by
Winner of the 2013 PRISM Award for Futuristic Romance
When Earth Central Command tells you to travel 24 light-years to a long-term assignment you never asked for, you go. High school teacher Marianne Woolsey has no choice but leave her hometown in rural Iowa to spend 26 years teaching the daughter of an alien ruler so humanlike that she has to keep telling herself that he is just her boss.
Handsome, deadly, and far older than he looks, the Sural finds himself drawn to the tutor he requested from Earth. He cannot reveal anything to her that he wants to conceal from the spacefaring races of the Interstellar Trade Alliance, but he cannot stay away from her. As their friendship grows, so does his conviction that she is hiding something from him.
This first novel in the Tales of Tolari Space series explores what can happen when you put an unsuspecting human on a planet of empaths.
Publisher: Independently Published
Editors:
Cover Artists:
Genres:
Tropes: FTL, Interstellar Travel
Word Count: 67000
Setting: Beta Hydri IV
Languages Available: English
Series Type: Same Universe / Various Characters
Tropes: FTL, Interstellar Travel
Word Count: 67000
Setting: Beta Hydri IV
Languages Available: English
Series Type: Same Universe / Various Characters
In the first in a series, Meierz’s debut, a rich sci-fi love story about a female teacher sent to a foreign planet to tutor the daughter of its rulers in various Earth languages, could be described as a space-opera spin on Anna and the King of Siam.
When the government informs high school teacher Marianne that she has been selected for a mission to the Tolari homeworld, where she will be the sole human occupant on that planet for 26 years, she hesitates, although she’s aware of the unpleasant consequences that would befall her should she ignore this “request.” Once on Tolar, a planet that houses a humanoid species known for being technologically primitive by Earth standards, she comes to discover that things are not quite as they seem. Meierz’s novel charts Marianne’s slowly budding romance with the Sural, the Tolari leader, as well as her gradual acclimation to this new world that is perhaps not as bizarre or backward as she originally thought. Meierz writes admirably, conjuring an alien planet and culture in a manner as straightforward as it is succinct. Her assured, no-frills approach to worldbuilding makes it easy to suspend any disbelief one might have regarding the novel’s more fantastical elements. Her realistic characters and their relationships build organically. The romance that develops between Marianne and the Sural, as well as Marianne’s shift in allegiance, might not come as a surprise to any reader, and there’s a predictable, overly melodramatic revelation regarding a trauma in Marianne’s past, but Meierz captures readers’ attention through her naturalistic character development and pacing. She also makes Earth’s government truly frightening and reprehensible.
A beautifully realized story that proves that politically driven space opera and tender love stories do not have to be mutually exclusive.
