Desperate alien refugees demanding a place to live in our solar system is a trope that frequently appeared in science fiction before this novel's publication. McCollum's sketch of a solar system on the verge of starflight, industrialized and colonized but still dominated by a populous and habitable Earth, is plausible enough as a trope to have appeared elsewhere. The character of Tory Bronson does have a lot of potential. Leaving aside the entirely plausible profession of software engineer, trained to ensure that the different programs of a very complex long-range space mission work together without causing an abort-retry-fail scenario, and the drama inherent in her position as the only being who can prevent a catastrophe that would consume the lives of billions, the computer chip networked with her brain gives her unusual potential.

The problem is that this novel is not particularly anything. I may have been more credulous when the book came out, but re-reading the novel it didn't seem credible that McCollum would go to great lengths to detail human and Phelan civilization and then not find a way to save both from annihilation. If there was a final, frankly understandable, breakdown of human-Phelan relations, then Tory Bronson and everyone and ever place she knew would have been destroyed without leaving any legacy, and the experience of reading the novel would have been pointless. Tory Bronson could also have been a compelling character, but even her two different love interests and the unusual mental capacities granted her by her computer implants were barely touched upon. She was a character not very distinguishable from others. (It might not be fair to criticize McCollum, writing in 1992, for not developing Bronson's relatively rare computer implants into a more thoroughly transhumanist imagining of the future.) Even the Phelans, as physically distinctive as they were, seemed to be hexapodal humans, with only lip service lent to the ideas that the veneer of human culture adopted by the first Phelans to enter the solar system is just that, and that the Phelans are fundamentally not human.

To a considerable extent, The Sails of Tau Ceti felt like it was only the introduction to a much broader and potentially more interesting universe. In the novel's final passage, with a preliminary human-Phelan accord behind her, Bronson imagined what the new human-Phelan civilization might accomplish, imagining the new bispecies civilization of Sol contacting the other Phelan colony systems. The Sails of Tau Ceti, alas, never had any sequels written in such a future. Maybe if there were, I would have been happier with the book.

[David Deleon · Rating 4 out of 5]

At first, this reminded me of other stories of oncoming ships to earth. But it clearly took a turn and went in a different direction creating some mystery and drama. I enjoyed the character development. It was a fun read.

[MacWithBooksonMountains Marcus · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is a quick 0️⃣ spoiler review of the audiobook. Sails of Tau Ceti is a First-contact novel that is more hard SF than action SF. The depiction of the alien species is well-done, though the aliens looking for refuge trope does not particularly excite.

[David · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a different angle on humans meeting aliens who are looking for a new home. It's not your usual first contact story (although it is humanity's first encounter with aliens). It's not your usual story about alien refugees from disaster or tyranny. It's not really an alien invasion story. There is a kind of intrigue.

Hard SF readers may like the fact there's no FTL and the generation ships use light sails (as per the title).

[Nick · Rating 3 out of 5]

I need holiday reading. I'll come back to the Girl With The Flagon of Poo when I'm in the mood to read about Swedish business again.

[Shaft · Rating 4 out of 5]

A very interesting take on a first contact story set in the future. Definitely worth a read and probably one of the few books read this year that is a standalone.