The Golden Globe by John Varley

This is Aprils bookgroup selection. We have read by Varley: Steel Beach, Titan and now The Golden Globe.

From Goodreads (because I despise retyping synopsis): Sparky Valentine is a former child star turned down-on-his-luck thespian who's just reached the grand old age of 100. Not that you could tell by looking at the old ham, who for some reason never seems to age--or stay out of trouble. Sparky's in the midst of a whirlwind theatrical tour designed to bring a bit of culture to the frozen desolation of the outer solar system when bad luck strikes in the form of a gumshoe hot on his tail. Sparky decides to skip the outer burgs for the more hospitable environs of Pluto, but things only get worse when he runs afoul of the notoriously unforgiving Charonese Mafia. As he's making his getaway, he learns something astonishing. The famous director Kaspara Polichinelli of Luna is planning a performance of King Lear, and he's short a lead to take on the title role. Sparky wires Polichinelli that he's interested, and Polichinelli tells him the part is his. Now all Sparky has to do is find a way to scrape together enough cash to get to Luna before the play starts while avoiding a seemingly unstoppable (and unkillable) Charonese hitman. --Craig E. Engler

I have mixed feelings about this book. I found the storyline intriguing, but the pages and pages of extraneous exposition incredibly dull and irrelevant to the story. For one example, I really didn't care how a outpost on the planet Oberon or was it the planet Oberon? was made and gravity enhanced. There were other places similar to this were it seemed the "science" was just rather stuck in. While I like science in science fiction, in this case it was distracting. This 500 page book would have been outstanding at 400 pages with a bit of editing.

However, it was the ending that that made the story for me. I suspected part of it earlier in the book, and it was this curiosity that kept me going till to the final pages. If you don't mind skipping bits, or if science is your thing, I recommend this book.