Bram Stoker Award nominee for Best First Novel!“This claustrophobic, horror-leaning tour de force is highly recommended for fans of Jeff VanderMeer’s Annihilation and Andy Weir’s The Martian.” — Publishers Weekly (starred review)A thrilling, atmospheric debut with the intensive drive of The Martian and Gravity and the creeping dread of Annihilation, in which a caver on a foreign planet finds … Gravity and the creeping dread of Annihilation, in which a caver on a foreign planet finds herself on a terrifying psychological and emotional journey for survival.
When Gyre Price lied her way into this expedition, she thought she’d be mapping mineral deposits, and that her biggest problems would be cave collapses and gear malfunctions. She also thought that the fat paycheck—enough to get her off-planet and on the trail of her mother—meant she’d get a skilled surface team, monitoring her suit and environment, keeping her safe. Keeping her sane.
Instead, she got Em.
Em sees nothing wrong with controlling Gyre’s body with drugs or withholding critical information to “ensure the smooth operation” of her expedition. Em knows all about Gyre’s falsified credentials, and has no qualms using them as a leash—and a lash. And Em has secrets, too . . .
As Gyre descends, little inconsistencies—missing supplies, unexpected changes in the route, and, worst of all, shifts in Em’s motivations—drive her out of her depths. Lost and disoriented, Gyre finds her sense of control giving way to paranoia and anger. On her own in this mysterious, deadly place, surrounded by darkness and the unknown, Gyre must overcome more than just the dangerous terrain and the Tunneler which calls underground its home if she wants to make it out alive—she must confront the ghosts in her own head.
But how come she can’t shake the feeling she’s being followed?
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Reading this book was like being slowly compressed by an anaconda. And I mean that as a compliment! The tension was superb as we follow Gyre down into the caves. She’s an excellent unreliable narrator and there were some truly scary moments. I loved the push and pull of her interactions with Em, too. Just UNF, excellent horror. Highly recommend this one!
As a diver this book could captivate the feeling of being under pressure and how you have rely your life on your instruments. Great future tech imagination. The book kept its hold well and it was easy to read. Although I bough paperback because the book was categorized as horror, but I found it more as a thriller and adventure.
Not my typical go-to, but I enjoyed this one.
Great imagination and storytelling. Caitlin Sterling has brilliantly captivated the feeling of being alone in the dark. If you like dive & cave movies and books, add this to your list.
I remember when I saw ‘The Luminous Dead’ on Netgalley. I had recently read ‘The Last Astronaut’ and when I saw the cover I was drawn to this, excited to read another similarly themed book (to a degree.)
Sadly, as with a number of books on Netgalley, this was unable to be requested, so I patiently waited until it was released and snagged it. It slowly made it’s way up my TBR as I watched more and more people rave about it. I watched as it was nominated for the Bram Stoker award for best first novel.
And then, there it was! Top of my TBR. I dove in (which if I was in the book would’ve been frowned upon) and truthfully, I struggled.
What I liked: ‘The Luminous Dead’ follows Gyre (which I still can’t figure out how to pronounce!) who has been selected to navigate a deep cave system. The book is set in the future, so Gyre has been surgically fused/infiltrated by the suit, which means it operates on a battery and eating is simply a function now, where she inserts a canister into the feeding port and voila, food in her belly.
At first there is little interaction between Gyre and the team that is watching over her from somewhere above. We soon find out her ‘team’ is simply one person – Em, and from there Starling begins a plot point of distrust and fear between our two characters. I enjoyed a lot of the back and forth between these two. At times, it borders on a romantic link, which continues throughout the rest of the book.
The cave itself acts as a majestic character, one that is home to these mysterious grub-like creatures, referred only to as Tunnelers. Because of this, the cave isn’t a solid set piece, instead, it often changes which made for some great tension as well as breaking up some of the monotony that started to happen half-way through.
The ending was a thrill-a-second finale, which kept me up longer than I wanted to, but was necessary, as there was no way I was going to fall asleep not knowing what happened.
What I didn’t like: I’ve seen a lot of people mention how claustrophobic and dread-filled the story was, and honestly I personally didn’t find either of those feelings anywhere. I did find chapter upon chapter that just felt unnecessary. I think the constant back and forth between Em and Gyre and Gyre’s distrust and anger towards Em and some of the decisions she’d made previously (staying spoiler free – so that’s all I can say!) became tedious and slowed the progression down. If this had been a novella length read, I think for my reader’s brain it would’ve been superb, but instead this never once had me riveted until the very end.
Why you should buy it: This one is a great study on relationships and one thing Starling did phenomenally was to create a lot with a little. This is essentially a novel with three characters: Em, Gyre and the cave. Other characters pop up here and there regarding back story etc, but otherwise Starling crafted a dramatic/border-line romance piece set in an immense sprawling cave system. If that sounds like a book you’d like to read, get on it!
The Luminous Dead by Caitlin Starling was another attempt for me into the Science Fiction genre, but unfortunately it didn’t work as well for me as other books have.
I was really fascinated by the main character being a caver, and it definitely amped up the claustrophobia. However, I was expecting it to be a lot creepier than it ended up being for some reason? I think if it were a movie it would be terrifying, but even though the author did really well describing the setting it wasn’t enough to make me all that creeped out. I also don’t have claustrophobia so maybe that helped!
The Luminous Dead was super atmospheric and I really liked it on audio. I think that the narrator, Adenrele Ojo, did an amazing job as Gyre and if I would have had the time I would have listened to the entire book. I was trying to finish it for a buddy read though so I mostly read my physical copy which may have been my downfall.
If you like sci-fi and the synopsis sounds good to you then I would recommend reading or listening to The Luminous Dead. I did enjoy it and even though it was the middle of the road for me rating-wise, I would still recommend it and I will definitely read more of this author’s work!
A harrowing, merciless descent into the human psyche.
Not what I expected
This is not the book I was expecting from the little bit I read about it before starting to read. I expected much more sci fi/horror. Yes, it is still sci fi and horror but, for the most part, it is a character study and a psychological thriller about two women.
Cassandra-V is a desolate mining planet populated with people trying to save enough money to get off the planet. Gyre Price is 22 years old and is hired to go underground in an unexplored cave to find new mineral deposits – she thinks.
It’s only after she’s underground (alone) that she finds out just how perilous her mission is.
This is a long book and it shows the skill of the author that she was able to keep my interest from beginning to end with two characters – Gyre and Em, her handler – and basically just the dialogue between them.
There are caving sequences and diving sequences that throw in some variety, and some perfunctory horror scenes but mainly this is a story of the developing relationship between two troubled women.
I recommend this book on the basis of what I’ve reviewed. If you’re expecting something else, you might be disappointed.
I received this book from Harper Voyager through Edelweiss in the hopes that I would read this book and leave an unbiased review.