The Reader Who Read

This is one of 'those' books that keeps you up late at night until dots dance in front of your eyes and somewhere in the back of your mind you know you will be worthless at work in a few hours, but it doesn't matter because right now you are truly alive and traveling in a human spaceship on an imperative mission to a new world full of danger and excitement.

And you're in love, hopelessly and desperately in love. Your breath catches in your throat when he speaks your name and when he looks at you...

This futuristic tale is the story of Helva, born mentally superior but severely handicapped, whose parents choose to give their infant daughter to the government for a life of service rather than have her destroyed. Helva is encased in a protective metal 'shell' and her brain is wired to peripheral attachments to allow her to see, hear, and speak with computerized devices far advanced to mere human eyes, ears, and vocal cords. However, as Helva matures she realizes that singing is a problem and she methodically experiments until she can sing any range of notes and, with access to extensive computer databases, any song.

Upon mental maturity, Helva graduates from the governmental program and is given her own spaceship where her shell is hidden behind a titanium wall and her brain is attached to all the spaceship devices. She is in debt to the government and will travel to distant worlds delivering important items and people until her pay-off is achieved. But first, she must choose a 'brawn', a mobile partner who is merely a normal human being, however extensively trained and intelligent he may be. And so she chooses Jennan, beautiful and sensitive, who understands she is human and not a machine. Although Helva can hear from anywhere in the ship, Jennan unfailingly turns his eyes to where Helva resides behind her wall.

I love a story with a strong heroine and Helva is brave, feisty, and independent. Like most new graduates, she is a little too smug and haughty and her sarcasm is biting. She has had massive doses of 'shell psychology' that make her proud of being a 'shell person', but she hasn't dealt with the limitations.

This is just the beginning to Helva's life among the stars, an existence fraught with challenge, laughter and songs, unimaginable danger, and tragedy. Every chapter is a new adventure. Religious fanatics, space pirates, strange lifeforms, and drug addicts challenge Helva's intelligence and training. But no school has prepared her to deal with love.

'The Ship Who Sang' is truly a book you can't put down; however, Ms. McCaffrey is not kind to lazy readers. This book is written at a higher level, almost scientific in nature, the language and ideas require concentration and attention to detail and it cannot be skimmed. It is even better the second or third time it is read. And you will!

This is not one of the books in Ms. McCaffrey's 'Pern' series. Although I enjoyed most of the Pern books, I found the plot too narrow for a sustained series. 'The Ship Who Sang' is fast-paced and sings a completely different tune. I wish it had been a longer book but I hate finishing a good book whatever its length.

The sky lightens to that impossible pre-dawn haze and that one early bird begins to sing and you are still awake and clutching a closed book, tossing on a pillow damp with tears, reluctant to let go.