Linesman
S. K. Dunstall
Ace Science Fiction
mmpb $7.99 US, $10.49 CAN
ebook $5.99

Before I get started, I’d like to thank Ace Books for the review copy.  Ace is one of those lines you should be paying attention to.

S. K. Dunstall is the collaborative pen name of sisters Sherylyn and Karen Dunstall.  Linesman is their first published novel.  It won’t be their last (the sequel hits shelves in February).

The story takes place at least 500 years in the future if I picked up on all the internal clues correctly.  Interstellar travel is accomplished by means of lines.  They’re some type of sentient energy, although the sentient part isn’t a widely accepted idea when the book opens.  Without the lines, it’s impossible to travel faster than light.  (Where they come from is a mystery that isn’t solved in this book.)

In order to travel and make use of the lines, a ship has to have a linesman on it.  Lines are numbered one through ten, with nine and ten being the two lines that involve entering  and moving through the void.  Not all linesmen can interact with all the lines, so “tens” are at the top of the pecking order.  That pecking order is about to be upset by an alien ship discovered in deep space.

Ean Lambert is a ten, but he grew up in the slums and entered his training late.  His training didn’t go well, but he was certified as a ten.  He’s not a respected ten, though.  Unlike the other linesmen, who communicate with the lines through something resembling telepathy, Ean sings to them.

Ean’s contract is bought out by a princess.  The Alliance is on the verge of war with Gate Union.  So far only the Alliance is aware of the alien ship, and they need Ean to help them investigate it.  What they find will change the power balance in human space.

First, a couple of things I didn’t like.  First, Ean tends to spend too much time feeling sorry for himself.  He is naive and inexperienced in many ways, but there are times when he really needs to grow a spine.  The good thing is by the end of the book, he was shoeing some initiative.

The second thing is something that probably won’t be an issue for most people.  I’m not most people.  I have a background in physics, and I found the whole physical justification of the lines to be claptrap.  If I thought too much about what the lines were, I tended to lose my suspension of disbelief.  So I considered them to be energy sources of different frequencies that just happened to be able to communicate.

Fortunately, the political intrigues and some mysteries of the ship that were solved were more than enough to keep me engaged.  In spite of his behaving like a wet blanket at times, Ean is a sympathetic character who usually comes through in a pinch.  And he gets pinched plenty.  And by pinched, I mean kidnappings and attempts on his life.

The Dunstalls handle a complicated political situation well, without allowing the complexities of the myriad intrigues to become too complicated.

The story in Linesman is far from over when the reader has closed the book.  There are some discoveries at the end which imply the real story is just getting started.  After all , that alien ship had to have come from somewhere.  Linesman is a solid first installment in what promises to be a terrific space opera series.