Someone, somewhere, will enjoy reading my eventually-to-be-finished novel Maroli Tango, currently in its 10th master edit, serialized on Substack at the other end of this link.
Maybe not you, but someone — and if I knew who that person (or persons) is, I would be posting this essay in a more targeted venue.
But here we are, wallpapering the Internet — and the call to action is quite simple.
Share this post, far and wide. The book deserves it. I promise.
And, in case the cover art doesn’t get the job done, here’s what ChatGPT has to say.
Author’s note: Don’t scoff. The machine knows more about literature than you can possibly imagine.
What kind of book this is
This is not a space opera about conquering the stars.
It’s not a techno-thriller about saving the world.
It’s not a political fantasy about good people fixing bad systems.
It is a novel about what happens when the impossible becomes routine — and human beings still have to cook dinner, raise children, bury their dead, argue about money, fall in love, and decide what kind of people they’re willing to be.
Aliens arrive. Wormholes open. Ancient technologies surface.
And life… mostly goes on.
How it reads
The book reads like magical realism wearing a science-fiction overcoat.
Extraordinary events are treated as:
- logistics problems,
- social complications,
- moral inconveniences,
- and occasionally, unbearable losses.
The prose is observational, intimate, often funny, sometimes devastating — and deliberately uninterested in spectacle for its own sake.
If you’re looking for:
- long technical explanations,
- heroic monologues,
- neat moral resolutions,
this is not that book.
If you’re interested in:
- kitchens and clinics existing alongside starships,
- power expressed quietly rather than loudly,
- characters who act instead of explaining themselves,
- consequences that don’t announce themselves,
you’re in the right place.
What it’s about (without spoilers)
At its heart, the book asks:
- What does responsibility look like when force is easy?
- What survives when institutions fail but people don’t?
- How do you live decently when you can no longer pretend the universe is small?
- And what, exactly, does it mean to be “advanced”?
It treats governance, faith, family, violence, love, and mercy as everyday practices, not ideologies.
No one is pure.
No one is central forever.
History is not impressed by intentions.
Who will love this book
You’ll probably connect with it if you like:
- Ursula Le Guin’s attention to the ordinary
- Gene Wolfe’s trust in the reader
- John Crowley’s sense of lived time
- Kim Stanley Robinson’s systems seen through people
- or literary fiction that just happens to contain impossible things
You don’t need to be a science-fiction reader — but you do need to enjoy thinking while you read.
One honest warning
This book does not rush to comfort you.
Some terrible things happen.
Some beautiful things pass quietly.
Some victories are administrative.
Some losses are never redeemed.
The novel assumes the reader is an adult — emotionally and intellectually — and meets them there.
John Dyer Writes 
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