Series
Engines of Light
Ken MacLeod · 3 novels · 2000–2002
Ken MacLeod's Engines of Light trilogy opens with Cosmonaut Keep, alternating between a present-day scientist drawn into a hidden Soviet-era space program and an interstellar exploration effort in the far future, carried out with the help of long-lived, faster-than-light-capable alien traders. The two timelines gradually converge across Dark Light and Engine City. MacLeod uses the setup to work through his recurring interests in Cold War history and left-wing politics inside a space-opera frame.
Summary by Loreful, from public sources
Reading order
The order the books came out.
Best read in the order they were published.
- Omnibus editions(1 edition)
Map
Engines of Light at the centre, its books fanned around what holds them. Pick anything for its details, and zoom out for similar series in orbit — the reading order above lists the same books as text.
Stats
By decade
- 2000s3
Shape
Mood
Bright and intense: 67% of this series' placed works, the catalog's 44%.
this series · the catalog · one dot = one book3 of 3 works carry a tone
Edges of the map
- Dark Lightdarkest · calmest
- Cosmonaut Keepbrightest · most intense