Typhon’s Children by Toni Anzetti

The discussion of Toni Anzetti’s first novel drew a crowd of ten people. Typhon’s Children is a science fiction story about a group of humans who have settled on a hostile planet. An expected supply ship is late, and the settlers are running low on necessities. Several key personnel have died, and all of the children born to the settlers have severe birth defects. The book details the colonists’ attempts to survive.

We enjoyed several things about this book. It was the first hard science fiction book we’d read in a while, and the writing style was direct and easy to read. Several people said that they read the book in a single reading. The planet’s ecosystem seemed well thought out, and we liked the variety of alien lifeforms. We liked the way that the deafness of Dilani, the teenage girl who was one of the book’s protagonists, was integrated into the story. The settlers had a lot of neat gadgets, including a really cool submarine.

There were a few problems. The subject of birth defects was a gloomy topic that was off-putting to several members of the group. Several scientific developments near the end of the book seemed almost so unbelievable as to be considered magic. And the book ended rather abruptly, obviously setting up a sequel.

Overall we thought that Typhon’s Children was an interesting but flawed first novel, and we think that Toni Anzetti is a writer to watch.

–A. T. Campbell, III