 The book starts with the premise that the moon Janus of Saturn suddenly leaves Saturn, just takes off across the solar system, which of course means it's not a moon, it's an alien ship of some sort. And of course the only ship in the system that has any chance of catching up to it is one of these deep space mining operations, these corporate employees that push ice they call it. But the book is never about pushing ice. I mean it starts with this premise that's very much like Arthur C. Clark's rendezvous with Rama, which is neat. It's like rendezvous with Rama with a different outcome, but then it turns into a different kind of book. It turns into Star Trek Voyager and then it turns into Babylon 5. Alistair Reynolds is one of my favorite authors, but up to this point I've only read his short story collections and his novellas. And whenever I pick up a novel by one of my favorite short story writers, I always have trepidation because I'm concerned that their writing style won't hold up in a longer form. And I'm afraid that's what happened here. It's not a bad book. In fact, I recommend it. I give it a soft recommendation. It's just not a great book. It falls short of being great.