Book Review - Sailing Bright Eternity

If you made it this far into the series, congratulations. Whether or not you'll like how it ends is a bit of a coin toss.

We learn that the old man at the end of Furious Gulf is none other than Nigel Walmsley. Someone how the jerk protagonist from the first two books managed to survive some 30,000+ years (time dilation and really advanced technology helped) and is now present to help Toby escape the Mechanicals that have been pursuing him. So the first solid chunk of the book is a flashback of Nigel's life since arriving here at the Galactic Center. Amazingly enough, the man changed! He's gone from being a jerk to a curmudgeon. Yes, that's an improvement. He's been humbled by marriage and parenthood, not to mention the discoveries made at the Galactic Center and how humanity fits into the galactic pecking order. But loss probably shaped him the most. This Nigel I liked, but I couldn't help but feel that the guy is a stand-in for Benford himself.

But the Mechanicals get the upper hand, errr appendage, and Toby is off on his own, wandering through those volatile estys again, trying to find his father or, at least, other Bishops. At one point, the whole thing transforms into the sci-fi adventures of Huckleberry Finn on the space-time-river equivalent of the Mississippi. I really wondered where Benford was going with this. It had its moments but it seemed like a distraction. Ultimately, this section comes to an abrupt end, and Toby is reunited with Killeen.

There's a final showdown with the Mantis, which was needed as the thing was responsible for so much suffering. The method of resolution was unexpected, but fitting. Afterwards, there's a bit of a long epilogue as we see glimpses of our main characters' lives. I found it to be a bit sad. There is no "happily ever after," but there is an after. And the takeaway borrows thematically from Shakespeare:

All the world's a stage,
And all the men and women merely Players;

Benford could be considered guilty of meandering around with metaphysical speculation about higher lifeforms, but I can forgive him for that. We humans have this arrogance that the world—you could argue the universe—revolves around us. We are blissfully ignorant of older and far more advanced lifeforms in the universe, and our narcissism boasts that they don't exist because we don't have proof of them having visited us, as if we were so special that we merited being fawned over. It's a conceit that Benford doesn't ascribe to.

3.75 stars

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DED