Dare Mighty Things

Dare Mighty Things, Heather Kaczynski. 2017 YA science fiction in which our NASA-intern protagonist is recruited for a mysterious competition for a chance to go into space. I don't actually watch reality shows, but I love the elimination-show format in fiction, the jostling in the rankings, the slow attrition of the background characters and the tension of wondering when your favorite secondary characters are going to go, the inevitable twists. I *also* love space and astronaut-training stories in particular, so this was basically catnip; reminded me of Kenneth Oppel's Starclimber in that aspect, although that was steampunk and this is near-future SF. Anyways, Kaczynski plays it very seriously and does an excellent slow reveal/ramp-up of what's going on, although I'm going to go ahead and say that not everything is resolved and there's a sequel that just came out last week that I am in the queue for and can't wait to get.

Major spoilers for the ending and for a couple of other aspects: ( Read more... )