Ark
Stephen Baxter
ISBN 0575080590(978-057-508059-1)
RRP $35.00 October 2009
Gollancz Paperback (234 x 153)

If you've not read the previous novel in this series by Baxter, "Flood", don't panic. It's not necessary as a prerequisite. This new (released in October 2009) novel "Ark" stands alone, and it includes enough references back to previous events so that the story makes sense.

"Ark" is a end of the world novel writ large. Baxter brings his trademark style to the work, piling disaster on disaster, weaving it with human emotion and character, and leaving enough of the cast alive — despite the disasters — to allow the reader to identify with the events that unfold.

If you've not heard of the Orion project, you're in for an education in a serious possible use for nuclear armaments. If you have heard of the project, you will be able to guess immediately what the Ark, a spaceship designed to deliver at least some of humanity from disaster on a completely flooded Earth, uses for propulsion — at least to begin with.

Initially, "Ark" is mostly about the hurried construction of the spaceship, and the selection of its crew, from the point of view of some of the main characters involved in the action. It's a relentless race against the unstoppable rise of flood waters.

Later, after a series of mini setbacks and recoveries, and a spectacular launch, "Ark" begins to remind me of the novel "Gateway" by Frederic Pohl (a novel that ought to be on your classic reading list). Once in flight, the crew, and many not initially chosen to be crew, must deal with the reality of their situation -- years confined in a cramped space, dealing with each other politically, personally, and with crises — before they arrive at their destination, Earth II.

Typically, in Baxteresque style, even this arrival is tainted with difficulty, indecision, human turmoil, and hope.

That's it, if nothing else, you must read "Ark" for the hope.