杏吧原创

Argonaut by Stanley Schmidt, Tor, $25.95, ISBN 0312877269 Reviewed by David Barrett

WALKING through a park, a man spots an unusual insect. He moves closer and it suddenly stings him between the eyes. He鈥檚 hit by an overwhelming rush of his most emotion-filled memories, so powerful that he blacks out 鈥� but not before grasping the insect in his hand. Later, in hospital he teams up with a young medical technician, and together they take the insect to an aged entomologist. Spotting metal flecks in the insect, she sends it to her grandson, a nanotech expert. By halfway through chapter four, the insect isn鈥檛 real, and it鈥檚 way ahead of human capability; it must be an alien spy device.

Argonauts begins with this intriguing tale of 鈥淔irst Contact鈥�, one of the staples of science fiction. But the rest of the plot is slower. Our three characters become involved in the US government and military response to the perceived alien threat. 鈥淚t鈥檚 just a small part of our larger mission to learn everything about the Universe.鈥�

This is a pleasant read, but it鈥檚 a very traditional novel, much in the style of Clifford D. Simak or, more recently, Robert Charles Wilson. But it doesn鈥檛 have Simak鈥檚 pastoral charm, or Wilson鈥檚 writing skill or ideas. This is surprising: author Stanley Schmidt has been the editor of Analog SF magazine since 1978.