Once and Future
by A.R. Capetta and Cory McCarthy
The (a) story follows Ari Helix, her brother, and a handful of their closest friends as they traverse a galactic empire run by a tyrannical capitalist regime known as Mercer. Ari is a fugitive—a refugee from a rebel planet that has since been walled off from the rest of the galaxy, and has spent much of her life fleeing from Mercer’s ever-watchful rule.
But when Ari pulls a sword from an ancient oak on a long-abandoned Earth, she is revealed to be the latest in a long line of reincarnated King Arthurs. Now, with the help of a backwards-aging Merlin, she and her friends must come together to kick off a rebellion that will unite humankind and slay the evil that is Mercer once and for all.
If Ari can live that long, of course.
The (A) story is about the horrors of a capitalist monopoly. Not only does every product in Once and Future’s galaxy include a “Mercer” logo, but so does the galaxy itself. And the only planets that show any resistance to them are the ones that have supplies withheld, citizens unjustly arrested, and, in some cases, even worse. Because the Mercer company is also the only form of government, it is impossible for its citizens to protest their rule without these repercussions, further sealing their tyrannical stranglehold on the galaxy.
But the story is also largely about the power of friendship. Through Merlin’s perspective we see that in every reincarnation Arthur is still surrounded by his Knights of the Round Table. However, it seems that tensions within their relationships are always what lead to Arthur’s inevitable downfall. Even Merlin is wary of forming bonds, knowing he will most likely lose them all by the end of the cycle. But this cycle is different—starting with Merlin finally opening himself up to companionship. And as he and Ari develop a friendship that has not been seen in previous incarnations, it begins to look as if victory and an end to the cycle are also a possibility.
Normally, I am not huge on science fiction. However, I found the mixture of sci-fi and fantasy intriguing as far as the storyline went. I have never seen that kind of genre-mixing done before, and I feel like it’s something more authors should take a chance and experiment with.
But while the writing was not so much in need of a better line editor (as I have felt about a sadly surprising number of books I have read recently), I did think it was in need of finer-tuned developmental editing. While I enjoyed the characters and their interactions, I felt like there weren’t really any high stakes or anything driving them forward for much of the book. In fact, it wasn’t until maybe about the last third of the story that I started really feeling invested in what was happening. And even then, the story seems to make a weird left-hand turn around that same point that feels like it should have been part of a sequel and not the last third of the first book.
Something I really appreciated about this story, though? (Besides a female Arthur, of course.) The casual inclusiveness of LGBTQ characters. It was really refreshing to see a universe where people were just allowed to exist without having to (for the most part, at least) explain themselves or make a statement about the wrongness of exclusion.
Is it a new favorite? No, but I do feel intrigued enough to eventually pick up the sequel, or at least explore other works by the same authors. Which, frankly, is more than I can say for some of the stinkers I’ve picked up recently.
