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WORK TITLE: THE ORPHEUS PLOT
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WEBSITE: https://christopherswiedler.com/
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COUNTRY: United States
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PERSONAL
Married; children: three.
ADDRESS
CAREER
Author, software engineer.
WRITINGS
SIDELIGHTS
Christopher Swiedler is an author and software engineer in California. He is the author of a pair of sci-fi adventure novels for middle-grade readers: In the Red, from 2020, and the 2021 work, The Orpheus Project. Swiedler writes out of his own interests and profession as a video game designer, as he commented to a contributor in MG Book Village. His day job is working as an engineering manager at Roblox, a platform for middle-graders to make their own video games and play each other’s games. “One surprising thing I’ve learned after over a decade of working in the video game industry is that writing a novel and designing a game are pretty similar activities that require a lot of the same skills,” Swiedler noted in his interview.
Speaking with Sean McCollum in From the Mixed Up Files website, Swiedler commented on his writing choice of middle-grade novels: “I love middle-grade novels because the stories are so genuine and positive. Young-adult books are great in how they can focus on the moments when our optimistic view of the world begins to crumble and be replaced by something more nuanced. But I find myself gravitating toward stories that see the world as an inherently positive place where conflict can eventually be reconciled.”
In the Red is set on a Mars colony and features twelve-year-old Michael Prasad, who has panic attacks every time he tries to put on his space suit and venture outside. This has kept him locked inside the Mars colony until his best friend, Lilith, manages to sneak him out on a stolen rover. All goes well until a solar flare upsets communication and navigation. Now the two are stranded on the surface of Mars with very little water or food and an oxygen supply that is quickly being depleted. They must use their own ingenuity and Michael’s navigation skills and knowlege of the whereabouts of outlying facilities with supplies. Together these two adolescents must make adult choices or face death.
Reviewing In the Red in School Library Journal, Elizabeth Speer noted that Swiedler employs a “skillful blend of science and survivalism to keep readers engaged and invested in the outcome.” A Kirkus Reviews critic similarly noted: “Swiedler’s debut is a clever and exciting read that casts a key female character as an intrepid explorer and a supportive friend.” Online YA Books Central contributor Karen Yingling was also impressed with In the Red, commenting that the “survival in extreme conditions, and the friendship between Michael and Lilith will make this a great choice for young readers who need to escape Earth for a while.”
Swiedler’s second novel for middle-grade readers, The Orpheus Plot, features more high-tension excitement in space. Lucas Adebayo is what is called a Belter: he grew up on a small asteroid belt in a mining ship. But he has always dreamed of joining the Navy and becoming a top-notch pilot. Lucas beats the odds–the Navy has never admitted a Belter before, but his skills manage to get him a place on a Navy training ship, the Orpheus. However, Lucas has a hard time finding a place for himself on the ship, a Belter among peers with a more distinguished background. And neither does he feel at home now, as a Navy cadet. He is caught between these two worlds until a Belter rebellion puts the lives of everybody in danger and now Lucas is the only one who can create peace again.
A Kirkus Reviews contributor was not impressed with The Orpheus Plot, finding the solution to the crisis “simplistic at best, undermining what is otherwise a well-paced and well-plotted book.” The contributor called the novel “disappointing.” Others had a much higher assessment. A Publishers Weekly reviewer termed the book a “fast-paced tale about defying expectations,” further noting that the book’s focus on character development and on plausible science in the plotting “makes this a read reminiscent of Robert Heinlein novels.”
BIOCRIT
PERIODICALS
Kirkus Reviews, December 15, 2019, review of In the Red; May 1, 2021, review of The Orpheus Plot.
Publishers Weekly, May 10, 2021, review of The Oprheus Plot p. 70.
School Library Journal, March, 2020. ELizabeth Speer, review of In the Red, p. 108.
ONLINE
Christopher Swiedler website, https://christopherswiedler.com (November 11, 2021).
From the Mixed Up Files, https://fromthemixedupfiles.com/ (June 25, 2021), Sean McCollum, “Interview with Chris Swiedler.”
MG Book Village, https://mgbookvillage.org/ (February 26, 2020), Christopher Swiedler, “How Writing Is Like Video Game Development.”
YA Books Central, https://www.yabookscentral.com/ (January 30, 2020), Karen Yingling, review of In the Red.
Christopher Swiedler is an author and software engineer who lives with his wife and three children in California, where they’re under constant threat from earthquakes, tsunamis, and the occasional Martian dust storm. His goal in life is to win the Newbery Honor (not the medal itself) because he believes being a runner-up builds good character. In the Red is his debut novel. You can visit him at https://christopherswiedler.com.
Christopher Swiedler is an author and software engineer who lives with his wife and three children in California, where they’re under constant threat from earthquakes, tsunamis, and the occasional Martian dust storm. His goal in life is to win the Newbery Honor (not the medal itself) because he believes being a runner-up builds good character. He is represented by Bridget Smith of JABberwocky Literary Agency. His debut novel, IN THE RED, will be published by HarperCollins in March 2020.
QUOTE: "I love middle-grade novels because the stories are so genuine and positive. Young-adult books are great in how they can focus on the moments when our optimistic view of the world begins to crumble and be replaced by something more nuanced. But I find myself gravitating toward stories that see the world as an inherently positive place where conflict can eventually be reconciled."
Interview with Chris Swiedler: The Orpheus Plot
Interview with Chris Swiedler
Dropping June 25, 2021! What a great cover!
The Orpheus Plot
I grew up loving science fiction in every form, and my tween self would have disappeared into The Orpheus Plot (HarperCollins, 2021), so I jumped on the chance to interview Chris Swiedler about his book The Orpheus Plot. Just in time for summer, Chris takes us on a great MG spacesuit adventure to the asteroid belt, where pre-teen Lucas Obadayo must bridge dual identities to prevent war. This is Swiedler’s second title with HC, following last year’s In the Red.
Welcome to Mixed Up Files, Chris!
Interview with Chris Swiedler
Sean McCollum: Lucas Abadayo is such a great protagonist, with a complete menu of internal and external conflicts to deal with. How much of your own young self is in his DNA?
Christopher Swiedler: Not enough, in the sense that I wish I’d had his internal strength when I was his age! I went to a new school for third grade and it was enormously difficult for me. Looking back I wasn’t really all that different from any of the other kids, but those differences were so magnified in my head that I felt as if I’d never be able to be friends with anyone. I can’t even imagine how I would have handled it if I’d been born in the asteroid belt!
Of course, there are lots of bits of me in Lucas. I was never very good in math, but I always loved computers. And I’ve always had a strong belief that most problems are caused by people not understanding someone else’s point of view. If all the people around you have seen something a certain way for a long time it begins to feel not only like a truth, but a truth worth (literally) fighting over. I’m mostly optimistic about the future of humanity, but I worry a lot about technology making it easier to segment ourselves and shut off any interactions with people and opinions that we don’t already agree with.
Orpheus Plot World Building
SMc: How did you go about the world-building process for The Orpheus Plot? What advice do you have for beginning science fiction authors on how to approach it?
CS: For me, world-building in science fiction is all about imagining how people will live and interact as we adapt to changes in technology. For example, it’s fascinating to think that as humans leave Earth and live in the rest of the Solar System, the first colonists will have to entirely give up eating meat, because growing plants to feed to animals and then feeding the animals to people is just too inefficient.
Or think about communication – in the last fifty years we’ve gotten used to being able to reach anyone, anywhere, instantly. Once people live on Mars, it will take anywhere from 3 to 22 minutes for signals to arrive, and then the same delay again coming back. Can you imagine trying to have a conversation with someone where it takes close to an hour for them to respond to what you’ve just said?
Good world-building is all about creating something that is different and believable. Making something different is easy—making it also be believable is the tricky part. Our brains are really good at spotting the little things that stand out and don’t quite make sense. My friend Shirin Leos uses the term “credibility gap” in her workshops, which I like a lot. I’ve gotten countless bits of great feedback from writers in her groups who start off by saying something like “I’m not at all a science-fiction person” and then proceed to point out in precise detail how a particular bit of futurism doesn’t quite make sense.
The best piece of specific advice I can give for world-building is to start off with the things you want to be different and then keep asking yourself “how would the world adapt?” If people flew on dragons—how would we adapt? If zombies rose from their graves—how would we adapt? Think about it in excruciatingly logical detail and open yourself up to all of the possibilities.
On the other hand, world building has to serve the story! Sometimes it’s fun to start with the world-building and then build the story and characters inside. But sometimes you need to flip it around and come up with the story first and the world second. My current project is fantasy / alternate-history, and I’ve only done light sketches of the world because I haven’t gotten the core story finished yet. Locking yourself into a particular, super-detailed world can sometimes be a hinderance.
MG Sci-Fi Influences
Author Chris Swiedler, everybody!
SMc: Because this is MUF, which middle grade books left an impression on you? And why do you write for middle grades now? Which science-fiction authors and books in general are among your influences today?
CS: In any genre, the stories that have an influence on me are the ones that make me think or make me cry (and ideally both). I love Watership Down for its detailed, believable, and almost totally foreign world, but the part that really gets me is at the end when you see how the story of Hazel, Bigwig, and the others gets woven into the legends of El-ahrairah for future generations. Another example is the movie E.T., where the science-fiction elements support and complement the amazing characters.
I love middle-grade novels because the stories are so genuine and positive. Young-adult books are great in how they can focus on the moments when our optimistic view of the world begins to crumble and be replaced by something more nuanced. But I find myself gravitating toward stories that see the world as an inherently positive place where conflict can eventually be reconciled. Of course, even in middle-grade there’s still a broad range of emotions like anger, sadness, and grief, but these are usually accompanied by healing and a return to an un-shattered, positive view of the world.
Out of recent sci-fi, I’m a big fan of everything that Lois McMaster Bujold has written. The settings of her Vorkosigan Saga and World of the Five Gods are amazingly authentic and engaging, but even more importantly, characters like Miles and Cordelia or Ista and Penric feel so much like real people that I’m sad when I finish the books and realize I have to say goodbye (at least till she writes the next one!)
((Looking for more space books? Check out our space-themed book list here)
Fundamentally Universal Themes
SMc: Thematically, science fiction seems to overlap with fantasy and perhaps superhero genres. What draws us to these stories?
CS: I think the great thing about themes is that they’re fundamentally universal. Things like setting, technology, magic, and superpowers can put characters into exciting situations, but it’s their choices—especially the difficult ones—that make us care about them.
One of my favorite quotes ever, from Lois McMaster Bujold, is this: “You are what you choose. Choose again, and change.” Think about that. You are what you choose. It’s true for us as people, and it’s just as true for characters. If someone is strong in the Force, or the wielder of some powerful magic, or smart enough to invent their own powered suit of armor—well, that’s great! But people are not their abilities or their talents. People are their choices. And the reason we care about them and follow them in their wonderful adventures is because we want to see those choices. We want to see Captain America choose to stick to his guns and keep fighting no matter what. We want to see Frodo Baggins choose to take the One Ring into Mordor. We want to see both the good choices and the bad ones, and we want to root for them to come out all right in the end.
Thanks so much for spending some time with us here at MUF, Chris. And have a great summer!
Keep up with Chris Swiedler:
At his website …
On Facebook …
Twitter @ChrisSwiedler
Goodreads …
You can also buy The Orpheus Plot online at an independent bookstore through our MUF Bookshop portal: bookshop.org/shop/fromthemixedupfiles
QUOTE: "One surprising thing I’ve learned after over a decade of working in the video game industry is that writing a novel and designing a game are pretty similar activities that require a lot of the same skills,"
How Writing Is Like Video Game Development by Christopher Swiedler
FEBRUARY 26, 2020 ~ BOOKVILLAGEADMIN
Or, why you should listen to your English teacher
Early in the morning, when my kids are asleep, I’m a writer of science-fiction novels for middle-grade readers. My first book, IN THE RED, will be out on March 24 from HarperCollins. It’s the story of two kids living on Mars who get stranded during a solar flare and have to find their way back home.
Once the sun is in the sky, though, I’m an engineering manager at Roblox, which is a platform for middle-grade kids to make their own video games and play each other’s games. (If you’ve never heard of Roblox, ask a ten-year-old; after they roll their eyes at you, they’ll explain in great detail). One surprising thing I’ve learned after over a decade of working in the video game industry is that writing a novel and designing a game are pretty similar activities that require a lot of the same skills.
Don’t believe me? Read on…
Setting
Any video game has a setting: think of the strange world of bricks, turtles, and walking mushrooms from Super Mario Brothers, or the kooky science-fiction universe of Overwatch. Similarly, a big part of writing fantasy or science fiction is coming up with an imaginative setting. In both cases, the goal is to transport the audience to a different world—one that feels strange but somewhat familiar, exciting and yet in some ways predictable, and vivid but also believable.
IN THE RED takes place on Mars in the twenty-second century, when life there is normal enough that kids grow up there not knowing anything about what it’s like to live on Earth. As I was coming up with the story, I spent a lot of time daydreaming about what life would be like for those kids. I imagined that while early colonists would probably have lived underground for protection from solar radiation, eventually people would create large domed cities with shops, neighborhoods, schools, and parks. Everything inside the domes would feel pretty normal.
Except, of course, that it’s not normal at all. After all, you’re on Mars, which means that as soon as you leave the dome you have to deal with a deadly atmosphere, harsh solar radiation, and temperatures colder than Antarctica. And that’s all on a good day!
That intriguing world where inside is perfectly safe, outside is OMG YOU’RE TOTALLY GOING TO DIE planted some of the seeds that eventually became the idea for the novel.
Rules
Ah, rules. Kids hate them, don’t they?
Except, as every parent knows, there are no rules, your kids will be more bored than ever. Sometimes my kids spend more time making up the rules for their games than they actually spend playing them: “Okay, you’re totally dead if two nerf bullets hit your torso or one hits your head, but you’re just wounded if a sword hits you, except if you’re touching one of these three bases, and no close-range shots because they hurt, and also…”
Video game designers devote a lot of time to the rules of their games. In a sense, all gameplay is rules. Do this and you succeed. Do this other thing, and you fail. One of the fun things about games is that the rules can be extremely arbitrary and imaginative. Why does eating fruit make Pac-Man invincible? Dunno, but it’s fun!
Rules are the core of world-building for novels, too. They define what the characters can and can’t accomplish. The rules of THE HOBBIT dictate that Gandalf has many powers. But the rules also say that he’s not capable of just teleporting everyone to the Lonely Mountain, because otherwise the book would be about four pages long. Trolls are dangerous at night, but if you keep them out until the sun rises, they turn to stone. Bilbo is a master burglar, but even with his magic ring, Smaug the dragon can smell him.
With middle-grade and young-adult novels in particular, the rules are heavily shaped by parents and society. Stories for preteens usually involve bending rules that are well-meaning but flawed: CHARLOTTE’S WEB is about persuading the adult world that Wilbur deserves to live. Books for older teenagers are often about taking those stupid rules, throwing them in the trash, and then blowing up the trash can for good measure. The characters in THE HUNGER GAMES break every one of the rules of that world, and we cheer them on the entire time.
Part of the storyline for IN THE RED deals with kids going out onto the surface of Mars, where you can be killed by a hundred different things. When I started writing, I wondered what the rules for that sort of world would be. In California we require you to be sixteen years old and pass an exam before you can drive a car. Maybe there would be something similar for kids of Mars, where they have to demonstrate that they know how to operate a space suit? That was an intriguing thought. What would kids think of an exam like that? How would they feel about passing or failing?
And what about parents on Mars? Do they set their own rules for their kids? (surely.) Do kids hate those rules and bend them any chance they get? (yes!) Do they sometimes go outside onto the surface in the middle of the night, just for the thrill of sneaking out? (they’re kids, aren’t they?)
Answering these questions helped add the details that made the setting for IN THE RED something that middle-grade readers could connect with.
Character
One of the most fun things about video games is that you get to step into the shoes of a character: a sword-wielding ninja, a star quarterback, or a frenetic hedgehog. In a sense, every video game is written in the second person, where you are the hero or heroine.
Even though modern video games can show you that ninja in high-definition detail, there’s still an element of belief. You need to connect with that character in some way. The character needs to feel powerful in some way, or else it won’t feel possible to win the game. On the other hand, the character needs to be vulnerable, or else there’s no way to lose the game. On top of all of that, they need to be sympathetic and admirable, or else why would you want to be them?
Books usually aren’t written in the second person. Instead, they let a narrator or the protagonist themselves tell you what is happening. But if the story doesn’t connect the reader with that character, then no matter how whiz-bang the special effects plot and description, the reader isn’t going to be reading that book for long.
In particular, the main character needs to have something called agency, which is the power to affect the story through their actions. Can you imagine how boring it would be to read a book where the plot unfolds regardless of the choices the characters make? In STAR WARS, Luke Skywalker is recruited by Obi-Wan Kenobi, but he has to make his own choice to leave Tattoine. If he were dragged across the galaxy whining about power converters, nobody would care about him at all.
Video games are great at agency. They are agency machines. Absolutely nothing happens unless the player does something. Writers have to worry about making sure characters make choices; game designers have the luxury of knowing that agency is built into the concept of video games.
IN THE RED focuses on a boy named Michael who has something called environment suit anxiety disorder, which means that he has a panic attack any time he puts on a helmet and goes out onto the surface. Now, if I were living on Mars with that condition, I’d just stay inside where it’s safe. But of course, Michael isn’t satisfied with staying inside. He isn’t satisfied with his diagnosis. He feels something is definitely wrong, but whatever it is, it’s not with him.
He takes the environment suit test even though his parents have forbidden it. He sneaks outside with his best friend at night. They drive hundreds of miles in the middle of the night to see his father, even though there’s a powerful solar storm going on. These choices are his, and they drive the story forward.
Of course, just because they’re his choices doesn’t mean they’re good ones—which goes to show that kids should always listen to their parents unless they want to unwittingly embark on life-or-death adventures.
Risks
The motto of NASA Mission Control during the Apollo Moon landings was “failure is not an option.” It’s a great quote that sums up how much they were willing to do anything to make the missions successful.
But of course, if failure weren’t an option, then they wouldn’t need that motto. There was a huge risk of failure, and which is exactly why they invested massive amounts of time in preparation, planning, and redundancy. The possibility of losing the astronauts of the Apollo 13 mission is why the story of their return is so good.
All novels have the possibility—the likelihood—of failure. Think of any gripping story and evaluate the hero or heroine’s chances of success. One in ten? One in a hundred? One in a thousand? Or, like one of the pilots in STAR WARS says about getting a proton torpedo into the ventilation shaft of the Death Star, one in a million?
Furthermore, the consequences of failure in any story need to be devastating. If heroes and heroines fail, bad things happen. People die, or the bank reposesses their farm, or they lose their best friend and get laughed at by the entire school and they spend the night of the big dance at home playing Jenga with bad-breath Aunt Marge. Whatever it is that might happen, the protagonist of the story cares deeply about it not happening. They tell themselves that failure is not an option, and we silently cheer them on.
This isn’t to say that characters don’t suffer failures and setbacks. Readers don’t want to see a nice clean journey without any roadbumps. Smaller failures raise the stakes and add to the difficulty. Any time the characters in a movie have a plan to solve their problem after only thirty minutes, you know that plan is going to fail.
As anyone who has watched me play Madden on my kids’ XBox can attest, failure is a huge part of video games. It’s built into the system. You start out unable to meet even the smallest challenge. You fail over and over, until your skills start to improve. Then the game gets harder and you fail some more. The risk is always there. Why would you play a game that didn’t have the risk of failure?
Video game designers know all of this because they learned it from writers.
Michael, the main character of IN THE RED, begins by feeling the emotional risk of being rejected and ostracized because his panic attacks prevent him from going out onto the surface. His choices in the story lead to more risks. By choosing to sneak out, he takes the known risk that he might end up grounded till he’s thirty years old. But he also runs into the unknown risks of Mars itself. A massive solar flare knocks out all of the planet’s communication and navigation satellites and Michael and Lilith end up stranded out on the surface. They can’t go out onto the surface during the day for more than a few minutes without being killed by radiation. As they try to find their way back, more risks emerge: collapsing glaciers, man-made volcanoes, dust storms. If it weren’t for the risks (both emotional and physical), there literally wouldn’t be a story to tell.
Pacing
We all need excitement in our lives. But we also need down time. We need rest; we need moments with our families and friends; we need time to reflect.
Game designers know this very well. No game sets a single pace and keeps it throughout. They’re always broken up into levels and missions that give the player some quiet time to take a breath before heading out into the excitement again.
And where did game designers get this idea? From writers. Friends, writers invented pacing. Thousands of years ago, when we first gathered around campfires, the first storytellers taught themselves how to pace their stories. Beowulf, the Odyssey, and other epics enshrined patterns for structure and pacing. Heroes and heroines venture out—they suffer setbacks—they regroup—and they journey again.
HARRY POTTER AND THE SORCERER’S STONE is a good example. The book contains a series of exciting encounters: a fight with a troll, a Quiddich match, a visit to the Forbidding Forest. But each of these is separated by quieter scenes where Harry and his friends are given the time to process the crazy things that are happening.
Can you imagine if those quieter scenes weren’t there? Would the book be anywhere near as good if it were jam-packed with TROLLS WIZARDS DRAGONS CENTAURS VOLDEMORT GO GO GO GO…?
I had to be very conscious of pacing with IN THE RED. When Michael and Lilith arrive at his father’s research station, they find it mysteriously abandoned. As they try to figure out what has happened there, the two of them have a little time to feel the emotions that all of the risks have brought on. This gives the reader time to pause and regroup as the story builds up again. And then, of course, Michael and Lilith discover the reason everyone has fled the station. (Spoiler alert: it’s not good.)
Video games are the same way. Pick any single-player game and you’ll see small challenges that lead to big challenges that lead to a final confrontation. Even positively ancient video games like Pac Man, Galaga, and Donkey Kong do this: they apply some pressure, they increase the risk, and then they give you a chance to rest for a moment before throwing you back into more challenges.
That’s pacing.
Conclusion
So far none of my kids has said to me that they want to be a writer when they grow up. That’s fine—I’ll be happy and proud of them no matter what they do. But they do tell me, quite often, that they think they’d like to design video games. In response, I nod sagely and give them a supportive hug.
And then I hand them a book to read.
Christopher Swiedler is an author and software engineer who lives with his wife and three children in California, where they’re under constant threat from earthquakes, tsunamis, and the occasional Martian dust storm. His goal in life is to win the Newbery Honor (not the medal itself) because he believes being a runner-up builds good character. He is represented by Bridget Smith of JABberwocky Literary Agency. His debut novel, IN THE RED, will be published by HarperCollins in March 2020. He can be found at https://christopherswiedler.com
QUOTE: "simplistic at best, undermining what is otherwise a well-paced and well-plotted book."
"disappointing."
Swiedler, Christopher THE ORPHEUS PLOT Harper/HarperCollins (Children's None) $16.99 6, 15 ISBN: 978-0-06-289444-1
A young Belter cadet deals with a rebellion in space.
Lucas Adebayo’s dream has come true: He’s the first Belter cadet in the Earther Navy. Well, the first openly Belter cadet—the true first was his adopted sister, Tali Chen, who’s posing as the only Martian. Though Tali’s actions are understandable given the Navy’s history of bias against people from the asteroid belt, who are marginalized and disdained by those from Earth, Luna, and Mars, Lucas is hurt that Tali doesn’t want anyone to know they are siblings. After Tali discourages him from joining the Navy with ambiguous, ominous warnings, Lucas sees her planting a device on the ship’s hull, investigates, and a rebellion plot unfolds. Lucas wrestles with guilt over his enjoyment of being in the Navy, loving the thrill of the chase but feeling conflicted about arresting Belters for relatively minor infractions while knowing how devastating imprisonment will be for them. Unfortunately, the theme of marginalized communities seeking justice is presented without nuance in a way that feels culturally disconnected from current events and seems to equate identity and difference with conflict while erasing the fundamental problem of an existing imbalance in power. The narrative’s assertion that the oppressed simply need to talk with their oppressors to bring about change feels simplistic at best, undermining what is otherwise a well-paced and well-plotted book. Racial and ethnic diversity are suggested through names.
Disappointing. (Science fiction. 10-14)
Copyright: COPYRIGHT 2021 Kirkus Media LLC
http://www.kirkusreviews.com/
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"Swiedler, Christopher: THE ORPHEUS PLOT." Kirkus Reviews, 1 May 2021, p. NA. Gale General OneFile, link.gale.com/apps/doc/A659924895/ITOF?u=schlager&sid=bookmark-ITOF&xid=0f3800ca. Accessed 11 Oct. 2021.
QUOTE: "fast-paced tale about defying expectations," "makes this a read reminiscent of Robert Heinlein novels."
The Orpheus Plot
Christopher Swiedler. HarperCollins, $16.99 (400p) ISBN 978-0-06-289444-1
Though the Naval Academy has never accepted a cadet from the Asteroid Belt, Lucas Adebayo, 13, a crack pilot who grew up on his father's mining ship, dreams of joining his adoptive sister Tali Chen, 16, who was accepted because of the lack of discrimination against Marsborn applicants. When Lucas is given a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to attend, he accepts wholeheartedly. Unfortunately, he's subjected to anti-Belter prejudice and bullying, constantly forced to justify his presence. Worse, to protect her own reputation, Tali pretends not to know him. With the aid of his roommates--tall, blonde Elena, who cannot tell a lie, and Rahul, who uses corneal implants to overcome astral vertigo--Lucas perseveres. But when the academy teaching ship Orpheus is drawn into the middle of a miner-led uprising, Lucas must decide where his loyalties lie, especially when torn between duty and conscience. Though themes surrounding marginalization feel poorly wrought, Swiedler (In the Red) offers a fast-paced tale about defying expectations; the novel's focus on character dynamics and scientific plausibility makes this a read reminiscent of Robert Heinlein novels. Ages 8-12. Agent: Bridget Smith, Dunham Literary. (June)
Copyright: COPYRIGHT 2021 PWxyz, LLC
http://www.publishersweekly.com/
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"The Orpheus Plot." Publishers Weekly, vol. 268, no. 19, 10 May 2021, p. 70. Gale General OneFile, link.gale.com/apps/doc/A662132075/ITOF?u=schlager&sid=bookmark-ITOF&xid=57bfeaa5. Accessed 11 Oct. 2021.
QUOTE: "Swiedler's debut is a clever and exciting read that casts a key female character as an intrepid explorer and a supportive friend."
Swiedler, Christopher IN THE RED Harper/HarperCollins (Children's Fiction) $16.99 3, 24 ISBN: 978-0-06-289441-0
Hypothesis: If a 12-year-old with panic disorder gets stranded outside the colony during a planetwide emergency, he'll need all his smarts and grit to survive.
Michael Prasad lives an ordinary life inside a biodome on a future terraformed Mars. Despite his math and science abilities, Michael has failed his suit certification test due to a panic attack and hasn't been allowed out on the surface since. When his best friend, Lilith, shows him a secret airlock, Michael takes the chance to prove himself. Together, they steal a rover and drive out to surprise Michael's dad at the magnetic field station. But when a solar storm wrecks the artificial magnetic field that shields the planet, they lose all satellite navigation and radio and eventually crash their rover. The friends must escape the deadly solar radiation on foot, navigating harsh terrain, mechanical disasters, and a worsening storm with dwindling supplies. Swiedler's debut is a clever and exciting read that casts a key female character as an intrepid explorer and a supportive friend. Disappointingly, however, when it comes to space science, Lilith is an ignorant foil to the lone boy genius, who's emotionally oblivious and thinks girls deliberately act confusing. Michael is biracial, with a South Asian father and white mother; other characters are implied white.
Engaging but androcentric. (author's note) (Science fiction. 8-12)
Copyright: COPYRIGHT 2019 Kirkus Media LLC
http://www.kirkusreviews.com/
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"Swiedler, Christopher: IN THE RED." Kirkus Reviews, 15 Dec. 2019. Gale General OneFile, link.gale.com/apps/doc/A608364469/ITOF?u=schlager&sid=bookmark-ITOF&xid=7e50ef4e. Accessed 11 Oct. 2021.
QUOTE: "skillful blend of science and survivalism to keep readers engaged and invested in the outcome."
SWIEDLER, Christopher. In the Red. 288p. HarperCollins. Mar. 2020. Tr $16.99. ISBN 9780062894410.
Gr 6 Up--Panic attacks have kept Michael Prasad from getting his space suit certification and keep him locked inside the safety1 of the Mars colony. But after he nearly passes the advanced qualifying test, his best friend Lilith arranges for them to sneak out onto the surface. One stolen rover and a long jaunt later, a solar flare knocks out all communication and navigation, leaving them stranded with little food or water and a quickly depleting oxygen tank. All they have now are their wits and Michael's knowledge of navigation and locations of possible sources of supplies from outlying facilities. Working together is the only way they might make it back to the colony alive. Michael and Lilith are well-written characters with whom students will quickly identify. While their decision to "borrow" a rover isn't well thought out, their teamwork and ingenuity in the face of danger are admirable. This is a wonderful adventure novel filled with so many twists and turns that it seems the characters very well may not survive. The story manages to invoke a real sense of danger, and at times hopelessness, as the teens fight to survive a hostile environment without help or resources. The writing is reminiscent of Gary Paulsen's Hatchet and Andy Weir's The Martian--it maintains a skillful blend of science and survivalism to keep readers engaged and invested in the outcome. VERDICT A smart choice to read individually or as a group to further explore the possibilities of life on Mars and the science behind the fiction.--Elizabeth Speer, Weatherford College, TX
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Source Citation
Source Citation
MLA 9th Edition APA 7th Edition Chicago 17th Edition Harvard
Speer, Elizabeth. "SWIEDLER, Christopher. In the Red." School Library Journal, vol. 66, no. 3, Mar. 2020, pp. 108+. Gale General OneFile, link.gale.com/apps/doc/A616314245/ITOF?u=schlager&sid=bookmark-ITOF&xid=427be68b. Accessed 11 Oct. 2021.
QUOTE: "survival in extreme conditions, and the friendship between Michael and Lilith will make this a great choice for young readers who need to escape Earth for a while."
Survival on the red planetJanuary 30, 2020
Overall rating
Karen Yingling
4.0
Plot/Characters/Writing Style
4.0
Illustrations/Photos (if applicable)
N/A
Michael Prasad and his family live on a colony on Mars, under a dome that controls the environment. His father, Manish, works at a ranger station outside of the dome, so he has taken Michael and his brother outside many times. Michael really wants to get his space suit certification, but he had a disastrous experience the one time he tried, and when he sneaks out to take the test again, his second time doesn't go well either. He blacks out, and comes to in the hospital. His parents are understandably angry; he's been diagnosed with anxiety, and has been told that as long as his "condition" of having panic attacks persists, he is not allowed to travel outside the dome. This makes him angry, and he feels like he is letting his father down. When his friend Lilith surprises him by arranging to meet one night near the edge of the dome so that they can travel outside just to look at stars, Michael decides that it's a great time to travel to his dad's station to say "hi". There are some problems going on in the community that are hush hush-- something with solar flares and the magnetic field around Mars perhaps being compromised, but taking off in a rover for a six hour drive should be just fine. Of course, it isn't. When it is unsafe to stay outside in the rover because of the flares, the two try to hide in a cave, and their exploration leads them to a station that has seen problems. They eventually manage to find Randall, a man who worked with Michael's father, and he helps everyone survive in abandoned shelters, living on old curry ready meals and monitoring their space suits for vital stats. Michael takes several very dangerous chances to try to contact his father's station, and doesn't have panic attacks all of the time. Eventually, he and Lilith are in very grave danger; will they be able to survive and make it safely back to the colony?
Good Points
This had a lot of good details about what it would be like to live on Mars, which is something I wanted from Emerson's Last Day on Mars (Chronicle of the Dark Star #1), before that book took off from the planet. I liked that the emergency took place entirely on the planet, and we got to see the various places where people could live. Traveling across Mars was also interesting, and very suspenseful. I really didn't think that Michael and Lilith could possibly survive! This was a fast-paced, quick read for fans of Sylvester's MINRS, Landers' Blastaway, Levy's Seventh Grade vs. The Galaxy and Buzz Aldrin's fantastic nonfiction book, Welcome to Mars.
Young readers will enjoy the fact that Michael does so many really, really stupid things; they'll be putting themselves in his shoes and thinking about how they might make other decisions. It's good to see a discussion of anxiety and panic attacks, and a bit unusual for a speculative fiction title to address these concerns.
Reading books like this make me all the more sure that I don't want to live on another planet, but the details of daily life, the survival in extreme conditions, and the friendship between Michael and Lilith will make this a great choice for young readers who need to escape Earth for a while.