Jenna Starborn

March 4, 2002
The author of the Samaria trilogy (Archangel, etc.) offers a moving, if somewhat less introspective, retelling of Jane Eyre
that is sure to appeal to SF readers with a taste for romance. The product of the planet Baldus's gen-tanks, Jenna Starborn is used to a life of pain and privation. After being educated at a technical school that focuses on the growth of the mind to the exclusion of all else, Jenna accepts a job as a nuclear reactor maintenance technician at remote Thorrastone Park, owned by the wealthy Everett Ravenbeck. She becomes indispensable to the household—and to Everett. Despite their difference in stations—Jenna is only a half-citizen—they fall in love. After a long, difficult courtship made longer because of the perversity of the two principals, the two plan to marry. But at the wedding, Jenna receives a terrible shock: Everett has another wife. Unable to live with him as his wife without being married, Jenna flees to a remote planet, where she falls in with a family that provides help and aid to travelers. She's on the verge of deciding whether to marry another and go with him to colonize a new planet when she hears Everett's voice, impossibly calling from afar. Reader, need we say what happens next? Jane Eyre
fans will enjoy tracking the character and plot parallels. Shinn fans will enjoy the way the author perfectly captures the tone and color of Brontë while maintaining Jenna's unique voice. Best of all, Jenna's narrative makes us feel—joy in her love, sorrow in her despair, numb in her shock. (Apr. 2)Forecast:Unlike Jasper Fforde's satiric literary fantasy,
The Eyre Affair (Forecasts, Dec. 17), this novel is targeted primarily at a female audience. Ad coverage in
Romantic Times and Shinn's established reputation in the romance field will ensure plenty of crossover support.

Starred review from April 15, 2002
Conceived in the gen-tanks on the planet Baldus and rejected by the woman who commissioned her birth, Jenna Starborn finds a career as a nuclear generator technician on the inhospitable planet Fieldstar. At the estate of Thorrastone Park, Jenna finds solace and friendship in the household's staff; she also succumbs to a forbidden attraction to the mysterious master of the house, Everett Ravenbeck, and finds her life changed forever. The author of the Samaria trilogy (Archangel, Jovah's Angel, and The Alleluia Files) has adapted the classic plot of Jane Eyre, setting it in a distant future where money and status divide humanity into citizens and half-citizens, and where breaking social barriers becomes a near impossibility. This hybrid blend of sf drama and Gothic romance features a strong-willed, genuinely likable heroine and belongs in most sf collections.

Copyright 2002 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

April 1, 2002
Shinn puts her romantic and graceful turn of phrase to retelling " Jane Eyre." At 11, Jenna, no longer wanted by the mother who paid for her artificial gestation and thereafter bore a son, knows she will never be more than a half-citizen of her world. When a doctor discovers that she is neglected, Jenna is sent to technical school on another planet, where she endears herself to the teachers if not her peers. After graduation, she gets work maintaining the force field that secures vast Thorrastone Park. Comfortable with her job and her friendships with other estate staff, she astonishes herself by falling in love with Thorrastone Park's charismatic master, Everett Ravenbeck. Of course, a dark secret and great class differences stand in love's way, and Jenna forces herself to leave. Her flight brings her adventure, success, and another chance at love, but her heart calls her back to Thorrastone Park. Will she heed it and risk her own life? Shinn's sf take on a great romantic tale succeeds wildly well.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2002, American Library Association.)