Book reviews by Mobilism's Book Review team
Feb 20th, 2015, 7:43 pm
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TITLE: Astra (The Gaia Chronicles 01)
AUTHOR: Naomi Foyle
GENRE: Science Fiction
PUBLISHED: 06/02/2014
RATING: ★★★★★

PURCHASE LINKS: Amazon
MOBILISM LINK: Mobilism

Review: Dystopian fiction rarely interests me. 99 times out of a 100, the premise is so fundamentally implausible to me that I can’t believe in the world the author has created. Suspension of disbelief is not really my thing — I demand that the books I read make me believe in their world, their story.

Astra, then, came as a surprise to me. But perhaps that's because it is a dystopia dressed up as a utopia, and I was wholly fooled until almost halfway through the book.

The world of the eponymous Astra is set far in the future — how far is never quite specified. I would guess about 200 years, after a period known as the Dark Times — a stretch of environmental and social collapse following the climax of the oil crisis — and the 100 year peace mandated by the global council, which is, at the beginning of the book, 21 years from ending. The world known to the readers is completely gone; the world Astra lives in is almost unrecognisable as a human society. It seems more like the utopia of some pacifist alien race...
Ms Raintree clapped. ‘Now let’s talk about Gaia’s creatures. Some of them aren’t always very nice to us, are they? What about ticks and mosquitoes? Sometimes they bite us or poison us. In other countries they call such creatures pests and try to control them. So why do we cradle them?’

Of course everyone knew the answer to that: which species, after all, had proved to be the planet’s real pest? Which species had nearly destroyed the biosphere of the only known life-bearing planet in the whole universe? Insects, on the other hand, were vital to biodiversity, and without them we’d never be able to reintroduce lost mammals and birds. Humans beings just had to take precautions and wear repellent if we didn’t want to get bitten.

Is-Land, Astra’s home, is described to us as a haven in a world still recovering from the effects of the Dark Times — and it feels like a haven, like something too perfect to be achievable by mere mortals. The inhabitants of Is-Land are all vegan, growing ‘alt-meat’ from vats ala the more advanced races of Bujold’s Vorkosigan series; violence is practically unheard of; they worship earth-mother goddess Gaia, and believe the life of a human and a worm are of equal value. More importantly to the rest of the world, Is-Landers are pioneers of Coding, which readers will recognise as genetic modification; at the beginning of the book most of the world survives on crops designed by Is-Lander scientists, and for which the first Gaians were granted the right to have their own country. Is-Landers accept polyamory and bisexuality as the norm, and honor those who don’t confirm to the gender binary (it’s unclear whether the character Leaf is transgendered or bigender).

It’s just too good to be true, isn't it?

I really should have been waiting for the other shoe to drop as I was reading, but I wasn’t at all. Part of that is because I never see the twist coming, but part of that was Astra’s ironclad certainty that her country and her people were the best country, and the best people, in the entire world. Her faith, conveyed through third-person narration, is so unshakable that even the revelation over the security shots didn’t make me realise that I wasn’t reading about a utopia at all, but a dystopia.
‘IMBOD cracked down on the dissidents and jailed them. That’s why they invented the Security Serum. So that no one would ever question IMBOD again.’

The book is divided into three sections, during which Astra is 7, 12, and 17 respectively. One of the things that most impressed me about this book was that Astra feels her age in each section, reading believably as a small child, then a puberty-ridden teenager with a 12-year-old’s and then 17-year-old’s level of maturity. I haven't seen many authors who can write believable 7-year-old’s, so kudos to Foyle for that; like Emma Donoghue in her book Room, Foyle expertly conveys enough information to give the adult reader the full picture of the situation even when Astra herself doesn't always understand the gravity of what’s happening.

And so we come to the security shot, the driving force behind the book’s plot.

In the very first pages, we learn that the shot Astra is to receive is intended to make her — and her classmates — better suited for the service of Is-Lander’s military, braver and stronger, etc. As someone who wants to grow up to catch the Non-Landers attempting to breach the sanctity of Is-Land, Astra is very much looking forward to her shot. However, her Shelter Mother Hokma (Is-Lander children being raised by three parents, who may or may not include their biological Code parents) takes her aside to explain that the shot will mean that Astra will never be a genius scientist. It will make her happier and more biddable, but also ensure that she is incapable of having original thought. She will never make any discoveries or create anything new...
‘I don't understand,’ Astra whispered. ‘Why does IMBOD want to change me – and all the other Or-kids – like that? Why don’t they want to have good scientists any more?’

Seven-year-old Astra can't grasp exactly what Hokma is telling her, especially when Hokma explains that, while she can keep Astra from having the shot, Astra will have to pretend she’s had it for her entire life, keeping it a secret from everyone, including her other parents. In the end, Hokma effectively blackmails child Astra by telling her that if Astra has the shot, Astra will not be allowed around the beautiful Owleon birds she loves so much (because the shot, apparently, will damage her empathy). The whole conversation feels pretty despicable, despite Hokma’s no-doubt good intentions; Astra isn't capable of making an informed decision (although she tries, by sneakily getting other adults’ opinions about the effects of the shot before making her choice), and the poor kid really just folds under the pressure from someone she loves and respects, distressed by the thought of never getting to handle and train the pretty birds Hokma is in charge of.

Thus, the story; a beautiful, languidly-moving tale of Astra’s struggles to pretend to be just like the other ‘Sec-Gen’ kids, freakishly serene and unquestioning, and her gradual realisation that the country she loves so much might be rotten at its core. The world-building was incredible, with details gradually building up to depict what does seem to be a perfect society, an intricate merging of science and neo-paganism, and the characters! Not everyone was nice or good, at all — Astra’s other (not biological) mother Nimma, in particular, was someone I came to loathe over the course of the book, with her low-grade but constant antagonism towards Astra’s every word and action. But every person to cross Foyle’s stage was incredibly life-like, to the point where I could see echoes of people I knew in the pages. Foyle’s cast breathes — not always nice, or good, but real and human in their flaws.

It’s important to be aware, going into this book, that Astra is not an action-packed, traditional dystopian novel. This is nothing like The Hunger Games; this is slow and beautiful and aching, painting a picture of paradise on earth so close to being what it pretends to be that it physically hurts. Not to say that Astra doesn’t have moments that rip your breath away and have you on the edge of your seat; it does. There were scenes where I wanted to throw the book across the room, I was so emotional. This book will make you feel frustration and anger right alongside Astra, at the unfairness, at the lies. But there isn't a whole lot of action, and I can see a lot of readers becoming very bored with it very quickly. This is the sort of novel you'll either adore or give up on after a few chapters.

Obviously, I loved it. I very much hope you will too. But I'll understand if you don’t.
Feb 20th, 2015, 7:43 pm
Sep 18th, 2016, 11:35 am
I'm tired of run for your life dystopians, now I'm interested in this one, thx!.
Sep 18th, 2016, 11:35 am

I'm a Survivor
Dec 7th, 2016, 9:05 am
Thereia wrote:I'm tired of run for your life dystopians, now I'm interested in this one, thx!.


Great read!
Dec 7th, 2016, 9:05 am
Dec 22nd, 2016, 1:50 am
great review!
Dec 22nd, 2016, 1:50 am

"I want to be completely captivated by the books I read. I want to finish each book as if I’m waking from a dream."
Jan 28th, 2017, 10:04 pm
Not my usual type of book, but think I'll give it a go. Thanks for a great review
Jan 28th, 2017, 10:04 pm
Feb 25th, 2018, 7:12 am
This book was strange and fantastic- For those who want more there are two more novels that take place in this world: Rook Song and The Blood of the Hoopoe - I'm not even sure if they sequels have digital versions, but I'll definitely be tracking down physical copies to finish this series <3
Feb 25th, 2018, 7:12 am
Feb 25th, 2018, 11:07 am
viraaja wrote:This book was strange and fantastic- For those who want more there are two more novels that take place in this world: Rook Song and The Blood of the Hoopoe - I'm not even sure if they sequels have digital versions, but I'll definitely be tracking down physical copies to finish this series <3


I at least have read the next two books, and I can't wait for book 4 :)
Feb 25th, 2018, 11:07 am