Mary Doria Russell is an anthropologist by profession and her academic background shows in her brilliant first novel, which sends a Jesuit mission to space in search of the source of haunting musical broadcasts from the Alpha Centauri system. Starting after the rescue of Emilio Sandoz— priest, linguist, and lone survivor of the expedition—the unfolding horror of what happens to the mission is at all times present in the narrative but contrasts with the heartbreaking beauty of the relationships formed between the explorers on the alien world of Rakhat. Russell gracefully balances questions of faith, love, and family with a speculative premise of awful and magnificent scope.
A Taiwanese science fiction novel published in 1995, The Membranes is both a novel of and outside of its time. It extrapolates a future where humanity retreats underwater not due to the effects of global warning, but to escape deadly holes in the ozone layer. It's a future where the world's most powerful company sells its wares on computer discs. Yet in other respects-- its matter-of-fact approach towards sexuality, its narrative of young adulthood rebelling against parental and corporate control, and its last-minute twist that turns the whole book on its head--this is as modern a novel as you'll find published today. Whether as time capsule or prophecy, this novel holds up.
