Normally, I’d say that all these different literary tricks would become overwhelming, but it works really well in a book this long. The author uses flashbacks, stream of consciousness, diaries and backstory to build the characters into believably flawed human beings who (mostly) have to work against their own desires to do the right things – like every good hero really. It’s long, but doesn’t feel like it the flowery prose is kept tightly in check so you don’t feel yourself drifting off in the middle of a sentence, and unusually for a science-fiction piece, the book is very much character-driven. Technically, there’s not much to fault The Vanished Birds, so that’s half the battle – the other half (the more important half) is the story itself. It’s all handled well, with smooth transitions between the characters, and the whole story is held together by a mad scientist who’s lifespan covers the entire book.

The point of view skips between a number of characters, but this is kept neat and compartmenalised so the reader won’t have any trouble following the plot. It’s a big story, spanning a thousand years, so it definitely falls into the literary space opera category. For the captain, it’s a few months between stopovers. This is beautifully illustrated in the first few chapters when we get to eavesdrop on the relationship between a farmer and a freighter captain. Ships can cover great distances in relavatively short timespans I say “relative” because a few months travelling in space for the crew translates into years for the planets at either end of the ship’s destination.

Humanity has cracked the whole interstellar travel thing – almost.

The story is set in the far future, where mankind has abandoned Earth and spread like a incurable virus across the galaxy.

The vanished birds review