The fantasy-science-fiction novel Moonbound spans time and splits into several stories, for me never quite gelling into a coherent tale I could sink my teeth into.
In Robin Sloan's science-fiction-fantasy tale Moonbound, it's eleven thousand years in the future, and young Ariel lives with his brother in a land controlled by a powerful wizard. Yet to the wizard's constant dismay, Ariel seems destined to never quite live up to his destiny, and he never behaves quite evilly enough, either.
Dragons feature heavily in the lore of the kingdom, including their ages-old trip to the moon, where they still reside and, we are told, wield control over the Earth.
An ancient, sentient AI creature takes up residence inside Ariel, serving as an internal voice and a documentarian of Ariel's life experience.
A young girl arrives, telling the story of her own timeline, and she and Ariel begin to figure out they may be able to advance their own goals if they work together.
For me, the many disparate pieces of the novel never really fit together in a coherent way. The dragons are a large part of the history--and are purported to exercise control over humans and creatures on earth--yet are never present, nor does the threat of their wrath ever feel real. The Ariel storyline feels most compelling when it focuses on the interplay between Ariel and the omniscient Anth inside him, but the book moves in several other directions, making the tale feel disjointed.
Clever beavers feature heavily in this book, and I never felt as though this strange element gelled with the rest of the story.
I listened to Moonbound as an audiobook.
Do you have any Bossy thoughts about this book?
Robin Sloan is also the author of Mr. Penumbra's 24-Hour Bookstore and Sourdough.
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