The novel “Light of Impossible Stars” by Gareth L. Powell was published for the first time in 2020. It’s the third book in the Embers of War series and follows “Fleet of Knives“.
The starship Trouble Dog is on the run from the Fleet of Knives, like any other starship whose crew doesn’t intend to abide by the strict rules that were set for humanity. The only hope seems to be in the Intrusion, where reality is very different from that of the normal universe.
Cordelia Pa and her half-brother Michael salvage alien artifacts, as they can make some good money out of them. When they get in trouble, they get rescued by people who tell Cordelia they want to take her to her father. Michael doesn’t have the courage to leave everything and go with her and Cordelia finds herself living a life completely different from the one she knew, not least because she starts manifesting strange connections with the alien artifacts.
“Light of Impossible Stars” concludes the Embers of War trilogy by picking up the plot from where it left off at the end of “Fleet of Knives” continuing the story of the protagonists already known and adding others. It’s one big story divided into three books, so you need to read them all to understand it.
Gareth L. Powell introduces Cordelia Pa and her complicated family. My problem is that her story is compressed with years of life summarized in a few chapters and built almost completely through clichés, so it ends up being predictable. Her role in the finale is important but in my opinion, it weakens it and it doesn’t help that it’s rushed.
The management of other characters also seemed questionable to me since some have behaviors that I could define as curious, starting with Ona Sudak. Bronte Okonkwo’s personal story could be interesting but it’s literally thrown into the climax of the war wasting it completely, also thinking about the relationship that was being created with Sal Konstanz.
The only character that gets really interesting is Nod, Trouble Dog’s Druff engineer. Throughout the trilogy, information about the Druff species was provided and this continues in “Light of Impossible Stars”. The Druff have an important role in this novel and in the end Nod is the character who offers the most profound thoughts. It seemed too little to me thinking that the previous novels had some flaws but at least some characters were used to address some ethical and moral issues.
In the end, “Light of Impossible Stars” closes the trilogy with the fast pace Gareth L. Powell already showed and that’s positive but otherwise, I found it rather confused and with trivial twists. The previous novels weren’t particularly brilliant but at least they were enjoyable space operas with some interesting characters and some food for thought about serious issues. It almost seems like this final book was hastily published without adequate editing work that could at least give some balance and decent depth to the various subplots.
Unfortunately, “Light of Impossible Stars” seemed to me overall disappointing as the ending of the trilogy with more flaws and fewer merits than the previous novels. It’s worth reading if you want to finish the trilogy and you’re OK with some space adventure with limited depth.
