This book is a science-fiction because of how Bart comes into interaction with two castaways from space who turn out to be interstellar thieves. I could use this book in my classroom when reading a science-fiction novel to a class of fourth of fifth graders. Another way I could use this book is to discuss the meaning of what science-fiction is and ask the class what kind of books they would read that they think would fall under this category. There is no media in this book as it is a novel. ( )

I picked up this book solely for the title (Monks in Space? Awesome! It needs a theme song). It is amusing to think of a monastery in space. But the amusement can only go so far. I found some of the physics to be doubtful (the monks throw liquid clay in zero gravity with no explanation as to how they can breathe with the air full of floating clay-gloop, not to mention the damage to a space ship’s electrical and ventilation systems), some of the details of the ship to be implausible (why would they have a drinking GLASS on a spaceship? Lit candles in an oxygen rich environment with the threat of zero gravity?), and why go through all the effort of making an authentic-appearing medieval monastery (on a SPACE SHIP) when real monks would be more concerned with practicality and thrift? A funny premise, but a STUPID book. ( )

‘Copernicans on the starboard bow,’ was never a line from Star Trek but it actually wouldn’t be out of place in David Jones’s near-disaster adventure about a spaceship abbey!
Set your optical organs to graphics mode and glory in the cover image of a blazing flying saucer that sports stained glass windows, then flip to text mode to input chapter one’s ‘Sweat’. Aboard Prominence, a spaceship abbey filled with holy treasures is a 14-year old novice-monk. But Bart (short for Bartholomew and – one assumes – no relation of the more terrestrial Homer) is more interested in training as a space pilot. When the intergalactic monks cruise to the aid of an unidentified spacecraft, it is Bart who realises the danger. It is also Bart who spikes the guns of the ensuing pirate attack (magnificent setpiece zero-gravity fight) and it is Bart who saves this floating microcosm in the nick of time.
This is a fast-paced, clever action adventure from the extremely talented writer of ‘Baboon’. Boys especially (a novel about space-monks is pre-programmed to be gender-skewed) will find themselves drawn into a fascinating sci-fi world . What will keep them hooked is that the author clearly knows his science (his day job was to design interactive shows for NASA, after all) so that the reader learns on the way pretty much about how a rocket functions. Something to do with fuel being mixed with an oxidant under extremely high pressure and then ignited. And Bart uses real science when he stumbles on a brilliant rescue solution to the monks’ imminent immolation. The nifty clue to the solution is buried expertly in the first few pages of the book.
What lifts ‘Meltdown’ above the ruck of sci-fi novels is the way his characters occupy - and find their actions governed by - a moral as well as a physical world. The female pirate seriously disturbs Bart’s radar and it is this ‘piratess’ who is at least in part responsible for Bart’s life-changing decision in the novel’s final pages. When the community is faced with having to choose who shall live and die, the reader really understands how humans are subject to more gravities than the one discovered by Newton.
This is a novel which deserves an audience beyond sci-fi buffs. Film fans will recognise HAL’s (‘2001: A Space Odyssey’) sibling computer in ‘Meltdown’ and ‘Mortal Engines’ addicts will find a new lease of life on board the Prominence. David Jones is a children’s novelist who has the gift of exploring alien worlds (under a monkey’s pelt in ‘Baboon’ and inside a space-kid in ‘Meltdown’) and this reader for one cannot wait for the next time his imagination goes EVA (extra-vehicular activity, for goodness’ sake!). ( )