"The year is 2004 and, detente in place, the U.S. has sent a manned mission to Mars to find out what happened to and perhaps rescue the Russian cosmonauts who landed there two years earlier and have not been heard from since. Lauren Wagner, chief medical officer on the U.S. unit Nova, suspects alien infection killed the crew of the Lenin and worries that the same may happen to those on her ship. Little does she know that they face a fate far worse: there are vampires on Mars!"
Veteran YA horror author Pike released this more science
fiction than horror tale in 1992 (though set in 2004). As a long time book
seller for various retail outlets, I was more than aware of his prolific
output. Much like R.L. Stine and his spooky books for kids, Pike seemed to be
the next step for those kids who outgrew the Goosebump stories. The Season of
Passage is defiantly bent towards adult, though, and it starts out as fairly
compelling. But eventually, at well over 400 pages in paperback, it becomes
bogged down in campiness and bad 50’s B-movies cliches Joel and the ‘bots would make
fun of on MST3K.
I can now
see why I never read his books, even though this one came highly recommended.
He’s like the James Patterson of young adult books, with a cringe-like prose
and with a grasp of science that is laughable a best. Any reader of The Expanse
series who loved the more realistic science presented in that series will
really have to suspend their beliefs here, as Pike throws what knowledge of
space he knew back in the early 1990s right out the window.
To justify the pages, I guess, there is subplot concerning Lauren's earthbound sister and a story she is writing -which appears to be a telepathically received fable about how Mars became a wasteland of ghouls (the book goes out its way to give some credence to why Mars lost its atmosphere). But even that part, more interesting than the rest, cannot save this very silly book
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