Planesrunner by Ian McDonald: review Tejendra Singh, Everett's father, is a physicist and, as Everett discovers, was among a small group of scientists who created a gate capable of transporting people and objects to other universes, known as planes. The planes make up the multiverse and the infundibulum is the map of this - albeit a map no one can read. People come and go through gates, so only travel to universes where a gate is available can be achieved. Until Tejendra discovers how to read the map. In McDonald's world, our earth, and Everett's, is the 10th to create a gate to other universes, so already a political party spanning the known universes has formed and the power of the decoded map Tejendra holds is invaluable. Without the infundibulum, however, there is no map to read, and it is here Everett's journey begins when a package sent from his kidnapped father turns out to be that very map. Where McDonald's narrative really shines is the detail in which he describes E3. While London is essentially geographically the same as our London, E3 has no oil, so industry has developed in a world reliant on coal. Their entire transport system runs off electricity and they have airships that float. Trainers were never invented, and Einstein discovered the means to travel to other universes instead of the theory of relativity. The Airish, who live on airships, are deemed the lowest of society, and it is these people on Captain Anastasia Sixsmyth's Everness ship that Everett befriends, and who helps him in his pursuit of his father. The beginnings of a romance between the ship's young pilot Sen and Everett are scattered through the second half of the book, and something I'm sure will developing the books that follow in this Everness series. There are similarities to Philip Pullman's His Dark Materials, yet McDonald's story differs by grounding the reader in reality at the start by using a normal boy from North London, and opening his eyes to worlds and universes so different from our own. There is a problem with empathising with him and I was not absorbed in his journey. Also, where Pullman has a plethora of character extras, Planesrunner is reliant on a few underdeveloped individuals with strange accents McDonald could have made more of the interesting idea that there is 'another you' in a different universe and while the fashion in E3 is described in detail, everyday life in this other universe is never established. A boy's battle against a higher political power is nothing new in science fiction tales, of course, but the author does succeed in portraying how a society can easily demonise certain pockets of people, showing that prejudice is a fundamental flaw in any community no matter how it grew. Book one of the series leaves questions unanswered and to gain a real following it may have to build quickly on the strengths of the opener and iron out a few crinkles. Ian McDonald - Planesrunner: Everness, Book One (Pyr Books)