Book review: Saturn

Ben Bova is one of those authors who is well respected by other science fiction authors. Part of why I hear his name a lot is because he used to be the editor for the sci-fi magazine "Analog". He helped a lot of big names get started. So when I saw one of his books on sale at the Friends of the Arlington Library Book Sale I grabbed it.

"Saturn" takes place after some major disasters happened on Earth. Religious organizations have taken over almost all governments and imposed a rather oppressive form of order on them. One of the reasons enough people were willing to accept them as the government was that they'd changed their views on birth control and abortion. It was the population problem that caused most of the problems the fundamentalists were trying to solve.

Anyway a space station capable of supporting 100,000 people is loaded up with 10,000 people and sent off towards Saturn on a scientific expedition to study the moons, rings, and whatever else they can find. The people chosen for the mission tend to be free thinkers and independently minded folks who don't fit in with the current administrations. Some are in scientific exile and some are in prison. There's scientists, farmers, engineers, shopkeepers, doctors, barbers, bureaucrats, and all sorts needed for a society.

The real purpose of the expedition is to study what will happen to a group of people sent off on their own. Will they form a new government or keep the rules and leaders assigned on Earth? What kind of society will develop? How will people behave?

Slipped into a few key places are representatives of the religious organizations ruling Earth. Their job is to make sure these people can't escape God's holy rule. They're to take power and keep everyone under their type of control.

And so the story goes. There's some unexpected scientific discoveries late in the book about why Saturn's rings are so full and bright while Jupiter, Uranus, and Neptune have such puny rings. But most of the book focuses on the political manipulations aboard the station.

This story was OK but not great. The writing has convinced me to pick up a few other of Bova's work.