Salvaged

Ok, I'm just going to say it -the Mother thing is icky. I recognize the Alien reference, but I think it may have been taken too far here.

A salvager with issues ends up on a derelict space craft that has been overtaken by a parasitic sentient fungus that has infected the ship's crew. It sounds exciting - it isn't. I can't really put my finger on why I have zero interest in continuing reading this after getting halfway through. The character's are not really interesting at all. Roslyn is an alcoholic and traumatized and has a Bad Dad, but none of those things end up having any influence on the actual plot. The rest of the cast of characters consists almost entirely of emotionally-stunted men, so unsurprisingly they were particularly vulnerable to a parasitic organism that likes to call itself “Mother” in their heads. They may come from different backgrounds, they all felt like the same flavor of snore.

Things started off ok. Roux does a lot of early work to establish Roslyn's predicament and mental state. I'm not saying as I was necessarily pulled in by Roslyn, but I could see it going in good places. We even establish a few characters from her first crew that I was actually curious about. And then all of sudden she's on a mission on her own with a dude she hates. Cool, conflict between our protagonists as they fight the evil? I like it. Oh wait, nevermind he's dead. And then once on the derelict ship, we switch to crew member's POV, and I knew we were in trouble. Whatever momentum there was completely crashed and burned, and never recovered. The story beats had little thrill and the chemistry between the characters was nonexistent.

I often credit a DNF to stumbling into a book that wasn't really for me. But this? This should be for me. I love sci-fi horror, especially considering that there is so little of it available. But there is little horror here, and the sci-fi stuff is pretty, like, juvenile? Like the future-tech elements are the kinds of things we would have thought were cool and innovative in like, I don't know, the early 90s? It doesn't feel like this was written by someone who is really interested in either genre, and on top of it didn't have the ability to put together an interesting narrative around it either.

Pros: great characters, interesting story

Cons:

On the run from her past, Rosalyn Devar took a job with Merchantia, cleaning up ships when missions go bad. Excessive drinking means this next mission is her last chance. But the Brigantine's not the dead, drifting ship the company believes. To survive, she'll have to face her past and a new alien threat.

If you like the claustrophobia of Alien and the mysterious alien element from The Expanse, you'll love this book. My only complaint was that the holidays cut into my reading time so the paranoia had time to wear off between reading sessions. Otherwise, it gets very intense.

The characters were all quirky and interesting. The storytelling tight and focused. I did figure out one aspect of the mystery a lot sooner than the characters. The ending is a rollercoaster ride of emotions.

I really enjoyed it.