Orbit
A while ago I finished reading John Nance’s new book Orbit and was disappointed. I think I need to stop reading anything “thriller”.
The plot is about a average guy named Kip Dawson who hates his life (including his wife) and wins a trip on a private space tourism flight. After a freak accident leaves the only other person aboard (the pilot) dead, Kip realizes that he will die in a few days. With nothing else to do, he flips on the onboard laptop and starts writing his thoughts about this life, his regrets, and the words of a man resigned to his fate.
And unknown to him, his words get broadcast to the entire world. Somehow his writing captures the attention of billions of people and the incredible public support starts a race between the space capable nations to go rescue him.
This plot is definitely clever, but the execution is poor. Much of the book concentrates on the people back on Earth trying to rescue him. So we hear endless bickering between bureaucrats and politic rants on ineffectiveness of government.
And instead of being rescued, Kip turns into a modern-day Macgyver. He manages to repair, fly, and land the space ship to get home. Pretty unbelievable.
Despite Kip apparently baring his soul during the course of the book, his character still isn’t very developed. Many key people in his life, like his wife and kids, are never introduced to the reader. Instead, Kip’s wife is a one dimensional character that is stereotypical “mean, nagging wife”. He says that he loves his kids, but we only briefly meet one of them.
Skipping over this leaves us with an incomplete picture of Kip. We see how he sees the world, but we never see how the world sees him.
Lastly, Kip’s narrative is not at all gripping. If it couldn’t keep my attention, how are we to believe that he captures the hearts and minds of billions of people?
This may be a good book for killing time at the airport, but not much else; great idea, but poor execution.
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