The Foreigners
James Lovegrove
Gollancz hardback, 421 pages, £16.99
Published September 2000
ISBN 0575068949
Gollancz paperback, 421 pages, £6.99
Published August 2001
ISBN 1857987918
Review by Mike Don (2001)

In return for their miraculous material Crystech, the mysterious Foreigners ask only to be sung to, until one of them is murdered, and their relationship with humanity seems doomed.

Enigmatic, silent, golden aliens appear on Earth and bring about a near-utopian society. The idea is SF; Lovegrove’s approach isn’t. Conventionally, the aliens themselves would be the focus; their nature, their origin, their motivations. Compare, say, Keith Laumer’s The Monitors. (It’s a long time since I’ve read it, so the comparison may not be as good as I think!). The Foreigners remain a mystery throughout, their role perhaps more or less symbolic – and certainly providing an exotic, attention grabbing spice to what is, essentially, a murder mystery.

FPP Captain Jack Parry (erstwhile Detective Sergeant Parry of the Met) is a thoughtful, painstaking copper in the footsteps of Morse, Dalgleish, Laidlaw . . . complete with troubled home life, aggressively ambitious rivals and loyal sidekick. I’m no expert in the genre, nor normally a great fan, but Foreigners looks good, with complex, subtle characterisation, the obligatory Red Herring to be sorted out, and a sudden, explosive finale.

Sadly, such novels as The Foreigners, falling between two genre ghettoes, tend to be neglected by fans of both. This one deserves a better fate.