The novel “Proxima Rising” by Brandon Q. Morris was published for the first time in 2021. It’s the first book in the Proxima Trilogy. The English translation is by Frank Dietz.

Marchenko is an artificial intelligence created using the memories of a cosmonaut. His task is to guide a spaceship to Proxima b, a planet orbiting Proxima Centauri. The mission is to find the civilization that sent a distress call or what remains of it if it was destroyed.

The interstellar spaceship led by Marchenko is very small for most of its journey and only when it’s approaching the Proxima Centauri system do the tiny on-board systems begin to build everything that will be necessary for the mission. It’s not just equipment but also two human beings who will have the task of exploring Proxima b together with a robot controlled by Marchenko.