Nightflyers

will review at www.fantasyliterature.com

My first taste of GRRM not in his Song of Ice and Fire series. I was intrigued going into this as his ASOIAF is a fantastic series, well deserving of its plaudits. With that in mind there were big things expected here from me.

Nightflyers plays along many of the classic themes of sci-fi horror/mystery, with the claustrophobic sense of dread of being on a spaceship isolated from the rest of humanity. The eventual identity of the threat in this story is reasonably well foreboded without it being spelled out - so far so good. The book does fall into quite a few sci-fi tropes however, especially with its stilted, Asimovian style dialogue in places.

There was some interesting potential in one of the main things foreboded in the book with the mysterious species moving through the dark spaces between stars without actually visiting them. In the end this intriguing plot device is almost an after thought. It is a shame it was not developed further.

This is a good sci-fi. It doesnt reach the great heights that GRRM has reached in some of his other works, but the story is told well and the concepts are interesting. Solid if not spectacular.

The illustrated version is also rather pretty!

I had gone through the authors books some time ago and added Nightflyers and Other Stories to my wishlist without even reading the bio. I then recently saw someone review it on Readerly under this Illustrated edition and had to grab it. A true scifi horror? And by Martin no less? Hot damn. 
For me this stands out as something that would immediately be linked to Event Horizon, but also this year's Dead Silence by S.A. Barnes as well. I found multiple articles asking if Nightflyers (due to the latest adaption) was based on EH entirely. Which struck me as super odd because no one pointed out that NF actually predates it. Apparently EH is based on an older movie that's based on an even older novel, but is uncredited. Dead Silence is kind of a spiritual retelling of both in a way. Regardless, Martin's ran so these other two had to walk, sadly. 
D'Branin and his team have hired the Nightflyer to take them after an elusive (and heavily debated) alien race. The ship is almost fully autonomous, being controlled by only a single man. Yet he refuses to show himself. Is he a ghost? An AI computer? Something even more dangerous and nefarious? And when things go wrong, just because he's the easiest to blame, is he the villain? 
This was atmospheric, engaging, creepy and overall a blast. Claustrophobic and evil, you can feel the cabin fever growing. 
Personally a 5/5* for me, can't believe I've never read before. David Palumbo's art is amazing and so worth it. Lots of use of the word ‘sexed'.