Dark Knight Station: Origins By Nathan Lowell - A Prequel Story For Fans Of The Golden Age Tales

Dark Knight Station: Origins by Nathan Lowell

Vagrant Station hangs in space with the purpose of serving interstellar commerce. From the outside, it looks like a serene place that belies what is actually happening on the inside. There is much unrest aboard the station as its residents go about their business. The owner of the station only seems interested in lining his pockets with as many credits as possible. Of his two sons, the one who is being groomed to take over when the owner, Edgar Vagrant no longer can, is a malicious predator. The younger of the two, Zachary, is happy to work in the hydroponics lab, but circumstances thrust station management upon him. He’s not ready and knows it. On top of all this is an apparent threat of a hostile movement to unseat the Vagrants from their ownership.

All of that is just the tip of the iceberg in this character-driven story set in Nathan Lowell’s Dark Knight Station: Origins set in the Golden Age of the Solar Clipper universe.

The tale is told from three points of view. Zachary Vagrant is a young man with no interest in being part of station operations. When his brother, Malachi, fails to find and solve problems, Edgar, Zachary’s father and owner of Vagrant Station, taps Zachary to take Malachi’s place. Zachary finds and tries to get the job done, but soon finds himself overwhelmed.

Malachi Vagrant is a man with absolutely no redeeming qualities. He prowls the station just looking for people to hurt and sometimes even kill. In his mind, he keeps lists of people to take revenge on if he perceives they have wronged him, and everyone he encounters seems to wrong him.

Verkol Kondur starts out as a barge captain. The barges go out to the asteroid belt near the station and bring back ore to sell. Kondur’s barge, and most of the others serving Vagrant Station, become inoperable because of the lack of maintenance and the use of substandard supplies. When it is time to deliver a load of ore to another station, Kondur is called on to be the first officer of the delivery ship. We learn he is a good man. Kondur is even-tempered and thoughtful. He treats everyone with respect but is not above snapping them back if the need arises. He receives the offer of a lifetime, but is reluctant to take the task on until he has all the facts, and friends convince him he is right for the job.

Every character in the story, including the minor characters and the walk-ons, have a depth to them that makes them seem real.

The story flows logically and moves at high speed. There is no waste of words and no point that the story becomes tedious. Once one opens this book, there is no stopping, you just cannot set it down.

For those of us familiar with the universe of the Golden Age of the Solar Clipper, this will seem like a prequel novel since these events take place before the events of the Ishmael Wang stories. What Nathan actually gives us with this story is a nod to his fans. On his blog, (https://nathanlowell.com/category/catalog/books/) Nathan explains:

“I picked up and combined some of the ideas that fans submitted to write the origin story of Dark Knight Station and how Verkol Kondur came to run it.”

The tone of this book differs from what we are used to in Nathan’s previous writings. It is grittier than his other stories and can make one a little uncomfortable thanks to the exploits of Malachi. That being said, there is no point at which the story is implausible. To those of us that read Nathan’s work, these stories are real, filled with genuine people we care about.

The theme that strikes me most in Dark Knight Station: Origins is how people who care about others can triumph over those who only care about themselves. We never really get the backstory on what happened with Edgar Vagrant to make him such a bitter, miserly, uncaring old man. Maybe we’ll get that story later on.

I give my highest recommendations for this book, and all the rest of Nathan Lowell’s stories.

Nathan Lowell was born in Portland, Maine, in 1952. He grew up in an agricultural community in rural Maine and spent time working on fishing boats along the coast. His first literary success came with the publication of a poem while still in elementary school. That early success was followed by forty years of attempt, rejection, failure, and ultimately giving up on the dream of writing science fiction.

In 2007, with the rise of podcast fiction, he started writing again. He completed his first successful novel - Quarter Share - in January, 2007, and podcast it through Podiobooks.com over February and March, 2007. Since then he has written more than twenty novels, several short stories, and a novella. His podcast novels have been finalists in the Parsec Award five times, and he’s won Parsec Awards for Speculative Fiction (long form) twice - 2010 and 2011.

He’s been a full time, self-published author since 2012 and was elected to the board of directors of the Science-Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America in 2018 as Chief Financial Officer.

He holds a BS in Business Administration with a minor in Marketing from SUNY/Buffalo (92), an MA in Educational Technology (98), and a Ph.D. in Educational Technology with specializations in Distance Education, Interactive Media, and Instructional Design (04). He lives in Colorado but travels the world online.

Well, there it is...

Qapla!

To Fire Called: A Seeker's Tale From The Golden Age Of The Solar Clipper By Nathan Lowell - Exploring New Frontiers!

To Fire Called: A Seeker’s Tale From The Golden Age Of The Solar Clipper by Nathan Lowell

Fans of Nathan Lowell’s Golden Age of the Solar Clipper series (including me) await each and every book with anticipation for another great story, and we are never disappointed when there is a new release, and often, we immediately begin badgering the author for more. This latest installment in the ongoing story of Captain Ishmael Wang, To Fire Called, takes our favorite freighter captain and his crew into unfamiliar surroundings, or at least they are to him.

For those of you that are not familiar with Dr. Lowell’s work, it is the story of Ishmael Wang, a young man of seventeen who knew where he was going until a tragic accident left him alone on a planet where he was not wanted. Ordered to leave because he had no way to support himself, he signed onto a freight hauler as a cook’s mate. He had few skills and less knowledge of what he had gotten himself into, but he had one talent that made him an almost instant celebrity on board the first ship he worked on; he knew how to make good coffee. But being able to make great coffee, the lifeblood of a happy ship, is not the only talent that Ish possesses though; he is also very good at working with and handling people.

As the years went on, he found that he was well suited for life in space and learned everything he could about ships and what makes them work. Finally went to the academy to learn to be an officer. After graduating, Ish had some rough postings, but always managed to leave a ship better than he found it. In this newest story, Ishmael is once again entering unfamiliar territory.

Ishmael, his friend Pip Carstairs, and a few other investors have started the Phoenix Freight Company with Ishmael as the captain of the only ship in the fleet, the Chernyakova. The ship is in drydock undergoing a complete refit after being discovered derelict with all hands dead onboard. As a matter of fact, Ishmael is the one who discovered and arranged for towing the ship back into port. After gathering his crew it is time to make some money to replace the large sums it took for the Chernyakova’s refit. Pip suggests that there is a lot of money to be made if they would start running in Toe Hold space.

Ishmael is used to running cargo in Confederated space where ships, officers, and stations are operated on a set of rules and regulations designed to keep everyone safe and to keep piracy out of the picture. In contrast, Toe Hold space is a place where there basically very few rules, and those rules are different at every port of call. There are some shady characters out there, and some that are not to be trusted, but there is big money to be made and Phoenix Freight needs to raise funds.

As To Fire Called is a Seeker’s Tale, everyone is looking for something, and all is not what it seems, and some are not who they seem to be on board the Chernyakova, so there are a lot of twists and turns in this story that make things quite interesting.

One of the many aspects that make this a great and compelling story is following the life of Ishmael. Owing to an incident in an earlier segment, Ish seems to have lost something, namely himself. One of the most important places on the ship, second only to the galley, is the Cabin, specifically the captain’s cabin where all of the major decisions are made. As the Chernyakova begins doing business, the officers notice that Ishmael is absent while on board, and that the Cabin isn’t a reflection of Ishmael’s personality as it has been on previous billets. He seems to be simply going through the motions as captain. He spends a lot of time in the Cabin, only goes to the bridge to stare at the stars or supervise vital ship operations, and occasionally goes to the galley for meals. He has somewhat isolated himself and the reason is that he is suffering from depression due to a loss of someone he cared a great deal about.

Ishmael’s officers take on the task of helping Ishmael heal and begin the process of recovering himself by making him decorate the Cabin and get back to moving about the ship. One of Ish’s qualities is that he surrounds himself with competent officers and crew and he know enough to stay out of their way and let them do their jobs, while at the same time knowing when to intervene to help solve problems. Of course, his officers know this about him and they are also aware of what the problem is, so they take care of their captain, who is very willing to take the help for the good of the ship as well as his own good.

At any rate, To Fire Called beyond Ishmael’s story gives the reader a picture of what freight hauling is about on the frontier known as Toe Hold Space. Most of the procedures in Toe Hold are the same as in Confederated space and many of the rules change as one travels from station to station picking up and delivering cargo. It makes for an engaging story that adds a new dimension to the Golden Age of the Solar Clipper series that includes some action scenes that have not appeared in earlier stories.

As always, I highly recommend To Fire Called as well as all of the tales spun by Nathan Lowell. I would advise the reader to read them in order though, starting with the first book, Quarter Share.

Well, there it is…

Qapla!

Edited by Benjamin Arrowood

Summaries Of Three Of The Six Books In Nathan Lowell's Trader's Tales From The Golden Age Of The Solar Clipper

I read a lot of science as you know if you regularly visit this blog.  I was very fortunate recently to get a heads up from a good friend and Babylon Project Podcast guest host, JP Harvey of Las Vegas, Nevada.  While we were working out some technical bugs in preparation for recording an episode, JP told me about a series of books that he really enjoyed and thought that I might too.  I had no idea how much of an understatement JP made when he said I would enjoy Nathan Lowell's Trader's Tales From The Age Golden Age Of The Solar Clipper series.  

I began reading the first of the six books the day before we got holiday break from school, and in the two weeks of vacation, I managed to read five of the six novels, and will soon begin reading the last of them

Most of what I read involved a violent conflict of some kind, or a post apocalyptic world, or an alien invasion, or a war.  While there is some conflict in this series, very little of it is violent, there is no ruined worlds, no aliens, and no wars.  There is, however space travel, but as far as I can tell to this point, the ships that the characters travel in aren't even armed.

So what's the deal?  There are none of the elements that make up a good Scifi story?  How does that work?

The novels are told from the point of view of Ishmael Horatio Wang (pronounced 'Wong'), an ordinary person who found himself in a bad position and then stumbles into a career that allows him to live an extraordinary life.  

This is going to be a two-part post and I will reserve my remarks about what I think of these stories for the second part.  So at this point, I will post a synopsis of the first three books in the series and suffice it to say that I loved everything I have read as of the end of the fifth book in the series.

Quarter Share: Book One of the Trader's Tales From The Golden Age Of The Solar Clipper Series by Nathan Lowell

The first book covers the life of Ishmael from August 13, 2351 to February 17, 2352.

Young Ishmael is preparing to attend the University on the planet, Neris.  He lives with his mother, a professor at the University in an apartment that is just large enough for the two of them.  

One evening, while Ishmael was home alone, two strangers knock on the door and inform Ishmael that his mother and the man she was out on a date with have been killed in a "flitter" accident (a flitter is a sort flying car).  Before the shock of losing his mother can set in, Ishmael is informed by university officials that he will have to leave the apartment and find passage off of the planet or face being deported.  Next he is informed by lawyers that any assets his mother had saved and any earnings due to her would be retained to pay for the property damage caused by the flitter crash.

With little time, and no money, Ish had to find something quickly.  He walked into the Union Hall to sign up to go aboard and work on a solar clipper.  Solar clippers are space-going vessels that transport cargo between star systems.  Just like the clipper ships of old, they would contract for cargos and make money by delivering goods on time to numerous ports of call.

The person who took Ishmael's application sees promise in him and he manages to get hired aboard the Lois Mckendrick owned by Federated Freight.  Ishmael is to be a quarter share rating on the mess crew.  A share is money over what the normal pay is when the ship earns a profit.  It is an incentive to make sure the job is done as contracted.  While officers made the highest shares, when there was a profit, everyone received shares or parts of shares.

Ishmael soon shows that he is a good hand on the ship and takes interest in other jobs.  His goal becomes to become a half share rating on all areas of ship’s operations, and to explore all of the possibilities.  He gets noticed and soon becomes an important part of the crew.

Just a word about the ships themselves here before I move on.  It seems that the average trip from one planetary system to the next takes about ten weeks.  Using solar sails to propel the ships through the “Deep Dark, “ it takes several weeks for a ship to climb out of a star’s gravity well, and about the same to go from the edge of a system safely into the stations in orbit around the habitable planets.

Among Ishmael’s many talents is that he is good with people, and he learns quickly.  When his friend arrives back on the ship after being mugged for his private cargo he intended to sell while in port, Ishmael takes in interest in the private trading which is not only tolerated, but is encouraged, as long as the items up for trade are not illegal or a danger to the ship.  Soon, Ish and his friend and coworker on the mess deck are trading and making good money on the stations that they visit.

Quarter Share is an excellent exposition to the rest of the series.  We find that the Lois McKendrick is staffed by people that are caring and offer a great deal of encouragement to young Ishmael to continually improve himself and his situation.  Ishmael himself is a fine young man who becomes focused on whatever he is doing and performs his duties with a high degree of efficiency.  Ishmael is also a very studious who takes his duties very seriously, but maintains a good sense of humor.

Half Share: Book Two of the Trader's Tales From The Golden Age Of The Solar Clipper Series by Nathan Lowell

The second book of the series include events beginning almost immediately after the first book and covers the next two months up to April 19, 2352.

Ishmael and Pip are having a great deal of success with their Cooperative trading arrangement.  Most of the crew are in on what is turning out to be a very lucrative venture for everyone involved.  With the help of the officers, there is space provided and the business is benefiting the ship in many ways, including morale of the crew.

Ishmael studies for exams and is promoted to work in the environmental section.

Full Share: Book Three of the Trader's Tales From The Golden Age Of The Solar Clipper Series by Nathan Lowell

The events of Full Share take place between April 23, 2353 and July 20, 2353.

Ishmael has performed well on the job, and has also done well with his trading activities.  He continues to prove himself a valuable member of the crew and is well respected, but he learns that he will have to leave the ship.  He is being bumped out of his job because the company has hired and assigned a more senior rating to take his place on the Lois.

While this is a sad state of affairs for everyone on board, Ishmael learns that since he has gained some seniority, he is also allowed to bump someone else and take their berth if he wishes.  Being true to his character, he refuses to do this and makes preparations to leave the ship.

During his entire time on the Lois, Ishmael has been encouraged by his fellow crew and officers to improve himself, both through his trading activities and by advancing up through the ranks.  But it doesn't stop there, the officers also begin encouraging him to attend the academy where he would also become an officer. He isn't sure he wants to do this and also observes that it is very expensive to go to the academy.

When he looks at what he has earned, he figures out that he has about half of what it would take to pay for going to the academy.

The entire crew rejoices when it is learned that Ishmael is allowed to stay on the ship to fill a new position that was created to avoid a disaster that took place on the Lois.  The power on the ship was interrupted temporarily and an officer and Ishmael managed to find the trouble, but it was also discovered that there was something else wrong when carbon dioxide levels began to rise.  The new position created was most likely temporary, but it bought Ishmael some time, and his job was to improve the ship's systems to avoid future power interruptions.

Finally, Ishmael is called before the captain who once again encourages him to attend the academy.  She, the captain, has already filled out the application for him and secured far more recommendations that is required and Ishmael decides to attend the academy.

As he leaves for the academy, Ishmael Wang has earned full share ratings in every area of ship operations as well as the respect of his fellow crew and officers.  The next book in the series, Double Share, picks up after he graduates from the academy and takes his first berth as an officer.

This post is more of a summary of the books in the Trader's tales series.  So far, I have read five of the six books in the series.  I began reading the first book on the last day before the holiday break from school and in I read all five books over the break. I found myself reading at almost every spare minute during those two weeks.

I set aside reading the sixth book until I could find the time to do some blogging, so stay tuned for my summary of the next three books and my thoughts about them in the next post.

Well, there it is...

Q'aplaH!