I was a little apprehensive to read Alien Clay by Adrian Tchaikovsky. I had read one of his short stories; The Road to Aldebaran and absolutely loved it, but then when I tried one of his full-length books; The Doors of Eden, I had to DNF it after 3 attempts.

I really needn’t have worried - I thoroughly enjoyed Alien Clay and was hooked throughout. We are introduced to Arton Daghdev, a rebel professor who has been shipped off to a prison colony on a new planet for upsetting The Mandate. However, the planet of Kiln holds a secret and Arton should have been careful what he wished for when he said he wanted to study alien life up close and personal.

Although I found The Doors of Eden to be a little inaccessible due to the more traditional sci-fi nature of the text, Alien Clay is a more relatable and easy read, whilst still keeping the intelligent narrative voice of Tchaikovky. Arton is an interesting character, and everything is written from his perspective. There are some time jumps in the third part of the story, as we are treated to flashbacks interspersed with current events, but this works well to keep the tension high. The world building of the planet of Kiln is vast and detailed, and I could picture everything that was described which is sometimes an issue for me with Sci-Fi books.

Not wanting to give any spoilers, the last part of the book is brilliantly crafted, and I really enjoyed seeing the characters develop. Although the ending is a touch cliched, I think it was the only way it could have ended.

Overall, Alien Clay was a 5 star read for me and has made me want to explore more of Tchaikovsky’s writing. Thank you to NetGalley & Pan Macmillan – Tor for the chance to read the ARC in exchange for an honest review.

Alien Clay is a book about politics as much as it is about aliens.

It begins as Professor Arton Daghdev plummets at speed to the ground of the planet Kiln, thrown from the latest ship bearing new workers. He's been exiled due to political activism, now condemned to live out the rest of his life under a new sky, where strange creatures roam outside the safety of humanity's dome.

It's a wry first-person tale from a scared and intrigued narrator. As desperate as Daghdev is to learn more about life on Kiln - the only known planet that might harbour intelligent life - he's also scared of being beaten to death by the superiors there, or worse. What follows is a prison story, to begin with. He doesn't know who to trust or who trusts him. He's constantly asking questions. Will he get beaten if the commandant asks to see him (yes)? Will previous allies ever trust him again (maybe)? Can a rebellion ever succeed (wait and see)?

The problem is, the people in charge at Kiln don't want to get truly up close and personal with this alien world until they fully understand it. Nor are they ready for the truth if it doesn't align to tidy expectations. Anyone with an opinion who differs from theirs is in danger. Including Daghdev. Eventually his opinions land him 'outside' where he finally gets to properly experience the alien clay (so to speak) that makes up the nature of Kiln. The things/individuals/monsters he encounters are scary, curious, and yet so believable in the world the author creates.

After all, Tchaikovsky is an expert at writing wondrous worlds, and Kiln is no different.

I was lucky enough to see him at a book signing shortly before the release of this title and it was fascinating to get an insight into what makes him tick, and how he enjoys looking at humanity through SF (which is exactly why I love SF as a genre so much).

This isn't a light read, but it is a well-thought-out, compelling one that's very relevant for today. The ending was both satisfying and a tiny bit disturbing - in a good way!

Alien Clay is a standalone (I think) far-future science fiction novel. It is typical Adrian Tchaikovsky in its uniqueness, its weirdness, its inventiveness, and I absolutely love it for that. The guy is an absolute master at creating incredible worlds and maybe making your skin crawl as you're reading and enjoying his work, and Alien Clay is no different.

We start off with a character literally being dropped off on a planet and we're just thrown in at the deep end. The planet itself is called Kiln and it's essentially a prison colony. In this far future, Earth has been taken over by the Mandate and they outlaw various sciences and scientific thought and so you have all of these people who are rounded up and sent off to various different prison planets, who you wouldn't normally expect to see imprisoned, or at least not for the reasons they are.

Kiln itself is a bit different to the other prison planets because it's got almost an Earthlike quality to it. It is almost a viable atmosphere—you can survive in it for a certain amount of time, at least—it's within that Goldilocks Zone of temperatures, so it does make it a potentially viable planet for humankind to colonise, but we only have a prison colony on there at the time the book is set.

The first humans to land on Kiln soon found out that they were not the first life forms there, and that that's where this book starts to get interesting because they are trying to find out where the builders went—they have these incredible structures and they have all of these incredible life forms, but they do not match up. There's no way that they can imagine the life forms that they have creating these structures, so a lot of the people who are sent to Kiln as prisoners are cherry-picked for their scientific background and they're going to try to unlock the secrets of the planet.

This story is written in the first person and you follow an ecologist called Arton Daghdev. I like exploring the world from his point of view because he's never been to Kiln, and I've never been to Kiln, so we're exploring together as we go and the vibe this gave me was very much that of Project Hail Mary by Andy Weir. The science was less “in your face”—it's not about trying to figure out where we are and what we're doing and using science to fill in the gaps, it's more about what the character already knows and explaining it to us in a very dry manner. That really worked for me, it's the type of humour that I get along with very well.

I like how we start with Daghdev waking up from cryosleep (or whatever you would call it in this far future) and he is literally falling to the planet. You've got these barges that send out prisoners and it's a one-way trip—the ship isn't supposed to go back and do another journey or anything along those lines, it’s literally a fragmentation barge that breaks up in the atmosphere and some of the prisoners don't make it. They die on entry to the planet, so it's a real harrowing opening as we're going through the waking experience with Daghdev as he's burning up in the atmosphere over a brand-new planet. So that's very different and I like the way that it was handled.

The planet itself is also very, very different in its worldbuilding. Tchaikovsky has literally built a world from scratch here and it shows. There are no real Earthly attributes to this planet, it's a whole new world and a whole new system and everything in it is brand new. There are analogues—things that look like things we would have, trees for instance, the structures have very defined rooms and they can imagine what certain rooms might be used for, that kind of thing, but everything is new, the materials and so forth, and it makes for a very creative and very exciting world as you're exploring it and finding out all of the dangers that lie within.

The two main things that I think were a bit different for Alien Clay are the characters and the plot. Adrian Tchaikovsky is great at writing characters I can really relate to, get on with, or generally just enjoy. Here it's very difficult because it's in the first person, so your main character is Daghdev and you don't really get to know the other characters quite so much, partly because he doesn't necessarily spend time with them, but partly because, of course, you're looking at them through one particular viewing portal. You're only seeing them as Daghdev sees them, so it's quite difficult to build a real picture of them and to really get into their heads.

The story itself was a little weird for me. It definitely surprised me as it did not go in the direction I expected it to. That's a good thing though because Tchaikovsky is so prolific, he has written a lot of books, a lot of very different storylines and scenarios, and I've read a number of those and he still manages to surprise me. He still takes me on a journey and ends up in a completely different location to the one that I fully expected to be arriving in.

It was done very well here, nicely developed over the course of the story, and even when I started to understand where we were going, I was still waiting for those moments where we would pull away from it. Periodically, those did come along, and then we were pulled back, and it was all very different for me, a very different way of telling the story and not necessarily pandering to our expectations.

I love that you've got two main story lines and the actual key story, the main thing that's happening, is kind of in the background actually for a lot of the book. It really gets brought to the forefront partway through the story though, and it does sneak up on you a little bit because you're focusing on the main aspect as the character sees it—and of course, he doesn't see the whole picture, he's learning things as he goes along. I think the way that that was told was done very well because you're not necessarily going to get the threads of the big picture until you spend enough time there to be exposed to them.

I guess the wording of being exposed to them is very relevant here as well because of the type of world that you've got, the type of organisms that you've got on there as well, and the way that they're not really compatible with humans but they're trying to be. You don't have alien species that will go and kill and eat humans, because they're not compatible, and that works the other way as well, so the humans can't really eat the vegetation or the creatures of the planet either, they can't digest them.

Overall, I had a good time with this story. There were a few bits in the middle where I though it kind of bogged down a little bit, the pacing wasn't quite right for me throughout the entirety of the story, but excepting that, I thought it was a really good novel. It showed another type of creativity, another weird and wonderful way that Adrian Tchaikovsky's mind can work, and it did everything I think it set out to do in a very competent way. It wasn't my favourite Tchaikovsky, but then I've read a lot of his work, and Alien Clay already had a very high bar to get over for me.

Alien Clay is a really interesting mix of sci-fi, dystopian and a tiny sprinkle of horror. We have an alien planet, Kiln, that acts as a prison for people who go against the Mandate which is essentially an all powerful government. Most of the prisoners are political dissidents giving this a very dystopian feel!

The world building is great and we get a real insight into how the system works and how corrupt it is. The Mandate basically wants to prove that humans are the optimal species and how life is meant to be. The descriptions of Kiln make us feel like we are really there and we can really see that this is a world very much unlike Earth.

The characters are all pretty interesting people and I like all the interactions between them. I really loved the writing style, it's easy to get hooked. This is my first full length Tchaikovsky novel and it has such a different more serious voice than the novellas!

Overall this is such a unique concept that was well executed.

Tchaikovsky cemented his status of deranged visionary genius in my list of modern sci-fi writers. While Alien Clay's premise is slightly derivative, execution is still on point with an engaging and witty narrative voice (à la Martian) carrying the story to a satisfying conclusion.
Only downsides for me were a lot of repetition (not sure why he found it necessary to restate how biology and species worked on the planet so many times) and an overly on-the-nose moral message towards the end that I found a bit unnecessary. 8/10

Science as those of us from the Science Fiction reading community is cool, noble, and hopeful. We love it. But science in our actual world has had a more mixed history. Science can be seen as political and has been used by those in powerful to bring them prestige, authority, and validation. The Race to the Moon or the Bomb shows that uneasy balancing act and when science runs counter to those in power’s worldview then suddenly the knives rather than scalpels will be sharpened. In Adrian Tchaikovsky’s fascinating novel Alien Clay, we have this conflict explored with added commentary on the power and problems of revolution.

The Madate had controlled Earth for over 90 years. Its tight grip on the population now covers not just Earth but has spread out to the three planets felt capable of some form of alien life. But The Madate’s use of science doesn’t spread to the usual orthodox means of exploration. They send to these far off and dangerous worlds the people that the Mandate view as its enemies to never be seen again – criminals, revolutionaries, unionists, and scientists who have not done what was expected of them. One key area of investigation is the planet Kiln which has a vibrant, deadly, and chaotic ecosystem of flora and fauna but also incredibly strange ruins of a vanished civilisation and possibly even remains of a language to translate. Arriving at the prison camp for investigating this is former Professor and dissident now prisoner Arton Daghdev. He finds himself with the attention of a Commandant who wants science to prove his own theories; Daghdev also has former resistance allies viewing him with suspicion while their own plans are prepared and most of all that Kiln itself holds dangers and revelations for everyone.

This is a really interesting and engrossing tale that in keeping with its themes explores an amalgamation of familiar plotlines; but nothing quite goes the way we expect it to. The mysterious alien planet with secrets to explore is a staple of the genre but here it’s also a prison camp of exiled scientists trying to find the answers. But it’s also not pure science as we usually find. Here the Commandant expects the Mandate’s view of reality to be proven and no other answers will be tolerated. Tchaikovsky plays with the idea that often science and politics (particularly dictatorships) want science to prove their view of the world cementing their position in the universe; on earth this has often been regards some form of racial superiority but Tchaikovsky has the idea that when we encounter the idea of alien life that it moves to a belief that humanity (and by definition the Mandate) need to be shown to be the heirs to the universe that all other life must look up to. It’s the next incarnation of Intelligent Design and we get our scientist prisoners dressed up for dinner parties for their Commandant but only his own theories must be explored or else demotion and likely death will occur.

This opens a debate on the morality of scientists – will they put their scientific purity above their desire to live? Our narrator is Daghdev and he definitely is not the revolutionary hero planning to lead people to the next renaissance. Daghdev is a fascinating grumpy and cynical character. He dislikes on principle the Mandate’s way of doing things; has skirted around the resistance groups and now finds himself pretty much dumped out of the world he knew. From a terrifying start to the novel as he awakens from a cryo-freezing then dropped from space onto an alien planet with only 80% survival rates we are soon in a prison drama - this may explain his grumpy nature. But he’s more complex and we find he too has plans. It’s a capricious political system that punishes hard those out of line but also we find threads of resistance, in the first two parts of the book we get the bravery of those who resist and the problems of resistance. Daghdev doesn’t trust anyone and many think he too is a traitor that likely got them imprisoned. The all seeing Commandant above them likes to foster division - some groups valued more than others; some people get special duties and it’s all a cleverly designed political ecosystem to keep control. Tchaikovsky in this book explores how that works and then has an interesting angle on the solution. Daghdev’s voice makes it work with gallows humour, snobbery and mild paranoia to make you feel how dangerous the camp is.

This brings us to Kiln a hotbed of alien life. As always with Tchaikovsky’s work it uses some biological ideas and then runs with them to dramatic effect. From its yellow-blue-black sky to mysterious black flowers this does not feel Earth like at all. It’s a massively invasive system that exposure to could soon see your body growing, carrying and releasing alien growths and yet it’s highly inventive here Kiln is a melting pot of symbiosis as various creatures join forces to create ever more powerful creatures. One gets described as an Elephant but with mantis legs; tardigrade limbs and 12 feet tall and extremely deadly. It’s another way of threatening and punishing the prisoners but it raises the question what happened to those who built the ruins - how did they survive in such a deadly world?

The final third of the book has Daghdev very much dropped in it and here Tchaikovsky knits brilliantly a finale of body horror; biological wonder and revolution with a beguilingly different way of looking at the world. Fear and empathy get explored politically but also biologically with a set up that brings all these elements together and manages to be both empowering and yet troubling at the same time. the metaphors of Kiln and Clay make you wonder exactly what happens next.

Alien Clay is thoughtful Science Fiction at its best giving us wonder; new ways of looking at the world but also wider commentaries on science, political control and puts evolution into the concept of revolution. The kind of book that will make you consider the world ina different way long after reading it like all the best science fiction does. Strongly recommended!

Adrian Tchaikovsky’s writing not only encompasses an impressive range of subjects and sub-genres within SFF – his stories also vary in tone between the angry savagery of City of Last Chances and the mordant humour running through Spiderlight. I loved the sound of this premise, as Tchaikovsky’s aliens are always interestingly different and was hoping for something with a bit of wry humour, given my current mood.

As luck would have it – I was in for a solid treat. This tale is told in first-person viewpoint by Professor Arton Daghdev, an academic specialist in xenobiology and environmental systems. He is also an outspoken critic of the Mandate, the political orthodoxy running all humanspace. And while there were plenty of disappearances and arrests, he was under the impression that those academics speaking out against the ideas underpinning the Mandate were being given a free pass. They weren’t. They were being given sufficient leeway to thoroughly incriminate themselves. Hence he’s ended up on a penal colony thirty light-years away from Earth with no prospect of returning.

I was thoroughly on Arton’s side from the opening paragraph – his disgust at the situation he’s found himself in, his dark humour, his searing honesty about his own weaknesses and fears were both poignant and endearing. It was a nice change – often Tchaikovsky’s protagonists aren’t all that likeable. It didn’t hurt that the book started with a bang, as Arton wakes up while the ship is disintegrating around him. And from then on, the tension doesn’t let up. The prisoners’ lives are horribly cheap – after all, there will be a new consignment of victims being ejected into the atmosphere in due course.

Arton gives us a ringside seat into his life as a prisoner on the one planet, other than Earth, with proven intelligent life. Life that has simply disappeared, after leaving unmistakeable traces of their existence in the form of buildings covered with writing. And Arton is on the team to try to figure out what the signs are saying. He has his doubts regarding the whole exercise – and being Arton, doesn’t bother to keep his views to himself. Which gets him into a packet of trouble in a place where that sort of bother can easily kill you…

I loved the tale, tearing through the 400-page book in two days as I was desperate to discover what would happen next. Tchaikovsky doesn’t do predictable plots. And this one has one doozy of a twist that has me now thinking about the very clever way he’s flipped this whole sub-genre on its head. With me thoroughly rooting for Arton. This story is every bit as compelling as Children of Time and Spiderlight – two of Tchaikovsky’s best works in my opinion. I wouldn’t be surprised if he garnered yet another award for this one. Whatever awesomeness is waiting in the wings during the rest of the year – I’ll eat my keyboard if this one doesn’t make My Outstanding Reads of the Year 2024. Very, very highly recommended. While I obtained an arc of Alien Clay from the publishers via Netgalley, the opinions I have expressed are unbiased and my own.
10/10

This is my first book by this author and, on the face of what I read, it won't be the last! In fact, I already have a few more lined up. That said, this book was also a game of three thirds for me... A strong start that I really enjoyed, getting into the new world he was building and the characters I met along the way. We also had a strong finish which wholly satisfied me. And also rewarded me for my persistence through the middle section which sadly for me did drag on a bit.
We start with a prison ship arriving at Kiln, a distant world, spewing its passengers out in a method that doesn't guarantee life. Luckily, our main protagonist, Prof. Arton Daghdev, does survive the disembarkation, although maybe that's not as good a thing given the labour camp that awaits him.
And so begins a kinda first contact story that introduces our Prof to a whole host of interesting and intriguing alien life forms, the like of which he could only imagine and still can't believe even given the evidence of his own eyes...
As I already said, this book has a strong start for me. The world building was intricate and exact and I followed avidly what was going on. I especially loved the descriptions of the blossoming and ever changing ecosystem. I also connected to the Prof right away, which I think helped me going forward. He was definitely a bit of a fish out of water, an academic who had been downgraded to manual work. I bet when he was wishing he could really study alien life up close, he really wasn't expecting THIS close! But then he did go off script in his political activism, pitting wits against the indomitable Mandate, who I will leave you to learn about yourself.
Pacing was hit and miss for me - the middle third dragged a tad - but, that said, the peril stakes were high all the way through. Ramping up towards an ending that completely justified my working my way through that middle section.
All in all, a good introduction to an author that I now have my sights on. My thanks go to the Publisher and Netgalley for the chance to read this book.

I love reading all kinds of genre and I craved reading a good SF book and I think I finally satisfied that craving but also opened a different kind of crave where I want to read more and more SF books. Adrian Tchaikovsky reminded me why I used to love this genre and why I shouldn't forget it.
Alien Clay talks about exile, dealing with a new world, betrayals and more. I enjoyed the descriptive words of the world where our main protagonist arrives, it helped imagining it in full details
Now, I have to go and check all the other author's books.

I loved this because it brings together lots of what I've been reading in popular science with a political thriller. Interesting on how our perspective on the natural world informs our view of society, and vice versa. So many clever ideas - and a great story too!

Yet another creative intervention from Adrian Tchaikovsky, who has created another new world to base his fantastic characters and dramatic events within. This author is always incredibly adept at creating new universes, races and worlds and manages to weave such intricate stories throughout all key elements, never to the impairment of the book.
This book is engaging and enjoyable throughout, allowing the reader to join such a unique world and scenario and be entertained throughout. The proposed science isn't overwhelming and as such the plot races on at a pace. This author never disappoints but always creates something so unique and enjoyable. I'm very grateful to the publisher in allowing me the opportunity to read this.

"Kiln doesn't do death like Earth does. Kiln does life."

As expected from Adrian Tchaikovsky the world is exceptionally well thought of and the people living in it are exposed to various hardships. But what the people left behind on earth sounded grim and desolate as well. I felt the oppression through the pages.
Fascinating concept and amazing imagery.

"Start with a wakening, end with an awakening."

If 1984 were solved by an alien not quite hive mind. Empathy solves all. Genuinely enjoyable if at times frustrating due to characters having knowledge the reader lacks, though thankfully the solution to the main mystery was foreshadowed.

Im not sure what made me reach for this book as I didn’t really get the title initially but the first couple of pages are gripping.,The exposition is precise, succinct and gets you in the picture very quickly wasting no time.
Earth is ruled by the totalitarian group, the Mandate who keep the news that there is sentient life on other planets from the citizens of earth .The story follows one citizen who after speaking out against the mandate, is sentenced to transportation to a planet, which has recently been discovered and needs investigation and settling
I loved the biology on the planet with multiple small organisms joining together to become part of larger and more effective being. The elephants amused me, particularly the scene when one of its legs eats one of the humans.
I did find that the story loses its fast pace, a little bit about 2/3 of the way through when the narrator starts to become linked up with the other organised organisms on the planet. I was intrigued to see what happens however so carried on reading, and I’m glad that I did .
This is intelligent, witty sci-fi. The author has a clean, clear, enjoyable to read, writing style..
The setting of the novel in a newly discovered world is highly cinematic, and Visual, and I couldn’t help thinking that this would make a great film, the ability of all the humans to communicate with each other telepathically once they had been contaminated by organisms from the New World would work very well in a film , in novel form, it did take quite a lot of explaining to understand this..

I read an early copy of the novel on NetGalley, UK the book is published in the UK on the 20th of March 2024 by Pan McMillan
This review will appear on NetGalley, UK, Goodreads, and my book blog, bionicSarahSbooks. wordPress,.com. After publication, it will also appear on Amazon, UK.

4.5 stars

Headlines:
Creep flora and fauna
Colonists and colonisers
Quiet anarchy

Alien Clay grabbed me by the yellow and blue imagination so quickly and this read dominated my week. I've thought about it when I wasn't reading it, I've even dreamt about it once. The story was vivid in its wordly description of Kiln; a wild place, full of life, life humans could not comprehend. Don't expect aliens in ships, alien life was quite different here.

The story centred on a professor (Arton) banished from earth with many peers to serve as a labourer on this planet for revolutionary behaviour. What was so interesting was that this rebellion to earthly societal beliefs followed those rebels to Kiln. Kiln as a planet creeped me out at the start and while that creep didn't disappear, I settled into the natives of Kiln as I understood them more. I didn't expect the plot direction, the big whos and whys that we got, but it was unexpectedly good as it was revealed.

The story cleverly brings readers to question the idea of colonising a planet with echoes of colonisation we've seen on earth. The ending, was hella uncomfortable and a part revenge story. That's not really a spoiler, you will have no idea what I'm talking about, unless you've actually read this book.

How the oppressed labourers of Kiln interacted with their superiors and how they found their strength was really interesting. One part of the book I loved especially was how Tchaikovsky took a retrospective look at the march across Kiln so the reader could later understand how events played out.

I've been meaning to read Adrian Tchaikovsky for ages and I think this was the perfect book for me to start with. I thoroughly enjoyed the story, characters and writing.

Thank you to Tor Books for the review copy.

Sentenced to a life of penal labour on one of Earth's exoplanets, a death sentence in all but name, xenoecologist Arton Daghdev finds himself on the planet Kiln.

Much of my previous experience of Adrian Tchaikovsky's work is his shorter novellas and Alien Clay could have benefited from being a similar length.

The narrative is flabby with lengthy periods in which nothing of real note happens and while the major characters are fully developed the minor ones are little more than ciphers.

Tchaikovsky's great strength here is his world building. Kiln is arguably the largest character, its archaeology, ecology and biology are weirdly unique and it's this that raises Alien Clay above the average.

Thanks to Tor, Pan Macmillan and NetGalley for an advanced copy.

My first book by this author and will certainly not be my last! Amazing, fast paced sci fi adventure and I loved every second of it.

I am still new to the sci fi genre so I will say I found this quite confusing and "sciency" to start with. The world building along with all the scientific names was alot to keep up with. However I soon picked it up and what a brilliant story it was.

We follow Arton Daghdev a science professor, as he is sent off as a prisoner to an alien planet to work & live out the rest of his days. While there he reconnects with old friends/colleagues and realises there is more to this alien planet than what they are told. I loved the politics that came into play in this book, and the world building really bought this new planet to life.

So cleverly written. I could not see how this story was going to end and it kept me hooked the entire time. The plot twists, the friendships made, the action & adventure, the hardships Arton and his companions go through, the politics all came together to make an amazing story.

This is a gripping and fast-paced adventure set on a very alien world. The world buiding is excellent, and the “alienness” is so well depicted that it I had a creepy sense of foreboding throughout a lot of the book.

A plot summary from the blurb:

"On the distant world of Kiln lie the ruins of an alien civilization. It’s the greatest discovery in humanity’s spacefaring history – yet who were its builders and where did they go? Professor Arton Daghdev had always wanted to study alien life up close. Then his wishes become a reality in the worst way. His political activism sees him exiled from Earth to Kiln’s extrasolar labour camp. There, he’s condemned to work under an alien sky until he dies."

For me it was a page-turner from the very beginning - it was engaging and well paced, and I enjoyed the slightly flippant first-person narrative. This is my first Adrian Tchaikovsky book, but if this is his writing style, then I’ll definitely be reading more. One odd stylistic quirk: the author broke the fourth wall a few times - talking directly to the reader. It wasn’t clear what the purpose of this was, and I was expecting it to become relevant at some point - which it didn’t. This didn’t detract, but I did wonder what the point was.

The world building is so well integrated with the plot, that it felt effortless. And it had a lot of ground to cover - from the Mandate, an ideological quasi-scientific/relgious organisation with totalitarian control over Earth’s society, to the flora and fauna of an oh-so-alien planet, “Kiln”, that Daghdev gets exiled to. And it’s that alienness that I really enjoyed about the book - it was somehow simultaneously seductive and replusive.

The plot has jeopardy from start to finish, but this really ramps up about two-thirds of the way through the book. Events unfold that emerge beautifully from the world building - the potentially extreme risks of the situation the characters find themselves in have been so well established that the consequences are obvious without having to be described.

So why not 5 stars? Only because it’s not a book that will stay with me. The plot and characters were enjoyable and engaging in the moment, but I’m not sure I’ll remember them a few months from now. I enjoyed the alienness, but it won’t stay with me in the same way as the unknowable alienness in Stanislav Lem’s “Solaris”, for example. None of that stopped it from being a cracking adventure, though, and I’d happily recommend it to anyone looking for that.

Thank you #NetGalley and Pan Macmillan Tor for the free review copy of #AlienClay in exchange for an honest review. All opinions are my own.

the painting is] a kind of hell, except it was called 'The Garden of Earthly Delights'. The joke, I take it, being that it's a delight humanity is excluded from. Everything else in the picture's having a grand time living it up at our expense. Being on Kiln feels like that to me. I can almost hear the pop and fizz of the planet's biospehere having its riotous party... [loc. 3147]
Xenoecologist Professor Arton Daghdev has been exiled from the repressive and totalitarian Mandate for political dissidence. Alien Clay opens with his horrific descent through the atmosphere -- in a flimsy capsule, from a disintegrating single-use spaceship where he's been freeze-dried for the journey, watching as others die ('Acceptable Wastage') when their capsules fall apart -- to Kiln, one of only three planets yet discovered where multi-cellular life has evolved. Daghdev is desperate to investigate the mysterious ruins left by a lost civilisation, but instead he's set to labour in the riotous and deadly jungle that surrounds the penal colony. When he's not hacking his way through the Boschian biota to reveal more ruins for others to investigate, he's assisting in the dissection of dead (or mostly-dead) alien creatures. (Not that the colony's findings can be reported to the Mandate, since what they're discovering doesn't fit the restrictions of Mandate scientific thought.) Daghdev, with his brilliant mind and his regrettable habit of heterodox thinking, may be the best person to unravel the mystery of Kiln, if it doesn't kill him first.

Tchaikovsky has written some of my favourite science fiction novels of the last decade -- for example, Doors of Eden and Dogs of War: I find him a very variable author, though, and didn't like Alien Clay as much as I'd hoped. It's a good read, inventive and well-written and with an intriguingly bleak narrator, but it meandered and became somewhat repetitive towards the end -- which makes perfect sense in terms of the plot, but could still have been tightened up without loss of impact. I might have liked this more if Daghdev had been more likeable, or if it hadn't been solely his narration. Perhaps if one of the two major female characters (both scientists) or fellow non-binary dissident Ilmus, had taken over some of the narration...? A fascinating scenario, though, and the science is compelling.

Thanks to the publisher and Netgalley for the advance review copy. UK Publication Date is 28th March 2024.

This book did not grab me like others by this author.
I felt the pace was too slow and the details of the alien biology in this far away world were so detailed that I was starting to lose interest. It was as if a great idea for a short story had been expanded too much to be transformed into a full length book.
The idea of traitors to the government on Earth being sent to far off worlds to hard labour in extremely hostile conditions and comparing the authoritarian state on Earth with the symbiotic oneness of the Kiln world is a good basis for the book but not enough happened for me.
However the book was fantastic at portraying the danger and fear the colonists had for the variety of life on the planet and their battle to survive with minimal protection from them.
Thanks to NetGalley and Pan Macmillan for the ARC