Books › Slow Bullets
Slow Bullets
192 pages
A tense, claustrophobic journey through deep space that asks what remains of humanity when our history is stripped away.
What it feels like
This novella delivers a tightly coiled, claustrophobic experience that balances the immediate tension of a locked-room survival thriller with the sweeping, melancholic weight of deep time. The narrative moves at a brisk, urgent clip, thrusting the reader into a decaying ship alongside bitter enemies forced into an uneasy truce. Despite the high-stakes environment, the underlying mood is deeply reflective and somber, steeped in existential dread and the tragedy of forgotten histories. The prose is clean and pragmatic, focusing on the gritty, mechanical realities of survival while leaving room for profound philosophical questions about memory and reconciliation. It is a perfect read for sci-fi fans who crave atmospheric, thought-provoking stories where the greatest battle is preserving the fragile legacy of humanity itself.
- Mood
- claustrophobic
- melancholic
- tense
- dread-tinged
- Tone
- somber
- pragmatic
- reflective
- urgent
- Pace
- brisk
- Themes
- fragility of memory · post-war reconciliation · burden of history · survival in the void · shared humanity
- The writing
- Clean, utilitarian, and quietly atmospheric, grounding vast existential concepts in the gritty mechanics of survival.
- The arc
- Begins in disoriented, hostile desperation and slowly transforms into a solemn, cooperative determination to preserve a dying history.
- Who it's for
- Readers who love locked-room space mysteries and philosophical sci-fi that wrestles with the weight of deep time and the legacy of war.
Content notes
- war trauma
- claustrophobia
- violence
- memory loss
- existential dread
About the book
A vast conflict, one that has encompassed hundreds of worlds and solar systems, appears to be finally at an end. A conscripted soldier is beginning to consider her life after the war and the family she has left behind. But for Scur and for humanity peace is not to be. On the brink of the ceasefire, Scur is captured by a renegade war criminal, and left for dead in the ruins of a bunker. She revives aboard a prisoner transport vessel. Something has gone terribly wrong with the ship. Passengers, combatants from both sides of the war, are waking up from hibernation far too soon. Their memories, embedded in bullets, are the only links to a world which is no longer recognizable. And Scur will be reacquainted with her old enemy, but with much higher stakes than just her own life.
Hugo Awards (science fiction) - Best Novella Finalist, 2016.
Description from Open Library.
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