The Books of Summer: Polaris by Jack McDevitt

Polaris by Jack McDevitt

My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Having really enjoyed McDevitt’s Engines of God and read Orson Scott Card’s review of the Alex Benedict/Chase Kolpath mystery/archeological-treasure-hunt series I turned to the library to see what was around. I was happy to see that they had number 2 in the series and so that’s where I’m beginning.

As with Engines of God, this book presents one mystery/cliffhanger after another and then goes about investigating in a very straight forward way. That storytelling style is fine with me since McDevitt’s storytelling is good and the concept interesting.

The Polaris is the Mary Celeste of its day, found 60 years ago abandoned in space with everyone mysteriously gone and no sign of a struggle. Our intrepid dealer in pricey artifacts manages to pick up a few choice items, only to find that someone is mysteriously tracking them down from all his clients. Presented with a mystery like this, who could resist? Not Alex and Chase.

This is a really solid mystery and when I was looking through the book again I was impressed with the structure. One tends to forget by the end, because it is rather a long book, how much of it was set up at the beginning as perfectly normal narrative. Quite enjoyable and I’ll be looking for the next in the series.