The Mimicking of Known Successes by Malka Older Narrator: Lindsey Dorcus
Series: The Investigations of Mossa and Pleiti #1
Published by Blackstone Publishing on March 7, 2023
Source: Purchased
Genres: Mystery, Science Fiction
Length: 4 hrs 27 mins
Pages: 176
Format: Audiobook
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On a remote, gas-wreathed outpost of a human colony on Jupiter, a man goes missing. The enigmatic Investigator Mossa follows his trail to Valdegeld, home to the colony’s erudite university—and Mossa’s former girlfriend, a scholar of Earth’s pre-collapse ecosystems.
Pleiti has dedicated her research and her career to aiding the larger effort towards a possible return to Earth. When Mossa unexpectedly arrives and requests Pleiti’s assistance in her latest investigation, the two of them embark on a twisting path in which the future of life on Earth is at stake—and, perhaps, their futures, together.
Mossa is an investigator who is in charge of a missing persons case. Or maybe it’s a suicide. Or murder. Any which way, a man disappeared from a sparsely populated platform at the edge of the colonized portion of Giant (Jupiter). Turns out the man was on faculty at the University at Valdegeld, as is Mossa’s former girlfriend from her college years, Pleiti. So of course, Mossa reconnects with Pleiti and asks for her help.
The world was interesting. Humans ruined Earth, so they colonized Jupiter. I liked that it had almost a gaslamp feel. Yes, they’re living on platforms above a surfaceless planet, but our characters bundle up against the cold, walk through the swirling storm, have tea and scones on a regular basis.
I liked Mossa and Pleiti and their slowly rebuilding relationship. Mossa is our Holmes, brilliant, but a bit emotionally distant and not one to share her theories. Pleite, our narrator and Watson, is loyal and resourceful. I liked them as a team and as a couple.
The mystery was put together well. The conflicts are clear throughout the story, but I guess I didn’t realize how important they were to the outcome of the plot. The clues were there, but I missed them. Of course, that’s what gives a mystery its twists, the reader not grasping the significance of (fill in the blank).
I thoroughly enjoyed The Mimicking of Known Successes and I don’t think you need to like sci-fi to appreciate it.
About Malka Older
Malka Older is a writer, sociologist, and aid worker. She is the Executive Director of Global Voices, a community of writers, editors, and translators providing community journalism from all over the world and advocating for indigenous and minority languages, media literacy, digital rights, and online freedom of expression. She is also a Faculty Associate at Arizona State University’s School for the Future of Innovation in Society, where she teaches on the humanitarian-development spectrum and on predictive fictions and hosts the Science Fiction Sparkle Salon, and an Associate Researcher at the Centre de Sociologie des Organisations.
Her novella The Mimicking of Known Successes, a murder mystery set on Jupiter, has been named one of the best books of 2023 by Barnes and Noble and the Library Journal, and was a finalist for the Hugo, Locus, Nebula, and Ignyte awards. The sequel The Imposition of Unnecessary Obstacles was named one of the best books of 2024 by Esquire, and the third book in the series, The Potency of Ungovernable Impulses, will be released in June 2025. Her science-fiction political thriller Infomocracy was named one of the best books of 2016 by Kirkus, Book Riot, and the Washington Post. She is also the author of the sequels, Null States (2017) and State Tectonics (2018), and the full trilogy was nominated for a Hugo Award. Her short fiction and poetry can be found at WIRED, Future Tense, Leveler, Sundog Lit, Reservoir Lit, Inkscrawl, Rogue Agent, Tor.com, Fireside Fiction, and others. She has written opinion pieces for the New York Times, The Nation, Foreign Policy, and NBC Think.
She has more a decade of experience in humanitarian aid and development, ranging from field level experience as a Head of Office in Darfur to supporting global programs and agency-wide strategy as a disaster risk reduction technical specialist. In between she has designed and implemented economic development initiatives in post-disaster context; supervised a large and diverse portfolio as Director of Programs in Indonesia, and responded to complex emergencies and natural disasters in Sri Lanka, Uganda, Darfur, Indonesia, Japan, and Mali.