Retrograde - Peter Cawdron

Synopsis:

The international team at the Mars Endeavour colony is prepared for every eventuality except one—what happens when disaster strikes Earth?

Mankind has long dreamed of reaching out to live on other planets, and with the establishment of the Mars Endeavour colony, that dream has become reality. The fledgling colony consists of 120 scientists, astronauts, medical staff, and engineers. Buried deep underground, they’re protected from the harsh radiation that sterilizes the surface of the planet. The colony is prepared for every eventuality except one—what happens when disaster strikes Earth?

Review:

I love diving into more genres when I read, Sci-fi isn't a genre I often dive in to so when I first got this book I was apprehensive about how I would feel as I read this book but I was pleasantly surprised by it and actually loved it a lot more than I thought I would. I'm going to try and write this review without spoiling any of the story so please stay with me if at first it doesn't make sense.

We follow Liz and the other 119 people who are living in a colony on Mars. There are the Russians, Americans, Chinese and Eurasia - including UK, Japan, Spain and other countries. Told from the point of view of Liz we get to see the other colony inhabitants that she interacts with which provides us with a few main and some minor characters. Although we have all of these countries to interact with throughout the story there is an understanding that we don't have anything to do with several of the inhabitants. Writing it like this is so clever, it helps us gain a perspective on the size of the colony and its crew without having to make every person a main or minor character. They are all very intelligent characters and every time they do something that i see as incredibly cool or smart which is basically everything the do, it blows me away.

The characters are strong and well developed, I instantly loved Liz and all of those we read about, even those who aren't shown in the great light we wished everyone was. We have US Commander Connor, who is the ex military self taught astronaut who is right hand man to Harrison who's the gruff loud type who is soft underneath. We have more people, James and Michelle are the most notable. We see a small amount of the Eurasian contingent but of the Russian contingent we see their leader Vlad and their Dr, Anna. The other group we see more of compared to the Eurasians and Russians are the Chinese, with Doi as their commander and Jaiyun who is Liz's love interest. With all of these people interacting together throughout the story it's a great interplay of culture, emotions and personalities and it's done perfectly.

The plot is brilliant and maybe that's because the statement is coming from a girl who hasn't read much Sci-fi in her life? or maybe it is brilliant because well...it just is? the jury is still out on that one. As I read the first chapter I was just praying to myself that the book wasn't going to be hard to get into and wasn't going to drag out but it was a pleasant surprise to be hooked by the first chapter and every other chapter after. I was automatically trying to figure out what was going to come but I wasn't right with what I ended up with. There are so many great things about this book, most notably the great twists it holds, its incredibly suspenseful in parts. I feel like there are undertones of uniting no matter who we are, where we come from or the political issues going on that continue to have a hold on our world.

You can easily tell how much research and thought went into this book, it screams volumes and is incredibly effective. I think I had a mini emotional roller coaster as I read this novel and part of me wants way more from Peter that goes with this book, I'd happily have a 20 part series really and that's no lie. Thanks to Peters high volume of accuracy in detail it was easy for me to put the book down and still see all of what had happened. I was hooked and in love, the imagery was beautiful an I couldn't control myself when it came to talking to my mother about this book.

Cawdron has done an amazing job with this novel, its an easy 5/5 from me and I definitely want to check out more of his work.