The Big Jump
Reviewed date: 2025 Sep 7
Rating: 2
128 pages
My verdict: an overall disappointing book. It starts out exciting, but ends up with woo-woo pure life energy nonsense.
Good friend
Arch Comyn is a good friend. When Comyn gets wind that Ballantyne has returned from his Big Jump (that is, his experimental faster-than-light spaceship worked, and he's returned from Barnard's Star), Comyn forces his way into the high-security corporate hospital where Ballantyne is being treated and questions him. Because Ballantyne returned alone, and Comyn would like to know what happened to his friend Paul Rogers who was on Ballantyne's inaugural Big Jump voyage.
Transuranae
Ballantyne whispers a few words to Comyn and then dies. Comyn is in big trouble with the Cochrane family corporation that bankrolled Ballantyne's trip, but only Comyn knows what Ballantyne revealed, so he parlays that into a deal with the Cochranes: Comyn tells what he knows, and in exchange he gets to go on the second Big Jump out to Barnard's Star to see what Ballantyne found. Comyn also becomes very friendly—very friendly—with Miss Sydna Cochrane.
What Ballantyne found was transuranic elements. The scientific and business opportunities of these new elements are boundless. But Ballantyne found something else, something that scared him to death and likely caused the demise of his crewmates: the Transuranae. Comyn isn't sure what or who the Transuranae are, but clearly that is danger at Barnard's Star.
Woo woo life energy
The answer is disappointing. The Cochranes outfit a new spaceship and everyone travels to Barnard's Star and lands on a habitable planet rich with transuranic elements. The transuranic elements are energetic, with a kind of life energy. This lures people in like a drug, and that's what happened to the rest of Ballantyne's crew: they were turned by the transuranic energy and joined the Transuranae, who are beings of pure energy or some such nonsense. Most of the Cochrane crew gets turned into transuranic energy zombies too. Comyn escapes back to Earth and ends up with Sydna Cochrane.