The novel “Summertide” by Charles Sheffield was published for the first time in 1990. It’s the first book of the Heritage Universe.

Humans have spread among the stars, slowly at first, with starships traveling at speeds lower than light, and then much more quickly using the Bose communication network that allows fast interstellar travel. In the course of their travels they met various alien species but also artificial structures millions of years old built by an unknown species.

Quake is a planet in the Dobelle system. There a particular configuration periodically causes the Summertide, an extremely violent seismic phenomenon. Quake and its twin planet Opal are joined by the Umbilical, one of the structures of Builders, the mysterious species that left so many artificial structures. Once every about 350,000 years this this phenomenon is even more violent and in occasion of this super Summertide some humans and aliens arrive on Quake to investigate but they’re not all what they seem.

In the novel “Summertide” Charles Sheffield lays the foundations for the Heritage Universe series. It’s set over 4,000 years in the future, when humans have spread among the stars. Over the centuries, they encountered some alien species and among the things that the various sentient species have in common is that they found huge artificial structures that are millions of years old.

The mystery of the structures and the species that built them, unknown and for that reason called the Builders, is at the center of the Heritage Universe novels. That’s not exactly archeological science fiction because Charles Sheffield gives a lot of importance to the various alien species present in the novel and the relationships among them.

On several occasions, Charles Sheffield was compared to Arthur C. Clarke, also because in some cases they addressed the same themes. Therefore it’s easy to think abou “Rendezvous with Rama” and certainly Sheffield creates an intellectual mystery around the Builders’ structures but the Heritage Universe series uses them to develop a much larger story.

Hundreds of those structures have been found in the areas of the galaxy colonized by other species. In some cases they’re dangerous because within them any type of memory, organic or inorganic, is deleted. Are those traps? Or of some kind of test? This type of structure is reminiscent of “Rogue Moon” by Algis Budrys but in that case the alien structure was an excuse for a story centered around the characters while in “Summertide” there’s a good balance between the investigation on the mysteries of the Builders and the development of the characters.

Despite millennia of investigations by various species, no one was able to solve the mysteries of the Builders. But something could change because of a very special event. The Summertide of the novel’s title is a periodic event caused by a pecualiar configuration of the Dobelle system and once every 350,000 years there’s one truly extraordinary.

The twin planets Quake and Opal, in the Dobelle system, are united by the Umbilical, one of the Builders’ structures. A human scientist wants to study it during the Summertide. In that same period, other visitors, humans and aliens, arrive in the system for various reasons. Some stated only part of their motivations or haven’t been completely honest about them.

This gathering of disparate characters in the Dobelle system starts a dangerous adventure because the forces that are unleashed during the great Summertide are incredibly violent. In the course of the novel, the real motivations of the various characters are slowly revealed and through that they start being developed.

“Summertide” is in some ways a great prologue for the series universe Heritage which aims to tease the reader by presenting the various mysteries of the Builders and other elements of that fictional universe, including the protagonists. The plot is somewhat limited because it’s basically used to start a broader story.

In “Summertide” many questions are asked about the Builders but no answers are given. Instead, it provides a lot of information, also through extracts from the “Lang Universal Artifact Catalog” inserted between the chapters of the novel. They, along with so many information included in other ways, often slow down the pace of a story that contains action only in its last part.

Due to its characteristics, “Summertide” is good as an introduction to the Heritage Universe series. It has an ending in the sense that the story of the Summertide is finished but it launches the next phase of the investigation on the Builders. It may make sense to read it to see if this series is your kind of stuff but you should know that it’s only the beginning.

In my opinion, “Summertide” begins the discovery of an interesting fictional universe with and intriguing mysteries and non-trivial characters. If you like this kind of stories I recommend it, with the understanding that a larger story and the protagonists are developed in the its sequels.