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[malabar]

The debut novel by writer and critic Adam Roberts; first published 2000.

An interstellar voyage to Salt, a planet with a lot of sodium chloride, is undertaken by a fleet containing various religious groups from Earth. Petja is the opening narrator of the novel. He belongs to a community of anarchists called Alsists. There are various other religious groups making the same journey, all strung out like pearls attached to a comet (an inevitably risky form of transport, especially considering the cabin fever inside the various ships, but the quickest way to cover the distances involoved). The Senaarians have a patriarchal, hierarchical culture and despise the Alsists for their perceived savagery.

One of the Alsists commits suicide and threatens the whole mission. This causes concern in the Senaar ship, who want to avoid a repeat performance. They ask the Alsists to send a delegate to discuss the issue, and Petja is sent. Not that Petja is any kind of leader: like all the Alsists, he's against any form of hierarchy and just goes because it happens to be his turn that day. Thus begins the troubled relationship between Senaar and the Alsists, which is exacerbated by the fact that Senaar men have fathered children on the Alsist ship. The undisciplined Alsists then break ranks by deciding to land on Salt first, angering the Senaarians further without even realising it.

What made this book work for me was that it is primarily about the people and their ideological conflicts - the SF setting is just the background. The author seems to have set out to make it so, because the amount of space devoted to the actual planet is sparse. Thought-provoking.