cover image TANGO MIDNIGHT

TANGO MIDNIGHT

Michael Cassutt, . . Forge, $25.95 (384pp) ISBN 978-0-7653-0645-6

This thoroughly readable near-future space thriller takes place in 2006, with Space Station Alpha a going concern and the Chinese sending men into space. Billionaire Tad Mikleszewski has failed in efforts to launch a privately owned space booster, but he is determined to get into orbit, even if it means paying the Russians for a ride on one of their rockets. Meanwhile, American astronaut Kelly Gessner is preparing for a shuttle voyage, actress Rachel Dunne will be doing shots for her next film aboard Alpha and Kelly's ex-lover Mark Koskinen is riding herd on Westerners at the Russian Star City space center. All of this takes place as a biowar plague known as X-Pox rages, and preparations for the launch are disrupted by weather, illness, sexual chemistry, politics, bureaucracy and Russian muggers. Once in space, Tad (aka Tango Midnight) sets up camp in an Alpha module, where he intends to develop an X-Pox antidote. An accident releases the deadly virus, trapping Tad in the module, and Mark is recruited to save him via a complex docking maneuver. The book is stronger on technical detail ("BAACC will put Shenzhou-Harmony in a minus-Z orientation") and pacing than on characterization, and the climax seems rushed, but it will satisfy space fans with a taste for thrillers, or thriller fans with a taste for space. (Nov.)