“Discovery”
Karina Fabian, Full Quiver Publishing (2016)
326 pages, $16.99.
Longtime fans of Karina Fabian’s “Rescue Sisters” stories will be quick to point out that the review of this month’s novel is a decade overdue. To them one can only reply that, after all, Christ gave the full day’s pay to the latecomers in his parable of the vineyard workers, and this reviewer is similarly grateful to have discovered such an excellent work of speculative fiction, even if a bit belatedly. Discovered, of course, being the operative word, as in any good work of science fiction.
In Fabian’s 2016 Rescue Sisters novel, “Discovery,” readers are brought a century into the future to an era of space colonization, exploration — and evangelization. As wealthy business magnates mine the resources of the solar system and researchers look to the stars for answers, the Order of St. Gillian of L5 (colloquially known as the Rescue Sisters) provides emergency aid to desperate souls against the dangers of a spacefaring life.
Among their number are Sister “Tommie” Thomas Aquinas, the older and more level-headed pilot; Sister Anne, who finds angels easier to talk to than human beings; and Sister Rita, a new addition to the order who has her own reasons for leaving Earth behind.
Those reasons follow her to the stars, however, when mining tycoon Augustus Cole assembles a team of researchers, miners and Rescue Sisters to explore an incredible new discovery: A dead extraterrestrial ship, the first ever encountered by mankind, has been found lodged in an asteroid. Included among the crew is James Smith, a former seminarian, current archaeologist and Rita’s old flame.
Tensions flare as the miners and researchers begin to butt heads, and competing ideologies clash: The head of the research team, William Thoren, is both a skeptic and a “Codist,” having turned a set of practical rules for surviving in space into a quasi-religious rule of life. Thoren is less than pleased to have to answer to a trio of Catholic nuns, who themselves are struggling to keep the peace between their fellow Catholics, zealous Evangelicals, irreligious fun-loving astronauts and even a devout pagan — and that’s before they reach the alien ship.
The test of good Catholic genre fiction is whether it’s successful as a work in its genre, not merely as a religious parable. Thankfully, “Discovery” is not only a good Catholic novel but also good sci-fi. The alien ship is genuinely fascinating, prompting wonder and curiosity about how a truly alien race might experience religion. The science of the setting likewise feels plausible and immersive, drawing more from the aesthetics of the lunar landing and modern space exploration than a farther-flung future; and, most importantly, the crew of the ship work through conflict and come together in compelling ways in the pursuit of their mission. On the level of spirituality, the novel insightfully distinguishes between true faith and blind ideology, and much of the story’s human drama is derived from characters who fail to appreciate the difference.
The novel does have a few flaws — the large cast of characters can at times be hard to track, and this reviewer personally thinks the will-they-won’t-they subplot between Rita and James could have been written a bit more persuasively in favor of its ultimate conclusion — but on the whole, “Discovery” is an exciting, fast-paced novel that brings an explicitly Catholic lens to the questions of extraterrestrial life and humanity’s journey to the stars. Most importantly, it answers the question that all Catholic sci-fi fans have asked at one point or another: What if there were nuns — in space!
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