✍️ Written by: Dennis E. Taylor
🏷️ Genre: Sci-fi
🗓️ Published: 05 October 2018
📄 Pages: 428
🧐 My rating: ★★★★☆ (4 stars)
If it were up to one man and one man alone to protect the entire human race — would you want it to be a down-on-his luck asteroid miner? When Ivan Pritchard signs on as a newbie aboard the Mad Astra, it's his final, desperate stab at giving his wife and children the life they deserve. He can survive the hazing of his crewmates, and how many times, really, can near-zero g make you vomit? But there's another challenge looming out there, in the farthest reaches of human exploration, that will test every man, woman and AI on the ship — and will force Ivan to confront the very essence of what makes him human.
This was the last of Dennis E. Taylor's books I hadn’t read, and I’m glad I finally got to it. I’ve always enjoyed Taylor’s writing — he tells engaging stories without getting bogged down in unnecessary complexity (though the Bobiverse series has been teetering on that edge lately).
The Singularity Trap is no exception. It hooked me from the start, and the pacing kept me invested all the way through. The ending is satisfying without tying everything up too neatly — there’s enough mystery left to make the universe feel bigger, but it still delivers a proper conclusion.
That said, I’d love to see a sequel. Just like with Roadkill, there’s plenty of room to build on what’s already a strong standalone.
Taylor himself seems open to the idea. On his Status of Things page, he mentions:
I am open to sequels on Singularity Trap and Roadkill. I may in fact do Roadkill 2 for my next non-Bob book.
So here’s hoping both sequels happen.
In the meantime, if you haven’t read The Singularity Trap — or any of Taylor’s other books — I highly recommend giving them a go.