Far from the Light of Heaven by Tade Thompson
Tade Thompson has been on my reading list for a long time. I follow him on Twitter and generally meant to get here soon. As it so happens this novel was nominated for The PKD award just as I was starting to read it. I am sure months ago I saw what it was about and put a hold on it at the library. Thankfully I had no idea what the plot was when I started reading. The way I like it.
Far From the Light of Heaven is a fantastic modern Afrofuturist novel that not only deserves to be nominated for the Philip K. Dick award but in my opinion could get a nod for the Raven award at the convention named PKD’s mentor Tony Boucher. That award goes to mystery writers and Boucher was known for those locked-room murder mysteries. In the afterward Thompson mentions Agatha Christie and it is not much of a spoiler to say her books influenced this novel.
Set on a long-haul transport space ship Ragtime with hundreds of hyper-sleeping passengers the mystery is kicked off when the first officer Michelle sends out a distress call. The ship has just arrived at Lagos and while she was asleep a couple of dozen passengers not only were awakened but killed, and dismembered. Responding to the call investigation is handled by Rasheed Fin and his artificial partner Salvo. This pairing pleasantly reminded me of the Asimov robot mysteries. Indeed Thompson plays all the mystery tropes perfectly. That is a feature, not a bug.
Thompson plays all the expected, tried, and true story beats and formulas like a skilled rhythm guitar player playing perfect power cords. That makes the surprises along the way work more powerfully. The mystery feels familiar while the universe, the world-building, and the third act twists feel fresh because they are fresh as produce straight from a garden.
The setting…
“Lagos was established by mainly Black Afrofuturists. Space is the Place. With considerable effort, all their fiscal and human resources, and a rich, funky cultural history mixed with African myth and mythmaking, they willed the space station into being. More than a few white supremacists liked the idea of a large proportion of Black people leaving Earth. They were disappointed when Lagos flourished.”
The colony world of Bloodroot is equally original and when we eventually get there, it is, without doubt, we are on a different world. The culture of Lagos is one that will be new to most SF readers, those of us who make an effort to read Afrofuturist SF on the regular will feel pretty comfortable. The story is set in the far future with FTL bridges, this world is neat.
The story is also fun, Rasheed and Campion are great characters and the story kicks into gear Rasheed has her arrested as the most likely suspect. The narrative switches POVs perfectly so we know she is not guilty, except there is a little question of self-doubt and the issue of sanity that being a deep-spacer might cause. The bodies are surgically and neatly torn-up so it is not the random wolf running around the ship. Oh yeah, did I mention the wolf that is running around the ship?
The way the narrative moves back and forth between settings, time and location is all done with great skill. Thompson seems to have planned this novel well and anyone who reads my reviews knows I love structure. There are some political elements to the final act and the ultimate reveal which I found satisfying, which is the main thing we all want in a mystery. I did not figure it out, but that is a good thing. The writing, pacing, story, characters, everything was top notch so in the end, Far From the Light of Heaven is a five-star book. Would it have made it into my top ten last year? It might of it was that good, we got lots of year left but this is a good start. Tade Thompson has made a fan out of me.
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