Interstellar Megachef by Lavanya Lakshminarayan
I would like to thank Solaris for an advance copy of this novel in exchange for a fair and honest review
Publisher – Solaris
Published – Out Now
Price – £9.99 paperback £5.99 Kindle eBook
Stepping off a long-haul star freighter from Earth, Saras Kaveri has one bag of clothes, her little flying robot Kili… and an invitation to compete in the galaxy’s most watched, most prestigious cooking show. Interstellar MegaChef is the showcase of the planet Primus’s austere, carefully synthesised cuisine. Until now, no-one from Earth—where they’re so incredibly primitive they still cook with fire—has ever graced its flowmetal cookstations before, or smiled awkwardly for its buzzing drone-cams.
Corporate prodigy Serenity Ko, inventor of the smash-hit sim SoundSpace, has just got messily drunk at a floating bar, narrowly escaped an angry mob and been put on two weeks’ mandatory leave to rest and get her work-life balance back. Perfect time to start a new project! And she’s got just the idea: a sim for food. Now she just needs someone to teach her how to cook.
A chance meeting in the back of a flying cab has Saras and Serenity Ko working together on a new technology that could change the future of food—and both their lives—forever…
Food! Glorious Food! Fear not I am not about to burst into song. but food is such a huge part of our lives. We need it to survive, the meal is often a huge part of our customs from Thanksgiving Day Meals to Chinese New Year Mooncakes, its part of our lifestyles, a huge business that defines careers and even national pride in our dishes and traditions. Food is both simple and just hugely complex even before you get into the science of flavours. Therefore, it is to Lavanya Lakshminarayan’s huge credit that their intelligent and entertaining science fictional novel Interstellar Megachef covers all of this in a fitting feast of storytelling and an intricately constructed universe of fascinating flawed characters and cultures that like all the best tales subtly reflets our own back at us with new perspectives.
The planet Primus is the future centre of humanity extolling the finest ideas on culture, morality and of course food. As Earth fell into war, greed and environmental collapse it is now the enhanced humans of other worlds who carry forward our legacy. One of which is how primus is the centre of cuisine with a millennia long history of exploring flavour and delicacy and of course reality television has helped this enter people’s homes and the long running Interstellar Megachef is another soft power at showing primus food is the best. Into which Earth refugee Saras Kaveri hopes to appear and dazzle the judges and restart their career and make a point.
Elsewhere on Primus the young VR simulation genius Serenity Ko has just achieved yet another high flying project but her boss has had enough of Ko’s selfishness and over ambition. Able to upset enough people to form a mob in a bar she is now desperate to find a project that can re-start jer career. A change encounter with Saras and a series of chaotic events brings these together and just possibly Primus may be changed forever.
In this story the power of mixing flavours is explored and explained and actually that is an apt metaphor just why I found this story so compelling. Lakshminarayan has crafted a tale of the sweet and poignantly more bitter flavours that give the tale huge depth and subtly critiques our own world. It has that rare Pratchett-like skill to make you laugh and then think at the same time so you come away after the last page filled with joy but also look at our attitudes to food with a whole new appreciation and perspective.
For the sweet side of the story, we have what could technically be a simple cosy tale of a young woman wanting to win a futuristic reality show. This is delivered stylishly and with characters to root for. Saras is a classic underdog dismissed by her snooty Primus competitors and very quickly seems to get underhanded treatment at the show. The unfairness of the situation and the kindness mixed with vulnerability that Saras portrays immediately wins us over. Aided with their best friend a robot named Kili who helps Saras navigate this world and acts as a confidant they are a lovely duo who win us over in wanting to see them win. Watching Saras makes friends and allies with fellow chefs who also get the harsher side of cooking is heartwarming and really pulls us into the story.
Into which the chaotic element arrives in the form of the not so aptly named Serenity Ko. Ko is very much a genius but also the type of person you may find yourself gritting your teeth at their mix of selfishness and inability to not say what they’re thinking. Ko creates disaster and often makes situations worse. She sees an opportunity to create the first ever Food-based VR simulation that will mix taste with the power of memories connected to our food experiences and this means Ko and Saras are forced to work together and try to match their skills. Ko is very much all about the goal and saras feels the craft is being ignored…and yet.. these two can work together and that opens up the final act as a chance for both to regain their ambitions and also they do find each strangely fascinated with each other. A lovely understated romantic connection is building but will it ever be revealed to each other? Also if you enjoy your cooking shows you’ll relish the very accurate asides to camera, snooty judges and various dramatic moments the Megachef show delivers in spades.
Moving a little deeper into the story and I loved how actually Lakshminarayan ensures both characters are a little more complex than that. They mirror each other in their ambitions to be the best and actually for both the tale is about how you can be brilliant but still not necessarily do things for the right reasons. As the story continues, we see each is very very good at what they do but their own personal baggage is what gets in their way. Saras is not quite who she tells us she is and that gives her story both added human impact but also perhaps colours all her other interactions she wants to take the world down a peg and everyone acknowledge she is brilliant. Ko knows she is brilliant and just wants all the praise and power that should be hers. Woking together opens each other up to asking why are you doing what you’re doing and also appreciating the power of teamwork, Chefs are known as singular cuisine geniuses but lets not forget they actually rely on a whole kitchen of people to help them deliver. The character arc work here is really gorgeous.
Moving even deeper into the more bitter and powerful of the thematic flavours this story has is we get to explore Primus and food. First off without spoilers I applaud the explanation given for why Primus is in love with a cuisine that is all about intricate flavours being injected into quite formless but well-presented food often without any form of oven. Genius. But that neatly starts showing the dividing lines in this world. Saras’ earth cuisine is scorned for using FIRE and actual solid sliced food. She gets called primitive and a ton of micro-aggressions (and more blatant ones are revealed) We start to notice how primus despite saying it is a world devoted to harmony and peace is actually incredibly dismissive to non-natives and culture snot their own. A repeating theme we se towards many of the non-Primus characters we meet. Primus is also very insecure about their place in the world and use culture in all forms like tv shows such as Interstellar Megachef to hammer home the message that Primus is best What Lakshminarayan does brilliantly is explore how food is often a form of power and privilege. The chefs are elites and the way food from other cultures is treated very strongly reminds us of the racism immigrants to any country get and yet how many f us have slowly accepted new dining experiences. The stagnancy of Primus culture gets challenged here and provocatively the science fiction VR food invented here is ambivalent over whether this will or will not be a great thing, I like the idea of a novel where while a lot of things go well you do worry if everything will end well. But just possibly they deserve what happens to them?
Interstellar Megachef was a gorgeous hugely enjoyable read that also makes you re-evaluate your relationship with food and our wider culture’s. It can be funny, zany, romantics, painful and always incredibly thought-provoking with a core tale to root for and a wider word to get invested in. There is room for more tales in this world and I would be all in favour of that. This is an excellent science fiction novel to get your teeth into and very strongly recommended!
