Union Station Series Review | Recommended Reading

Remember when science fiction was about a future you wouldn't be terrified to live in? Well, the series we're looking at in this video is a light hearted and fun science fiction series which shows such a future.

So if you're after a science fiction novel that doesn't take itself seriously, but one that's not as ridiculous as hitchhiker's guide to the galaxy. This could be the series for you.

Watch the video review here. 

The EarthCent Ambassador series by E.M Foner

I've only read first two in the series but can say that I'm impressed. The first novel, Date Night on Union Station which is a sweet, romantic comedy that revolves around a mystery to be solved, the next one Alien Night on Union Station which revolves around a sort of political thriller which of course, there is a mystery to be solved.

So what is it all about?

Humanity has finally reached the stars, thanks to some help from an ancient race of AI beings, but there is a catch, these being, called the Stryx, will only allow Earth to use the interstellar flight lanes if they can show a united front, basically a planet-wide government.

This is where Earth Central comes in, or EarthCent., which is the autonomous pseudo-government set up by the Stryx. However the ambassadors and diplomats were not given any directions by the Stryx as how the organisation needs to run, along with the competing interesting of the various nations of Earth and it ends up being quite an anarchic place to work. Which brings its own comedy.
The author says that the goal of writing this series was

‘to cheer myself up and to find out if there is still an audience for a science fiction comedy that gets its laughs from dialogue and funny situations rather than from gross-outs and shocks.”

Each book is a self-contained story so there are no cliff-hangers. My main interest in the Union Station universe, aside from the relations between people, aliens and AI, is imagining what happens with species who have had access to high-tech for, in some cases, tens of millions of years. Do they continue to work? Do they continue to care? Do they die out, go back to nature, try to elevate themselves to gods? How do the nearly omniscient AI deal with issues like monetary policy and rental agreements?’

We see this and more, the situational comedy that we get from the interactions between alien and human culture is on point, the writing is well paced, funny and well done. There is also some good character development over the course of the book and the series as a whole.

Each of the books in the series picks up some time after the last one, for an example there is like, five years between Date Night and Alien Night but the main characters return and newer ones are added.

All up it’s a fun series to read and I think a perfect synopsis would be …it is about characters trying to make a living and find some joy in life.

So if you need a break between the more intense writers like Peter F Hamilton or Alistar Reynold, then the Union Station series may be what you’re looking for.

Have you read the series? Let me know what you thought, or if you’ve read some light hearted fun science fiction let me know in the comments section below what it is.

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