Summer reads

"The Margarets"
By Sheri S. Tepper
Eos, $26.95

What if your mountain lake or ocean beach destination isn't far enough, vast enough? What if you want adventure travel but you have only a weekend to spare? There's nothing quite like struggling with big issues in distant future worlds to banish workplace and everyday concerns from the mind. In "The Margarets," Sheri S. Tepper provides a handy wormhole through space into a deliciously inventive and adventurous quest.

Margaret is the only kid on a research colony orbiting Mars. Smart, bored and profoundly lonely, she begins to create alter egos for fun. A spy, a queen, a tough boy -- her imaginary selves are her only friends. The adults around her are working on a doomed project to transform Mars into a garden planet, and let her be.

As Margaret grows into a smart and lonely teenager her family must return to the grim, environmentally ravished Earth, where the only economically viable product for interplanetary export is human slaves. Facing a series of blind choices that pull her in two directions, she begins to shed the imaginary Margarets.

The Margarets scatter off to other settled worlds, unaware of their other selves. Each Margaret struggles to survive by her (or his) wits, and to understand the growing threats to Earth and humanity. While they are not equally brave or heroic, they are each called upon to take action in dangerous times, as unknown forces pull them toward the other selves they do not know.

You might call this book dystopian speculative fiction with social commentary and strong female characters, fitting squarely in Tepper's body of work. But that misses the pure adventure that provides the summer reading pleasure in this book. "The Margarets" incorporates a grab bag of creatures, cultures, psychological metaphors, characters, commentaries and predicaments. The result is a delightful variation on the kind of novel with disparate characters and plot threads that somehow come together at the end. In this tale, they are together in the mind of a child at the beginning.

What's more, these are not simplistic and flimsy characters. Here M'urgi, Ongamar, Gretamara and the rest of the Margarets each prove more interesting and independent than they have any right to be. But there's no need to pay any attention to the craft of this story. Just slide into it like your most comfortable summer sandals and enjoy.

-- Gail Ann Williams

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