Book Review: Station Eternity by Mur Lafferty

Station Eternity
by Mur Lafferty (Lafferty)

While attending the World Science Fiction Convention in Chicago in August 2022, I attended a panel discussion, by industry professionals, on Science Fiction and Fantasy Murder Mysteries. Of the dozens of book and story suggestions offered up by panelists and audience members, one jumped out at me — Mur Lafferty’s Fall 2022 release, Station Eternity, set up to be the first in an ongoing series entitle “The Midsolar Murders”. I quickly purchased a copy as soon as it was released, in addition to creating a booklist here on the BookGuide readers advisory pages on that broader theme.

 

Station Eternity is a fun, though complex, murder mystery novel wrapped tightly in a science fiction setting. Contemporary human female Mallory Viridian has a weird problem — people around her (both friends and strangers) tend to die, frequently, and usually as a result of murders. And she seems to have an uncanny knack for solving the murders, like a 20-something Jessica Fletcher. But she’d really rather not run the risk of having more people in her vicinity die in the first place. So, when the opportunity to hitch a ride with some intergalactic space travelers presents itself, she doesn’t think twice about leaving Earth in the rearview mirror. She’s one of the first humans to be allowed to live aboard the huge, sentient, living space station, Eternity. But, even though the learning curve of getting to know and live amongst multiple fascinating new (to her) alien species is pretty sharp, it’s still better than having other human beings die because of her curse. But then Eternity agrees to allow a delegation of visitors from Earth to come to the station, and multiple deaths start occurring around Mallory again. And, she has to decide whether to stay and try to solve the new murders, or go on the run to keep people around her safe yet again.

 

Mallory herself is a bit of a whiny character, but the rest of the cast of space station regulars are all really well-developed and intriguing, and we learn a lot of their individual backstories as Lafferty lays the groundwork for this new series. I was particularly interested in the Sundry, a wasp-like insectoid hivemind species. Although I was a tad disappointed in the ultimate wrap-up of this first entry, I’m still excited to see more in this series, including volume 2 — Chaos Terminal — due out in October 2023! Mur Lafferty is definitely an author to keep an eye on!

 

(Mur Lafferty’s previous novels should appeal to you as well, though they’re in a different style. I particularly recommend The Shambling Guide to New York City and Ghost Train to New Orleans.)

 

( official Mur Lafferty web site )

 

See more titles like this in the Science Fiction and Fantasy Murder Mysteries booklist here on BookGuide!

 

Recommended by Scott C.
Bennett Martin Public Library — Public Service

 

Have you read or listened to this one? What did you think? Did you find this review helpful?

New reviews appear every month on the Staff Recommendations page of the BookGuide website. You can visit that page to see them all, or watch them appear here in the BookGuide Blog individually over the course of the entire month. Click the tag for the reviewer's name to see more of this reviewer’s recommendations!