It’s fair to say readers familiar with the Crater School will come to this fourth novel with expectations. A new pupil will arrive and find her place among women and girls who value each other’s skills and merits, even if the hierarchical, patriarchal society of Old Mars fails to appreciate them. Along the way, newcomer and established pupils alike will learn subtly unobtrusive life lessons. So far, so formulaic, but there’s infinite scope for variation on these themes as Brenchley crafts another note-perfect story inspired by classic science fiction and the English school story tradition.
Let’s start with the title. Useful things, prepositions, with their multiple meanings. “At” can simply indicate location. It can also indicate an action directed towards some target. Both are applicable here, and Radhika has plenty to be angry about. She hasn’t come to the Crater School by her own design, or through some benevolent twist of fate. She doesn’t want to be here, but she has no choice. Her father is a disgraced British officer from the Indian Army back on Earth, seeking anonymity on Mars. Living in not-so-genteel poverty, he must find his daughter an acceptable, chaperoned lodging when her mother, his Indian wife, is taken seriously ill and admitted to the Sanatorium across the lake from the school. He has already strained the tolerance of polite society by marrying outside the expectations of his class and upbringing, with the ominous, unspoken implications that has for his daughter’s future.
No one at the Crater School would dream of disparaging Radhika’s complexion. Mistresses and pupils pride themselves on welcoming newcomers, whatever their backgrounds. Readers have already seen girls from strikingly different cultures learn to rub along together here, as their sharp corners are knocked off. We see the widespread expectation that Radhika will leave behind the Hindi she has spoken with her mother, the childhood songs from a very different, non-European musical tradition, and the ruthless, competitive attitudes an army brat learned playing cricket on the Raj’s parched pitches. She will realise they’re not quite the thing, if she’s going to fit in.
Such comfortable, blinkered assumptions lay bare the school’s hitherto hidden flaws. If the Cratereans cannot see for themselves why Radhika rebuffs this pressure to conform so furiously, they risk failing their latest pupil without even realising. With this gulf between them, how can Radhika find a way to help herself?
Brenchley crafts an entertaining, thoughtful read which will more than satisfy returning readers and engage those new to the series equally well.
For a full roster of purchase links, visit the Wizard’s Tower Press webpage.
For thoughts on previous books
Three Twins at the Crater School
Dust Up at the Crater School
Mary Ellen, Craterean
