I missed Peter Cawdron’s Retrograde when it was released by John Joseph Adams Books last year. But I received a review copy of Reentry, became immediately intrigued, and eventually figured out it was a sequel. Here’s what Publisher’s Weekly, clearly more on the ball than I, said about the first novel.

Post-apocalyptic disaster meets fractured utopian space exploration in this terrifying tale, which Cawdron sets in a scientific outpost on Mars. Geologist Liz inhabits one of four subterranean modules built through massive cooperation among earth’s space agencies. Hazy news of a widespread nuclear war back home sends the astronauts into paranoid seclusion… This tense cat and mouse game plays off fears of self-aware computers to satisfying result.

Here’s the publisher’s description for Reentry.

After almost dying on Mars, astronaut Liz Anderson returns to Earth, but not to a hero’s welcome. America is in turmoil. The war is over, but the insurgency has just begun. So while life on Mars may have been deadly, at least up there she knew who the enemy was. Along with her, Liz has brought the remnants of the artificial intelligence that waged war on two planets. Buried somewhere deep within the cold electronic circuits lies the last vestiges of her dead partner Jianyu. Liz is torn, unsure whether he’s somehow still alive in electronic form or just a ploy by an adversary that will go to any length to win. Heartbroken and treated with suspicion, she finds herself caught up in the guerrilla war being waged on Earth, wondering if the AI threat is truly gone, or if it has only just begun.

Now all that’s left to decide is which one to read first. Here’s the complete publishing details.

Retrograde (256 pages, $24 hardcover/$15.99 trade paperback/$9.99 digital, September 12, 2017)
Reeentry (297 pages, $24 hardcover/$9.99 digital, June 11, 2019)

Both were published by John Joseph Adams Books, with covers by Elizabeth Leggert.

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