RED NOISE

RELEASED 14 JULY (ebook out now) 426 pages | Paperback/ebook Author John P Murphy Publisher Angry Robot

Sci-fi that’s actually just a Western with spaceships and lasers is nothing new, and Red Noise enthusiastically embraces this mongrel genre. It’s set on a space station named after John Wayne, features a Clint Eastwood-style Woman With No Name as its kick-ass protagonist, and has an on-the-nose call out to High Noon at one point. But onto that it grafts a deranged Buckaroo Banzai/Big Trouble In Little China vibe.

The end result is surprisingly like an 18-rated Firefly, as an enhanced former special agent/ now space miner helps the downtrodden locals free themselves from the grip of warring crime gangs and corrupt law enforcers.

It’s all unapologetically plot-driven, with only one secondary goon receiving anything in the way of a character arc, and a fistful of subplots that never pretend to be anything more than, well, plot mechanics.

But the characters are a lot of fun, the dialogue is often hilariously droll, and there are a few moments of ingenious literary sleight of hand (one chapter is total WTF? territory until it becomes clear what’s going on). Red Noise isn’t going to trouble The Arthur C Clarke Award, and could have done with a little trimming and tightening of some of its clunkier prose, but it’s utterly readable pulpy nonsense.