Galaxias
By Stephen Baxter
By the year 2057 the Earth has already been through a lot. The effects of climate change have even forced the relocation of the British parliament to Newcastle and the American government to Alaska. But then the Blink occurs – a name given to the sudden disappearance of the Sun. This truly does seem like the end of things. But then, just as quickly as the Sun left, it comes back.
Obviously some very powerful forces are at work, which the global brain trusts take to calling Galaxias. It seems the removal of the Sun is a message that’s been sent to us, though the meaning of that message is obscure and the nature of Earth’s response much debated by the scientific bureaucracies in China and the West.
This makes Stephen Baxter’s new novel a bit talky in places, but the focus on a trio of friends and the backdrop of speculative “hard” SF on a grand scale combine to make Galaxias an engaging enough cosmic mystery story, with an ending that opens up in a big way.
Alex on SF 
Has anyone ever told you that you are ‘fiercely intelligent’?
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Only fierce.
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Movie fodder do you think?
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Not sure. Like I say, there’s a lot of talk and not a whole lot of action. I think it probably works better as a novel where you can sort of think about what’s happening and the science can be explored in more depth. On the other hand, a movie could make use of some great Newcastle locations . . .
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I was thinking that, though film makers tend to use York as a stand in for the Toon sadly.
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This one begins on the Millennium Bridge. So I had to look that up. I think Baxter actually lives in Newcastle, but I’m not sure about that.
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I’ve never read anything by Baxter but if this is representative of his work, I can understand why it never interested me. Near Future is always hard to pull off in my opinion and I don’t think most of it works (not just by Baxter).
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It’s more interesting on a technical level. Just what would happen if the sun was suddenly relocated? The disruption to the solar system’s gravity balance, the deep freeze setting in. But I don’t think this would be your thing.
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So he does address the gravity thing? That was my first thought and my uneducated guess is that if the sun disappeared for longer than 5min is that the planets would go flying and even its return wouldn’t be enough to recapture us.
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Yeah, he definitely goes into all that. Actually, the way it works is that things only slowly go out of whack. Even the freezing of the Earth takes a lot longer than I thought it would.
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