Virtual reality simulation of trip to Mars takes on life of its own

The Wanderers Meg Howrey G.P. Putnam’s Sons CARLA K. JOHNSON

In The Wanderers, a private corporation called Prime Space is financing the first crewed mission to Mars and training three astronauts: an American woman, a Russian man and a Japanese man.

Helen, Sergei and Yoshi will undergo an elaborate 17-month simulation that will use virtual reality to mimic the round-trip mission to the Red Planet. That includes goodbyes to their families, a realistic-feeling launch, an outbound trip through “space” and 30 days on “Mars” — actually an unpopulated area of Utah.

The training mission is called Eidolon. It’s a high-stakes test to see how they perform as a team. The trio will be monitored by corporation observers who will joke that their jobs are as dull as watching “Chekhov in space.”

Meg Howrey’s novel starts at a Chekhovian crawl, but picks up after 100 pages when the simulated mission gets rolling.

Her near-future premise is based on Mars500, a real-life experiment completed in 2011 by a six-person international crew.

In the novel, as the mission adjusts from a 24-hour Earth day to a slightly longer Martian “sol,” the crew faces increasingly stressful equipment malfunctions. Their troubles may or may not be part of Prime Space’s simulation. Tensions rise. But the crew must not let the company know that the pressure is getting to them or that they’re having bad dreams. Helen, a NASA veteran with three space missions on her resume, wonders if her emotions will feel more authentic on Mars, or if Mars will feel like a simulation.

Rarely does she shed her defences. In one such moment, an awestruck Yoshi sees Helen for who she really is: “What a large thing it is to be Helen, what infinite space she is,” Howrey writes.

The crew members worry that their thirst for space exploration has crippled their family bonds. Helen’s daughter, Mirielle, struggles in the shadow of her famous mom. Sergei’s 16-year-old son explores his sexuality. Yoshi’s wife speaks honestly only to a robot.

The family sections give The Wanderers more opportunities to play with notions of counterfeits and authenticity, beyond the obvious stage of the simulated mission. Helen doesn’t ask anyone at Prime Space to explain her mission’s name, Eidolon, but if she’d checked she would have learned that an eidolon is a phantom in human form.

Is the Eidolon mission all it appears to be? Or more? The unfolding of that mystery launches this plausible space tale into higher realms of enjoyment.