"Chindi" is the third novel in the Priscilla Hutchins series. The archaeological mysteries continue."Hutch", as her friends call her, is fed up with her career as pilot. She gets all of the blame when things go wrong and none of the credit when things go right. She's been asked by her employer, the Science Academy, to pilot one last mission before landing a desk job: ferry the well heeled members of the "Contact Society", an E.T.-phile crowd, around in a ship they commissioned for the Academy on its maiden voyage to investigate a strange signal emanating from the vicinity of a neutron star.We journey with the crew as they discover a network of stealth satellites engaged in the observation of several worlds. As Hutch and her passengers track down clues to who built the network and why, they visit several worlds in the network and even make first contact with a new alien species. It's significant in that most worlds explored in this series contain the ruins of long dead civilizations, with one or two exceptions.One of Hutch's passengers is an ex-boyfriend. Readers of previous works know that Hutch has been unlucky in love. Her career doesn't leave much time on Earth for relationships. Interstellar pilot really gives a new meaning to long distance relationships. Most give up. Hutch's relationship with this ex, Tor, makes for an interesting sub-plot, though it takes a while to really develop.I don't want to give away too much, but suffice it to say that the Contact Society may have bitten off more than it could chew. Fatal mishaps plague the expedition, but they press on. Their compelling need to get to the bottom of the mystery pushes them on. They're rewarded with the discovery of the "chindi," a massive starship that they believe is the key to the stealth satellite network. Despite everything that has gone wrong and Hutch's warnings, the remaining members of the Contact Society set out to make contact with the chindi. The story reaches its climax with Hutch setting out to rescue her passengers from the chindi after a surprise turn of events.McDevitt's writing style returns to the top form he achieved with "Engines of God" and quite possibly surpasses it. While Deepsix was a bit of a disappointment to this reader, Chindi made up for it. While his ability to weave a good mystery has never been a problem, McDevitt's use of characterization in "Chindi" easily surpasses what he provided in the previous two novels in this series. And the level of action and suspense also return to the level presented in Engines of God. This was a novel that I had a tough time putting down. Excellent work. Highly recommended.
Wish I had read it before. Priscilla Hutchins (Hutch for friends) starts the book with an almost botched salvage on a station circling a star going almost nova. What a start for her, and she wishes to retire it she is convinced to try one last flight to look at a white nano star where a strange transmission was heard 20 years prior.The passenger belong to a society of "Contact" who are looking for aliens. The Galaxy until now is quite empty and mankind has not found some other starfaring races, even though they found traces (see Deepsix book).The group strikes gold and finds a world which has not survived nuclear war and from then on it is a continuous crescendo, until Almost the last page, of adventures and very good archeological science fiction.Some of the adventures do not look good on the characters, as they seem a bit dull and do not understand something that is quite apparent (hurrying in trying to dismantle an alien satellite is not advisable, who would have ever thought of it ?) but it is still very good.I read it in 4 days, could not let it down, a cliffhanger after another, probably the best of the first four books in this series.
Do You like book Chindi (2003)?
This one's been sat on the shelf for a while.McDevitt has a reputation for solid old-fashioned SF, with an emphasis on plot rather than characterisation. His work reminds me of the SF being published (and I was reading!) back in the 1980's.This is pretty much that.Where McDevitt scores is in developing that 'sensawunder' for the reader, so reminiscent to me of the Analogs and Astoundings of years gone by. Here we have long dead aliens and their cultural remains uncovered, underneath a sky with not just one but two ringed planets.We travel on vast empty alien spaceships, whose purpose and occupants remain enigmatic.The pages turned very nicely, with situation after situation being piled on to ratchet up the tension.On the downside the events did become a little bit far-fetched at times, especially towards the end. McDevitt gets a little too over-emotional at times, in what is both a love story and a love of technology, and as a result lets the emotion override the logic. At other times things do seem to be solved a little too conveniently in a book that is in that true tradition of problem-solving SF.And yet, despite all this, despite the cliched and rather thin characterisation, despite the fact that you knew what was going to happen, this was a real page turner that was difficult to put down.
—Mark
I've read two other of McDevitt's books and they were both good reads.... "The Engines of God" and "Omega". In Omega the characters reference events that occurred during Chindi so I read it to find out what had happened. I found the book to be a very exciting and enjoyed it immensely.It has a strong woman main character (Hutch) but what I like about it is that the characters are not too smart and not too brave. They are only smart enough and brave enough. That makes them more real to me. The circumstances are extraordinary... not the characters themselves.The story is about the pilot (Priscilla Hutchens) who wants to retire from space ferrying scientists from star to star, but the Academy director asks her to do just one more. A group from the Contact Society (read as "rich nuts") want to contract her services to fly out to a neutron star where possible radio contact with an alien race was thought to have been made. It looks like a trip out and back, making these rich Academy donors happy, but it turns into an adventure.I really liked it and it was a nail-biter until the very end.
—Alex
3.5 stars. This is the third book in the Priscilla Hutchins series, and even though I've got this far I'm still torn about it. The main character ('Hutch') is a little lacking. There are plenty of internal monologues and character building type stuff, but she just doesn't seem like a fully rounded character to me. And this can be extended to the other characters. After a while they mainly just blur into each other so I forget who is who, and only slightly care to be honest. The draw of the books, for me, is the epic backstory, which is let out in excruciatingly small hints and plot developments, padded out by one crisis after another, with heroic resolutions etc....... Towards the end of Chindi I just wanted it all to be over....
—Dave Dando-moore
