Review: Orbital, by Samantha Harvey

Review: Orbital, by Samantha Harvey

by Rich Horton

I discovered this novel based on recommendations from Alvaro Zinos-Amaro and Robert Silverberg. And I owe them gratitude!  Samantha Harvey is a British writer who has gained considerable admiration for her previous novels -- all of which I confess I was unaware. Orbital, published just a couple of months ago in the UK and in December in the US, is her fifth novel. And it is glorious -- one of the most sheerly beautiful novels I've read in recent years.

It's set on a space station -- indeed, the ISS, though in what seems a slightly alternative history, or perhaps a slightly aspirational near future. The ISS is nearing its end of life (scheduled for 2031), but there is finally a new expedition to the Moon, and plans for sending people to Mars. But this novel, set simultaneously with the trip to the Moon, covers one day -- sixteen orbits of the Earth -- on the space station. There are six astronauts aboard -- or, I should say, four astronauts and two cosmonauts. Shaun is from the US, Chie from Japan, Nell from the UK, Pietro from Italy, and Roman and Anton from Russia.

In simplest terms, this is just a day in the life, for all six characters. A look at their daily routine, their interactions with each other, the work they do, what the station is like, what they see looking down on Earth. There is little or no drama on the station. But on Earth there is a super typhoon gathering strength, heading for the Philippines -- where Shaun and his wife had befriended a family now threatened. On the way to the Moon are the first astronauts to land there since 1972. And Chie's mother has just died. Roman is worrying about his marriage, which is on the verge of collapse. Nell is happily enough married to an Irish farmer, but at the same time aware that if she were asked to go to Mars she would accept. Pietro thinks about his daughter, and Anton about his heroes such as Sergei Krikalev, the cosmonaut who was the last man on Mir and one of the first on the ISS.

We see Chie thinking about her mother, who miraculously survived the bombing of Hiroshima. We see Roman talking on the radio to ham operators all over the world. Shaun thinks about the postcard he has from his wife -- a reproduction of Velazquez' great painting Las Meninas, which was discussed in the class in which they met, and which is further discussed powerfully here. We see visions of the Earth passing underneath them, over and over, the whole world, piece by piece in the 16 orbits. We hear of the progress of the Moon mission. We learn about the histories of each of the station's residents. And again and again there are astonishingly lyrical passages -- just some of the most powerful prose I've read -- about many things -- the fragility of the Earth, the promise of Mars, the beauty of humans, our aspirations, our failures. One of the highlights -- just a wonderful sequence -- is a meditation on what aliens might think of the golden record on Voyager 1 -- "Would they ever infer that over forty thousand years before in a solar system unknown a woman was rigged to an EEG and her thoughts recorded?" "Could they see into a human's mind? Could they know she was a woman in love?" "In five billion years when the earth is long dead, it'll be a love song that outlives spent suns."

I'll warn you -- there's no real plot here. But what does that matter? This short novel is ecstatic, lovely, hopeful, despairing but believing, honest, loving, real. The best tears are tears of awe, and I shed those. What a book! What a triumph!