Estimated reading time: 8 minutes
Short Summary
Elizabeth Moon is no stranger to writing memorable and original pieces of literature (for which she has been recognized time and time again), and with Remnant Population she certainly keeps up her stride, to say the least. It tells the story of Ofelia, a woman who chooses to stay behind in her space colony after all the others get shipped off elsewhere, with the fantasy of living her days out in blissful solitude… however, such lofty dreams are hardly meant to be.
Table of contents
Elizabeth Moon Sells the Peace of Loneliness
Though by our nature we humans tend to band with each other and seek comfort in larger numbers, there are those who begin wishing for a solitary existence without expectations and norms to conform to, especially as they grew older. Few ever get to live out the fantasy, especially due to their dependence on the systems we’ve put in place in our societies. However, in Elizabeth Moon‘s Remnant Population, one lucky old woman gets just that type of chance, or at least, so she thinks.
The story opens by introducing us to Ofelia, an elderly woman living on Colony 3245.12 in space, far away from any hint or whiff of Earth even. She has been living in this colony for over forty years at this point, scraping by and earning a meagre living to the best of her abilities, weathering the death of her husband and the trails of single motherhood.
At this point, all Ofelia wants to do is tend to her little garden, and live her days out in as much peace as possible, without any dreams of leaving the colony, now her home and eventually her grave. However, some corporate affairs shake her dreams up, with orders coming in to dismantle the colony and ship its residents off to some strange new locations in cryo-sleep caskets.
All around Ofelia accept their predicaments, and prepare for what will likely be a difficult period of transition from one world to another, packing their things up. The old lady, however, sees in this moment the greatest opportunity she could have ever asked for: a shot at true solitude. And so, she decides to cleverly hide out until everyone leaves the place, and being an old lady, it wasn’t difficult for most to forget about her.
With all that she needs to comfortably survive right at her fingertips, Ofelia begins to live out the type of retirement plan very few, if any, get to even dream about. Free from petty gossip, unreasonable demands, head-scratching norms and uninvited judgments, she finds herself in a true paradise… which naturally means, something has to go terribly wrong. At some point, a reconnaissance ship returns to the planet, and its crew gets mysteriously slaughtered… and not by Ofelia, bless her soul. Something else lurks out there, and it’s only a matter of time before it comes for her.
An Unlikely First Contact in Remnant Population
I don’t think there’s any point in dancing around something relatively obvious: this novel has aliens in it, and even the blurb on the back proudly states it. While I do think it’s a subject which can always be extrapolated into curious unforeseen directions, it’s also one which has been discussed and depicted to death. In other words, for a novel about aliens to be noteworthy, I think it inherently needs to do something different and original at this point.
When it comes to Elizabeth Moon‘s Remnant Population, the nature of the First Contact is what it does differently by throwing a simple wrench into the mix. Whenever the great moment where humans and aliens cross paths with each other is depicted, the characters are, more often than not, suited to the task in some way, if not in the primes of their lives, at least intellectually.
Naturally, as you might have surmised at this point, Ofelia is far from being in the prime of her life, nor is she particularly well-suited to communication and diplomacy with beings from other planets. She’s a relatively simple old lady who just wants to live out the rest of her days in peace and quiet, but finds herself thrust smack-dab into the centre of perhaps the most important moment in human history, at least to date.
I quite enjoyed this twist on the subject, seeing how a nice elderly woman would approach the situation, as opposed to scientists, physicists and language experts with all the world’s resources at their fingertips. Watching Ofelia establishing a line of communication with them and figuring out all on her own what to do with the situation isn’t just heartwarming (and comical at times), but it also has some educational moments, with Elizabeth Moon interspersing passages of hard science-fiction with noticeable frequency.
Now, it is true that the relationship between the aliens and Ofelia evolves a little too quickly (as does their understanding of human culture) if we’re trying to imagine the scenario in realistic terms at least. However, I understand that it was a choice made to prevent the pace of the novel from slowing down to a crawl, which might have been fatal considering the novel’s introspective nature.
Ofelia, Mother to Aliens
Writing a story with one main character living in total isolation is always a bold choice, especially if a lot of time is spent with said character, even if there are some additional events taking place here and there. The reason for it is simple: if the protagonist fails to be interesting enough, then the entire story crumbles like a frail sand castle.
So, is Ofelia captivating enough to carry the torch all on her own in Remnant Population? I would say that she very much is for the most part, with the depth of her thoughts betraying the simple life she was said to have lived. Her insights and ways of seeing the world around her herald a type of wisdom generally only present in those who have experienced life, and I have no doubt Elizabeth Moon drew on her personal ruminations on more than one occasion.
She takes the time to think and give her thoughts about what drives people to behave the way they do in societies, whether big or small ones, the source of their tiny daily tyrannies and selfish desires, and of course, how ridiculous all our little squabbles and pointless pursuits look when we take a step back and explore them from an outside perspective. I think it’s the type of reminder we could all use from time to time.
I’d also like to take some time to talk about the relationship between Ofelia and the aliens she encounters. In this context we’re talking about the “tribal indigenous aliens” scenario, and though Elizabeth Moon could have gone wrong in countless ways while depicting them, she stayed on the path of what was believable. The budding relationship between them and our lovely protagonist is crafted with such care and attention one could actually see it unfolding that way in the real world.
I wouldn’t say that Remnant Population is a complicated novel, but it does have layers of profoundness to it while telling relatively straightforward story about an elderly woman essentially becoming a sort of mother figure to a group of young aliens. It does have a few moments of wish fulfillment here and there (how Ofelia outsmarts a bunch of younger scientists, for instance), but let’s be honest, what’s the point of being an author if you can’t even do a little bit of that? Besides, those moments are good fun and don’t ruin the show in any way.
| PAGES | PUBLISHER | PUB. DATE | ISBN |
|---|---|---|---|
| 338 | Random House Worlds | Sept 30 2003 | 978-0345462190 |
The Final Verdict
In conclusion, I think Remnant Population by Elizabeth Moon is a thought-provoking science-fiction novel which mixes a relatively straightforward and heartwarming story with some more profound meditations about life and human nature, driven forward by a lovable, insightful and moving protagonist in Ofelia.
If you’re looking for a science-fiction novel which has a different and original take on the concept of First Contact with also some appreciable depth to it, I’m certain you’ll find a whole lot to love about this book and recommend you give it a shot.
