Moon, Elizabeth
TRADING IN DANGER
Elizabeth Moon
Del Rey 2003
Pb 357 pages
ISBN#
0-345-44761-1
Kylara Vatta is the daughter of the CFO of
Vatta Transport, Ltd. (freighters in space). Though trained for a
military career, circumstances bounce Ky back into the family
business where she must captain her first ship into deep space.
Luckily, her father did include a trained crew for this adventure.
The goal? "We're sending you out to the Rift with a ship going to
salvage. . . . You'll have a cargo on the way out, sell the ship,
then come back commercial. Altogether it should take at least
eleven months and by then things will surely have died down." By
that, Ky's father means the trouble she stirred up at Academy,
trouble with world-wide ramifications. This opportunity to leave
Slotter Key proves two-fold: get Ky out of trouble here and offer
her a new life somewhere else. But will she continue to stay out of
trouble? Now her father knows she won't, in fact he's counting on
her to be just like every other Vatta on first captaincy--he expects
her to take charge of her own destiny.
What kind of trouble does Kylara Vatta get
into? She helps people. She's too honest. She gets her ship and
crew trapped in a deadly war with no escape. Her wits prove sharper
than her luck as Ky maneuvers through stupid bureaucracies and past
murdering pirates. She grows up fast, earning respect with the load
of frustrating responsibility that heaps onto her shoulders,
responsibility she claims and tenaciously will not relinquish. She
wants to refit her ship, find more trade, and turn a higher profit.
But the ship breaks down, the trade she finagles falls into
compromising complications, and her profit line crashes into the
red. If anyone can turn a broken ship, war and pirates, and the
inflexible bureaucracy of bankruptcy into a profitable venture, it's
a Vatta captain from Slotter Key. Ky just has to live long enough
to make it happen.
Recommended for science-fiction fans requiring
a female protagonist, TRADING IN DANGER offers a plausible read with
plenty of action. There are no aliens or weird physics in this
storyline, but the futuristic technology is good and "feels" real.
It's an all human galaxy with human problems and complications. A
lucid, pleasing read with fair characterization and excellent
plotting.
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