Obscura

Gillian Ryan heads a neuropsychology lab researching Losian's disease, a dementia similar to Alzheimer's. Losian's killed her husband, and now daughter Carrie shows early symptoms. With no breakthrough in sight, funding for Gillian's lab is threatened. A former classmate working for NASA is familiar with Gillian's research and, guaranteeing continued funding, convinces her to spend six months in space exploring a Losian's-like disease devastating a U.N. space station. Once up, Gillian finds she's not in orbit but has been kidnapped and is bound for Mars! Then things get very strange—and Gillian's opiate addiction doesn't help. Christina Traister's narration and characterizations keep the interesting, suspenseful story moving. The science and technology are plausible and allow the story to develop despite some problems with laboratory procedures and the clearly unethical behavior of NASA and the U.N.