The Halferne Expedition

About

Genre: Sci-Fi, Adventure
Themes: Knowledge, Sin, Anthropocentrism
Pages: 203
Words: 50,145

The Halferne Expedition, like the rest of the series, can be read as a standalone novel, as part of a cycle of six, loosely-connected novels, or as part of a prequel series to something I may never get around to writing. This one was my NaNo 2023 win. I decided to take a bunch of books that I originally read in one sitting because I couldn’t put them down, and try to emulate that style. I think of it as “Arthur C. Clarke’s hard-SF imagines a Jules Verne grand adventure while Carl Jung guffaws philosophy from the corner of the room.” I fear it’s too obviously derivative of a couple of these influences and drastically needs to be rethought. Still, it was a fun win for NaNo.

Back Cover Blurb

On the frozen world of Lambda Tonitrus 9, an elite team of scientists uncovers a structure that shouldn’t exist — vast, intelligent, and older than recorded history.

As they descend into its alien halls, the team begins to question not just what built the place, but why it’s still waiting. Every discovery draws them deeper into a system that studies them back, testing their beliefs about life, creation, and consciousness itself.

Dr. Disha Tamana, the team leader, a biologist who built her reputation chasing the origins of life, now faces evidence that life may have been manufactured.
Dr. Jaysn Katsaros, the jaded xenoanthropologist, is looking for one last mystery worth believing in.
Major Wolff, the pragmatic soldier, trusts procedure more than philosophy—until procedure fails.
Dr. Umar Amin, the geologist, believes every truth can be unearthed, until the ground itself begins to move.
Anita Solvig, the archaeologist, sees patterns in everything, even when the patterns start looking back.
Cari Clarc, a cybernetically enhanced zoologist, has no faith in gods or machines.
Dr. Lev Novik, a synthetic intelligence built to understand humanity, may be the only one who truly can.

In a universe that measures time in millennia and meaning in data, seven explorers will uncover the one thing even a perfect machine can’t predict—what happens when humanity is finally seen.

A haunting fusion of hard science fiction and mythic philosophy, The Halferne Expedition explores the fine line between god and engineer, creation and control, faith and the freedom to choose.