Book Review: The Glass Garden

Reviewed by Gabriella Harrison

In which an irresistible adventure to an exoplanet transforms into a moving story about the complexity of sisterhood

Lissy and her crew just finished a horrendous mission. Their reputation within the space-salvaging industry is wrecked. So when she and her boyfriend find something with the potential to cleanse their reputation and wipe all their financial woes away, they’re quick to take it. But it’s going to take her sister, an anthropology professor at a prestigious university, to make it happen.

Despite the disaster of their last mission, the crew is eager to get started. Lissy’s sister, Therese, is insistent on following due process. That would help them all in the end since she needs to publish about the discovery, but it doesn’t win her any friends within the crew, especially since she is new and an introvert perceived as a snob due.

Once they finally begin, it is immediately obvious that something is very wrong. The religious colony that inhabited the exoplanet before their arrival believed to have left fifty years ago for unknown reasons. The strange thing is that they left all their personal possessions behind. There is no evidence of a massacre. They’re just gone.

Things become even stranger when the rest of the crew finally see what they dub “The Anomaly.” A glowing artifact with an indecipherable origin that captivates everyone who looks at it. While everyone is still figuring out what to do, one of the crew members becomes sick, and things really start to go downhill from there.

The Glass Garden is a mystery-driven science fiction that unfolds over three days. On the first day, the crew arrives on the exoplanet, and The Anomaly is studied. The rest of the crew is introduced through Therese’s keen eyes: handsome Carver, whose main purpose in the crew seems to be to sweet-talk people and maintain peace; Tsieh, a sharp-eyed skeptic and brainiac; and McArdle, the hard-to-please pilot and mechanical whiz of the crew.

On the second day, they split into two teams; one conducting a proper in-depth study of The Anomaly and the other exploring the site where the previous colony stayed and trying to salvage anything of value. By the third day, they’re barely hanging on.

From the beginning, Therese is withdrawn, sitting at a corner of the ship’s galley, sipping coffee and observing her new crew members while remembering times when she has felt left out: “…she had flashes of the first day of sophomore year, sitting in the cafeteria of a new high school knowing absolutely nobody, hoping someone would sit with her, terrified that they would.”

With Therese, author Jessica Lévai aptly captures how easy it is to misunderstand an introvert who doesn’t know how to join a conversation with strangers. Balancing out Therese’s perspective is the equally nerdy Tsieh, who observes her reclusiveness as creepy: “She was probably listening, but not contributing, which was spooky as hell.”

Then Lissy enters, “splashing into the pond with all the subtlety of a rock thrown by a kindergartner.” Lissy is her younger, more vibrant, and daring sister. As the story progresses, the sibling rivalry and her resentment toward Therese for their mom’s preferential treatment toward her and repeated disregard of the career of a space salvager are evident. During one of their arguments, she remarks, “You never stand up for me when Mom tells me to get a real job or go back to school. It’s obvious you think I’m beneath you.” Amid the chaos of their mission, interactions such as this ground them in their humanity—a quiet reminder that beneath all the tension, they’re still just people. Unfortunately, Lissy’s sentiments rub off on the rest of the crew, and Therese must prove herself to belong.

The alien cave system of the exoplanet is brought to life through tactile, sensory detail, especially when the characters peel off their masks and interact physically with The Anomaly. These artistic details create an immersive and emotionally evocative atmosphere that is both magical and menacing, evoking awe and dread in equal measure. For instance:

“One wall of the cavern was lit as if from behind, and upon it were…images. Like a stained glass window in an abandoned cathedral…the images impressed on it reminded her of Tiffany lamps at the art museum, but more free, more alive. These were the flowers that watched martyrs put to death and grew exuberantly, mockingly, from their remains.”

Despite its emotional resonance, The Glass Garden leaves a few questions unresolved. While the ambiguity surrounding the sick crewmate is intentional, it doesn’t exactly provide closure, and readers may find this frustrating. The lack of psychological buildup, such as Therese and Lissy’s final decision concerning The Anomaly, can make some character decisions feel sudden, but in the novella form, these are likely to save space and allow for the reader to ponder the truth in the silence.

Jessica Lévai’s The Glass Garden is a surreal and thrilling science fiction novella that prompts you to wonder what truly exists beyond Earth, and it succeeds greatly in balancing introspection and action. Therese’s archaeological mindset provides a steady rhythm of analysis and reflection, while the unfolding mystery of The Anomaly keeps the tension alive.

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