Antartica Station

What is your plan for when the apocalypse comes? One of the best things about reading speculative fiction is that you get loads of clever ideas on exactly what to do should a meteor plummet to Earth or the undead rise from their graves. The truth is that your plan is to curl up and inevitably succumb. However, if you have the means you might be able to plan ahead, create a safe space, a safe society. A station in remote Antarctica sounds like a plan. 

Whilst Dr Laura Reynolds is going about her day job as an anaesthesiologist, the billionaires are plotting for the New World. Unbeknownst to her, Laura is part of their plans as they need people with her skillset. Laura finds herself framed and out of work, so when an offer comes from an obscure research company based in Antarctica comes she has little choice but to take the job. Laura finds herself at the centre of a conspiracy that will shape the very future of the world. 

I am all for a technothriller, the type of science based speculative fiction that Michael Crichton did so well. There have been many who have tried to match Crichton since, but few have succeeded. A G Riddle is one such author and they try again with Antarctica Station a book that feels like part technothriller, part stream of consciousness, like the author sat down at their writing table and just produced whatever came to them in the moment. The result is brainless fun, but also disjointed and naïve to an astounding degree. 

Take the central character of Dr Reynolds, already respected in her field, she seems an intelligent character. However, it feels like she has no impact on events in the story, but they are affecting her. She ineffectively defends her name, signs a contract with a random company and sets off to Antarctica. Once there she is torn between working with the new company of being a whistle blower for the Feds.  

There are some twists in the book, not all are well thought out, as if Riddle decided at certain points to mix things up for the sake of it. It feels like a series of parts, rather than a whole. The science is not explained well enough to be in the speculative technothriller genre or played with enough to be science fiction. Instead, it is something washy and in between.  

This sense of washiness is seen elsewhere in the book. There is a prolonged section of the book that has two characters sitting in an AI driven car. Protracted and stops any momentum that the book had. Laura is not the only naïve thing in the book, the book's philosophy is also childlike. Riddle goes as far to point out that Laura is naïve but seems to sell this as a badge of honour, like it is a good thing in the apocalypse. I know exactly where Laura’s character would be in the future world of Antarctica Station, long dead and clueless. 

The structure of the book is naïve as well, to the point of insulting. “Twists” are obvious to anyone who has read a sci fi book in the past 40 years. Obvious to everyone, except medical doctor Laura Reynolds. Characters return that are ridiculous happenstance. I understand that fiction is make believe, but there is coincidence and writing that borders on insulting the reader. 

There is a brainless fun thriller here and the book can be read quickly. It lacks any sort of nuance or intelligence when compared to even the middle of the road fiction that this genre can attract. I would recommend that you return to, or read for the first time, the wonderous technothrillers of Crichton’s pomp instead; Jurassic Park, Congo, Sphere.