The Moonday Letters by Emmi Itäranta
(Titan Books, 2022)
Reviewed by Dave M. Roberts
When Lumi travels back to Mars after a break, she is to meet up with her spouse Sol who has been working on a major clandestine project. This doesn’t go to plan, as Sol doesn’t show up at the hotel as expected. The only clues that Lumi has are a few short and faintly cryptic messages from Sol, implying their work is proving more demanding than expected but they should meet up shortly. Told as an epistolary novel, the bulk of the narrative consists of letters from Lumi to Sol, exploring the possibilities of what has happened to them. At the same time, she is going back over their relationship in an effort to understand what may have happened, but possibly just as importantly why.
The two of them are evidently from very different backgrounds. Lumi is from Earth, and she works as a spiritual healer, complete with soul animal. Earth has suffered hugely and is on, if not past, the point of full-on climate catastrophe. Sol grew up on Mars and they are a controversial environment scientist. While there is no actual official animosity between Earth and Mars, the question of Mars using its precious resources to support what is largely seen as a collapsing and dying Earth is a very hot political issue. Travel from Earth is restricted, and migration from there is tightly controlled. Attitudes are obviously more conservative there. This is shown up by the hotel clerk recently from Earth, making assumptions about Sol’s gender based on Lumi, and using assumed and incorrect pronouns. Lumi’s reaction to this would suggest that the clerk’s assumption is somewhat unusual off Earth.
As well as coming to understand Sol and her relationship with them, Lumi also learns much about herself. In particular she goes back over her own life before meeting Sol, the process of how she became a healer and the discovery and befriending of her soul animal. This creature is, or certainly feels, very real, in spite of its existence only being apparent to healers. Its role is to accompany and direct her when she is healing, taking her where she needs to be to carry out the healing process. Whether it’s real in a physical sense is immaterial; its role is in the spiritual realm. Her relationship with her soul animal is closely entwined with her relationship with Vivian, an older healer, who uncovers Lumi’s skill and guides her to her animal.
This self-discovery runs alongside attempts to track down Sol, who appears to be actively trying to not be found. They have a past, and the cryptic statement they made on a news programme discussing their work appears to suggest that their reasons for disappearing are considerably more far-reaching than initially suggested, and hints at connections with an environmental terrorist organisation. It’s entirely possible that their elusiveness is more about Lumi’s protection than their avoidance of her.
Trying to do the right thing can often create unforeseen side effects. The Moonday House of the title is a sort of psychic space that Lumi and Sol share and develop, but which she seems unable to get to at the same time as Sol. When she forces her soul animal to go further than it was willing to, the repercussions for her are far reaching. Douglas Adams wrote in Hitch-Hikers Guide To The Galaxy of tendrils attaching people to their home, and these get stretched the further away one gets, causing homesickness, and when that home is destroyed, they flap about aimlessly. In Lumi’s case, the home these tendrils are connected is broken and toxic, causing a very different type of homesickness. The question is explicitly asked, what would you sacrifice to repair the Earth? The answer is difficult and complex, as any real cure for Earth’s sickness would involve sacrifice on an unprecedented scale, of those who would have no say in the matter. This is a deeply moving and thoughtful novel.
Review from BSFA Review 18 - Download your copy here.