Between Martha Wells’ Fugitive Telemetry and Malka Older’s The Mimicking of Known Successes, detective mysteries set in space in the distant future are quickly becoming one of my favorite science fiction subgenres. Murder, mayhem, and the infinite expanse of space. What’s not to love?
On a remote platform high above the swirling gasses of Jupiter on the edge of civilization, a scholar vanishes. Was he pushed? Did he jump? Investigator Mossa is tasked with figuring out what happened, but to do that she’ll have to go to the man’s home platform of Valdegeld. He was a scholar there at the same institute as Pleiti, Mossa’s ex. Pleiti is in the Classics field, studying the Earth humans fled centuries before, while the missing man was in the Modern department, studying life as it is now, bound to metal platforms and gazing at Earth animals forever trapped in a zoo.
At first, Pleiti agrees to help Mossa work her way through the scholars and get her access to facilities and researchers she might not otherwise be able to find. Soon, Pleiti is as deep into the mystery as her ex is. Our missing man may be part of a larger conspiracy that threatens life on the platforms and the future of humanity. Past, present, and future collide miles above Jupiter. As the two women follow trails and leads across the platforms orbiting Giant, they must also chase their own feelings for each other.
Buy the Book
The Mimicking of Known Successes
I went into this novella expecting a sapphic space mystery and was delighted to discover it also had Sherlock Holmes and John Watson vibes. Mossa is the emotionally distant investigative intellectual who picks up on the tiny discrepancies that will eventually break the case wide open. Pleiti is the science-leaning assistant who may not be a genius but can still figure things out. But here the romance between our Holmes and Watson is not just a headcanon.
Mossa and Pleiti begin the story as ex-girlfriends who haven’t seen each other in ages. We spend most of the novella in Pleiti’s perspective, so we don’t fully know what’s going on in Mossa’s head. However, both seem to feel like they themselves have changed but worry the other hasn’t. Or, more accurately, worry that the other still thinks they’re the same unyielding people they were before. Mossa flirts but doesn’t push, as if she worries Pleiti is still nursing old wounds. Pleiti treats Mossa with kid gloves like they used to, so much so that they can’t see the person Mossa’s become.
Like with Older’s Infomocracy series, The Mimicking of Known Successes explores alternate forms of governance: the failures, the ideals, and the practicalities. From Pleiti’s perspective, the whole point of her job as a Classical scholar is to analyze the past so they can create a better future. Turn the past into datasets, pluck out the flaws while reinforcing the benefits, and then apply the results to what’s left of Earth. Pleiti and Mossa live in a utopia, but one that is stuck in stasis. Most people are simply living their lives within the parameters they’re given—from the farmers clustered together on agricultural platforms to the commuters riding free public transit to talented cooks in outposts in the middle of nowhere—while others want more. Scholars like Pleiti want to recreate and perfect the past, but others want to force a new future, whether by destroying the past entirely or by, well, mimicking known failures.
Malka Older’s cozy little sci-fi mystery was a delight in every way. The Mimicking of Known Successes blends a sort of Western/Victorian/Edwardian feel with speculative flair and mystery and romance tropes. I yearn for a 10-book novella series of Mossa and Pleiti’s romantic adventures.
The Mimicking of Known Successes is available from Tordotcom Publishing.
Alex Brown is a Hugo-nominated and Ignyte award-winning critic who writes about speculative fiction, librarianship, and Black history. Find them on twitter (@QueenOfRats), instagram (@bookjockeyalex), and their blog (bookjockeyalex.com).
