Galaxias by Stephen Baxter
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Not perfect, but still interesting, this is a novel like Spin if only it were written by Stephen Baxter. Fortunately, this WAS a Stephen Baxter novel and the best parts are always the technological exploration, theorizing, and scope.

Simple concept here. The sun goes out. Not only does it go out, its gravitational waves go missing.

Now take that a step further and see what happens to the Earth, all the other planets, our civilization... everything.

And then add Galaxias, the entity/entities or WHATEVER it is that caused it. We get a lot of Fermi paradox questions, Dark Forest questions, and speculation HERE, too. It's really cool.

So why am I giving this only a 4 star? Because while the characters aren't bad, precisely, they're a lot duller than the surrounding worldbuilding and science. This is a pretty great novel of ideas and, considering when it was probably written, during Covid isolation, it's very topical, dystopian in a lot of ways, but I'm proud to say it never stays there.

It's definitely hard SF in all the best ways. Baxter needs some good love. If you like Cixin Liu, head over here, too.

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