DOORWAY TO THE STARS

Reviewed by Steven H Silver

In 1996, Jack McDevitt introduced the roundhouse, an ancient artifact found in Fort Moxie, North Dakota, which allowed people to travel to pre-defined places in the galaxy. At the end of Ancient Shores, the novel in which the roundhouse made its first appearance, there were many questions which McDevitt had not answered about the artifact. In 2015, McDevitt revisited the roundhouse in Thunderbird, which detailed the way the local Sioux tribe, which claimed control of the roundhouse, worked with scientists to explore the artifact's capabilities. Ultimately, at the end of that book, mysteries still remained. McDevitt once again returns to answer some of those questions in the novella Doorway to the Stars, whose characters are only slightly hindered by the apparent destruction of the roundhouse at the end of Thunderbird.

Although James Walker, the Sioux tribal chairman who presided over the events of Thunderbird is present when Doorway to the Stars begins, he has been voted out of office for his handling of the situation in that novel. The focus is, instead, on Jack Swiftfoot, a pilot who had helped Walker in the previous novel. Unable to get clear answers from Walker, the federal government puts pressure on Swiftfoot to gain his assistance in locating the device needed to potentially make the roundhouse function again. Reticent, at first, Swiftfoot eventually helps them out, to the detriment of his relationship with Walker, but allowing McDevitt to further explore the Roundhouse and the worlds it leads to.

Although Swiftfoot is the connecting character throughout the novella, the story isn't really about him. Instead, he serves as a connection between Matt and Eleanor Everett, who have their own ideas about the origins of the Roundhouse and the planets it connects to. Although Matt has approval to travel using the Roundhouse, Eleanor doesn't and Swiftfoot is how she hopes to get special approval. Given Swiftfoot's part in the end of Thunderbird, it seems counterintuitive that he would have the pull to allow Eleanor on a trip through the Roundhouse, but with same adept hand-waving, she gets permission to go.

The bulk of the novella focuses on Eleanor and Matt's trips to various worlds, most of which are quick sight-seeing jaunts, as well as their attempts to push the limits of what the authorities will allow them to do. Given permission to visit one world under strict guidelines about contacting the inhabitants, Eleanor continues to push, but also becomes convinced that her theories about the Roundhouse's origins are accurate and ready to be shared with Earth. While Thunderbird, ended with a nod to the idea that "there are some things man was not meant to tamper with," Doorway to the Stars offers the insight that while the scientific method may offer what seems like the correct and obvious solution, the results can always be superseded by more accurate information.

Return to