Stefen’s Bookclub – December

Radiance by Catherynne Valente

Catherynne’s books are notoriously hard to describe, this one especially so. Nevertheless I’ll do what I can. Imagine a world where 1930′s science fiction is an accurate description of the solar system. Bases on the Moon, colonies on other planets, which are basically like Earth with a few quirks. Mars is a red desert wild west, Venus is a water world and there are various colonials and aliens zipping about the solar system. Into this setting steps Severin Unck, a young film maker who has travelled to Venus to investigate the disappearance of a diving colony, taking with her a crew and the equipment to film her adventure. Only something goes wrong and her traumatised crew return without her. The only clues to what happened are the film she shot, and the words she recorded and wrote. This is a story presented in pieces, a narrative jigsaw. A puzzle to be read and a book to be solved.