The Echo

March 3, 2014
Set primarily in the depths of space, the second novel in Smythe's Anomaly Quartet (after The Explorer) picks up 23 years after the disappearance of spaceship Ishiguro as identical twins Mira and Tomas Hyvonen are put in charge of the latest expedition to outer space. As Mira leads a team to the anomaly, Tomas is left behind to run the mission from Earth, and a subtle resentment beings to build between the brothers as a result of their various roles. Yet just when the spaceship reaches the anomaly, the mission begins to go off the rails. Mira must battle with his desire to learn about the anomaly, save his crew, and please those on Earth who funded the mission, all the while trying to get back alive. Told from Mira's perspective, we become enthralled with his increasing paranoia and frustration with his perfect mission going awry. The anomaly presents the fascinating mysteries we expect from space and opens up the story to morally ambiguous choices for the characters. We may learn very few nuances about the anomaly, but there is more to come.

January 15, 2014
Dysfunctional...People...in...Spaaaace! For the second time in a projected four-book series, Smythe demonstrates why it's a bad idea to shut up virtual strangers in a tin can with an unclear directive. The Ishiguro vanished on its journey to examine an anomalous area of space. Readers of The Explorer (2013) know that everyone died except for journalist Cormac Easton, trapped within the anomaly and looped in time, observing the tragedy over and over. Twenty-three years later, scientist twins Tomas and Mira Hyvonen head a new mission to explore the anomaly. Tomas remains on Earth at ground control while Mira, the narrator, travels aboard the spaceship Lara. Mira is physically, socially and emotionally clumsy, ill-suited to heading an expedition into unknown territory. The brothers believe they have considered every contingency, that their mission will succeed where the previous one did not. Of course, things go terribly wrong--again and again--as the crew becomes ensnared in their own series of devastating time loops. Both novels in the series resemble a bleak cross between Jean-Paul Sartre's No Exit and the film Groundhog Day. These works share a common theme--that the protagonists' psychological problems and moral failings led to their predicament; the only way to escape is to confront those problems and strive for redemption. Sadly, Mira is no Bill Murray. Nicely written and thoughtful, but two more of these literary variations on a morbid theme may be far too much of the same for readers.

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February 15, 2014

Twins Tomas and Mirakel Hyvonen have been competing and collaborating their whole lives to get their dreams of interstellar travel off the ground. When they launch an expedition to investigate the blank area in deep space known as the Anomaly (last seen in 2012's The Explorer), Mira is the one who wins the chance to go to space, while Tomas supports the mission from the ground. But things go horribly wrong, and the true isolation of space is more than Mira anticipated. VERDICT Despite a fairly unlikable protagonist in the awkward and socially inept Mira, his plight is devastating and the mystery of the Anomaly is completely compelling. The slow pace suits the story with an added spookiness that will give readers chills.

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