Enjoyed the mystery of the missing Olivia. This book focused more on Chase than anyone else, I loved that. The A.I discovery was amazing and sad at the same time. Belle has grown up, curious...
If you like mystery and Archaeology, wormholes and philosophy then give Octavia Gone a try. ( )

Better than the last entry, but the series feels tired. ( )

Always liked Jack McDevitt's adventures with Alex Benedict and his girl Friday Chase as they explored the universe in search of solving mysteries of the galaxies.

In this story we have a missing space station, gone the last 12 years, as it orbited a black hole. Originally this was a science mission, but much in the way of speculation happened here.

Alex's uncle Gabe, found after 7 years in a time warp (Yikes) searchs for an alien artifact left by one of the now gone space station above, the Octavia. What's the connection?

Unlike Chindi, Echo, Devils' Eye, the story and plot are interesting but so slow, it's like Jack is writing and so much exposition, not a lot of story, only at the end we get a quick yet somewhat unsatisfactory ending.
Recommended for Alex and Chase fans, but don't expect gripping action or suspense.
( )

The fact that I am still reading this series eight books in says a lot about how much I like McDevitt's work. That said, it is the eight book and it's starting to feel a little tired. I've commented on hints of formula in previous installments but those books were still pretty exciting. This one feels more...leisurely. Some elements seem recycled from previous novels. Downtime is filled with an unnecessary romantic subplot, and somewhat unnecessary family conflict. As always, the central mystery is interesting. Although I did hope for more Chase & Alex stories, I feel that Coming Home would have been a good one to end with. ( )

This is the 5th (of 8) Alex Benedict novels I've read and I think it will be the last.

There are two mysteries to solve in this novel. 1) what happened to an interesting artifact, which appears to be entirely alien, that Benedict and company had in their possession some years ago; and 2) what happened to the Octavia, a space station orbiting a black hole looking for a wormhole? How do they tie together? The guy who owned the artifact was on the space station when it disappeared.

Alex Benedict runs a company called Rainbow, which specializes in selling interstellar archeological artifacts. They generally act as brokers for the owners. Apparently eBay hasn't survived 9,000 years into the future. They also handle the odd cultural artifact (like a lamp once owned by a comic dead some 7,000 years but still in reruns).

The book is mostly a boring recitation of the day-to-day operations of Rainbow, as told by Chase Kolpath, Alex's assistant and starship captain (yes, Alex owns his own starship). Chase puts a lamp up for sale, Chase does some accounting, she watches a talk show, she has a cup of coffee. In between these thrilling events, she occasionally takes Alex or Gabe (Alex's partner) on a mission to interstellar space, or maybe just across town, to chase down leads on the two mysteries.

As if the day-to-day stuff wasn't dull enough, chasing down leads is even duller. They have no real theory on the artifact and 3 theories on the Octavia but none, and I mean none of these leads results in moving the plot forward. "Well, I guess that didn't turn out" is repeated often.

Chase also has a tepid love affair with a local rare book dealer which has all the spark of a wet firecracker.

Do they ever resolve either mystery? Well, mystery #1, the weird artifact, does sort of get solved, by following a tenuous chain of coincidences. But ultimately, they can't actually tell anybody what they find.

The Octavia mystery is also resolved, in the last few pages, by doing something they should have done much earlier in the book. It's also a trick McDevitt used in the last Benedict book. Flying off in their faster than light vehicle to get in front of a radio beam sent from the station before it vanished. As it turns out, none of the theories was right but the actual fate of the Octavia was even more outrageous than any of the theories. And they can't tell anybody about it either.

I'm really sorry I wasted my time on this. ( )