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Clare O'Beara
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Dining Out Around The Solar System Kindle Edition

by Clare O'Beara (Author) Format: Kindle Edition
4.4 out of 5 stars 24 ratings
In a future where giant corporations run countries, all British Space Mines has to fear are journalists and hackers.
Donal and Myron are their worst nightmare.
When people from offworld races open ethnic restaurants in London, they meet a lot of opposition.
Donal and Myron are their best friends.
The London's Eye zine has vacancies.
What do you think happened to their other reporters?

JUPITER'S BOUGHT THE DOME!
Donal, an Irish lad, and Myron, a Cockney-Jamaican mix, meet aged seventeen as book reviewers and trainee journalists. Before long they're onto the hottest stories in London.
DEATH CAUSED BY CAFFEINE
In their future, Stansted Airport has been converted to a space shuttle base and Londoners are recruited to mine the asteroids.
AHOY NEPTUNE! ESTUARY BOMBS TO BE CLEARED
While exploring the other planets, we found that they were all inhabited. Now those people are coming to Earth and looking for work. They're also opening ethnic restaurants in central London.
THE SMOKING GUN
Befriending immigrants makes Donal and Myron unpopular with some, while their investigative reporting lands them in trouble with wealthy organisations, criminals and the Home Office. Their romantic prospects are compromised. But you can't keep a good team down, especially when they report for London's Eye, and they've got every book ever digitised at their disposal....
STOWAWAYS FROM SATURN

"If you enjoy suspense stories with science fiction twists, I believe you will find Dining Out Around the Solar System by Clare O’Beara to be your five-star cup of tea."
D.S. Kane, author of Swiftshadow, DeathByte and Greynet in the 'Spies Lie' series.

This story is complete in itself and is followed by DINING OUT WITH THE ICE GIANTS and DINING OUT WITH THE GAS GIANTS which are standalone reads within the series Dining Out Around The Solar System.

By the Amazon No. 1 Bestselling author of MURDER AGAINST THE CLOCK and MURDER AT IRISH MENSA.
Clare O'Beara won the Arkady Renko short story competition held by Simon & Schuster in 2014 and judged by Martin Cruz Smith.
"Please congratulate Clare O'Beara for me for her clever short, short story 'London Calling.' I appreciate that she treated Arkady kindly, taking his age into consideration, and managed to cross the finish line with a different sort of twist."
- Martin Cruz Smith.
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  1. Book 1 of 4
    Dining Out Around The Solar System
  2. Print length
    1196 pages
  3. Language
    English
  4. Publication date
    January 13, 2014
  5. File size
    5.4 MB
  6. Page Flip
    Enabled
  7. Word Wise
    Enabled
  8. Enhanced typesetting
    Enabled
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There are 4 books in this series.

Editorial Reviews

Review

This is London as you almost know it. It just has different immigrants from those you're used to. The press are as pushy, the politicians just as greedy. Donal and Myron are a fantastic guide to their universe... And Clare O'Beara writes it like a dream: Donal is an English Lit graduate of Cambridge and Trinity Dublin, and it shows.- Jemima Pett, author of The Princelings of the East series and The Viridian System series.Donal is a nascent hacker and novelist, living in the London of an alternative future, where humans have discovered sentient beings on every other planet in the Solar System and trade with other planets is starting to flourish... If you enjoy suspense stories with science fiction twists, I believe you will find Dining Out Around the Solar System by Clare O'Beara to be your five-star cup of tea.- D.S. Kane, author of the Spies Lie series.

About the Author

Clare O'Beara is a tree surgeon and expert witness, and a former national standard showjumper. She has been elected Chairman of Irish Mensa and Director of British Mensa Ltd. She was also appointed National Representative to Mensa International. She has served on the Royal Dublin Society Forestry And The Environment Committee. She lives in Dublin with her husband and cats. Clare is an award-winning writer of fiction and non-fiction, whose journalism work has been published in more than thirty countries. Her credits include Mensa Magazine and Mensa International Journal. 2013 - first prize for Print Journalism in Ireland's National Media Awards. 2014 - won the Arkady Renko short story contest held by Simon & Schuster and judged by Martin Cruz Smith. 2020 - Second, Dublin Business School Create Contest. Clare contributed a story to A Pint And A Haircut (Lon Dubh, 2010), an anthology in aid of Concern's Haiti fund. Clare reads extensively and reviews books for Fresh Fiction.com.

Product details

  • ASIN ‏ : ‎ B00E4N30XS
  • Publisher ‏ : ‎ Clare O'Beara
  • Publication date ‏ : ‎ January 13, 2014
  • Edition ‏ : ‎ 1st
  • Language ‏ : ‎ English
  • File size ‏ : ‎ 5.4 MB
  • Screen Reader ‏ : ‎ Supported
  • Enhanced typesetting ‏ : ‎ Enabled
  • X-Ray ‏ : ‎ Not Enabled
  • Word Wise ‏ : ‎ Enabled
  • Print length ‏ : ‎ 1196 pages
  • ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-0992638603
  • Page Flip ‏ : ‎ Enabled
  • Book 1 of 4 ‏ : ‎ Dining Out Around The Solar System
  • Customer Reviews:
    4.4 out of 5 stars 24 ratings

About the author

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Clare O'Beara

Clare O'Beara

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Full content visible, double tap to read brief content.

Clare O’Beara is a tree surgeon and expert witness, and a former national standard showjumper. She has qualified in multimedia journalism, data visualisation, media law and ecology, and writes on environmental themes. She has served on the Royal Dublin Society’s Forestry and the Environment Committee.

Clare is an award-winning writer, award-winning blogger, and award-winning photojournalist, whose journalism work has been published in more than thirty countries. Her credits include Writing ie, The Register com, Mensa Magazine and Mensa International Journal. Editor of Dublin Business School’s Inside DBS blog and Sustainable College blog.

During 2020 Clare created the Irish Lockdown series. A Pony For Quarantine was nominated for Children’s Multicultural Book Day by US educational site Wise Owl Factory; A Dog For Lockdown was chosen Best Middle Grade Book of 2020 by author/ reviewer Jemima Pett.

Clare independently publishes crime, science fiction and romance, and No.1 Best Selling Young Adult books; she works to make her books Carbon Neutral.

2022 - Winner, Journalism Relating to Health, National Student Media Awards.

2021 - Winner, Blog Of The Year, National Student Media Awards.

2021 - Nominated, EPA Award for Journalism Relating to The Environment.

2020 - Second, Dublin Business School Create Contest.

2014 - Winner, Arkady Renko Short Story Contest: Simon & Schuster. Judged by Martin Cruz Smith.

2013 - Winner, Print Journalism, Ireland's National Media Awards.

The MacGuyver for the Hugo Awards at Worldcon Dublin 2019.

Reviewer for Fresh Fiction.

Customer reviews

4.4 out of 5 stars
24 global ratings

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Customers say

Customers find the book enjoyable and fun to read, with one noting that each episode is different enough to stay interesting. The story receives positive feedback, with one customer highlighting how it connects complex issues in a holistic way. Customers appreciate the book's readability, with one mentioning that the author manages to avoid sounding preachy.

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6 customers mention "Story quality"6 positive0 negative

Customers enjoy the science fiction narrative of the book, with one customer noting its realistic storyline and clean editing, while another appreciates how it connects complex issues in a holistic way.

"...This story is quite good at presenting current day issues as hypothetical, with the veneer of futuristic technology and a space age setting...." Read more

"...While the story and approach are unique and original, there are some familiar resonances: The aliens interact with humans in ways that are a little..." Read more

"...The final conclusion of the story was unexpected and enjoyable. It seems to promise the beginning of a series. I hope so...." Read more

"...Last, the story is clean—of editing errors, which I hate, but also clean in the other sense...." Read more

4 customers mention "Enjoyment"4 positive0 negative

Customers find the book enjoyable and fun to read, with one customer noting that each episode is different enough to stay interesting.

"...'s advocate and nit picking, this is a solid, well written book and a fun read." Read more

"...All in all, this was an enjoyable book that was difficult to put down, (especially without chapters to park on). I notice that there is a sequel...." Read more

"...The story was fun to read, and while long was not tiring. The final conclusion of the story was unexpected and enjoyable...." Read more

"The title hooked me into reading a little. The story hooked me into reading a lot—the whole book, in fact. What was so interesting?..." Read more

4 customers mention "Readability"4 positive0 negative

Customers find the book readable, with one noting that the author manages to avoid sounding preachy.

"...Fortunately, the author manages to avoid sounding preachy, which can be tricky when the main character is a paragon of virtue...." Read more

"...in my evaluation of books is how well-drawn the characters are, how believable, how easily may I identify with the character, how understandable..." Read more

"...you may find it less interesting, but still a good SF read. Kudos, Clare O’Beara!" Read more

"...Overall, it's a great book and definitely a good read! The narrator is a young man just starting out in the world...." Read more

Top reviews from the United States

  • colorful_socks
    5.0 out of 5 stars So good, I want to complain
    Reviewed in the United States on April 3, 2017
    Verified Purchase
    This is a really good book. The pacing is swift, the dialog is snappy, the mini-adventures are interesting. The world is described in such evocative detail that it's like being on a walking tour. (I also appreciate that the sex happens "off screen," or is only briefly described, as too many writers use that as tasteless padding.) The book is not divided up into chapters, but rather adventures, as the 2 main characters chase one news story and then another. Most of the story is so seamless that the few faults really stick out.

    The book follows one young man as he grows from a chronically shy teenager into a confident reporter, with the help of his best friend. The story is told through the lens of the news stories he writes up and the process of investigative journalism. The main character & his best friend are very socially conscious and actively engage themselves in other people's problems. What's unusual, at least compared to other scifi books I read, is that the world described is basically the world as it is now, except there're rocket ships, anti-grav freighters and alien immigrants. Some of the social and environmental issues described are the exact issues we're dealing with now, and some of the issues are current day topics that have been "rolled forward" to a logical future state.

    One of my initial frustrations with this story is that the main character doesn't seem to have a flaw. Being shy is not a flaw (it's endearing). Chronic headaches and hypersensitivity are not character flaws (they derive sympathy, and he's gotten a lot of incidental benefit from it throughout the story). He's got lots of good, virtuous, moral traits, lots of interesting eccentric traits, but no negative traits. Everybody likes him, except for racists and other people who are wrong, and everything he does ends up being correct or beneficial. The closest thing to a flaw is moral rigidity. He seems allergic to anything that's not strictly politically correct. Fortunately, the author manages to avoid sounding preachy, which can be tricky when the main character is a paragon of virtue.

    The main characters' political and social morals drive their choice of investigations. This can make the story, at times, feel heavy handed. While I've yet to feel 'lectured,' the story has a clear message of "racists are bad, immigrants are good." On the plus side, these characters' story choices also emphasize the value of community, of trying see past stereotypes, trying to understand multiple perspectives and connecting complex issues in a holistic way. This story is quite good at presenting current day issues as hypothetical, with the veneer of futuristic technology and a space age setting. This gives the audience a chance to consider these issues with some emotional distance, or from a different perspective. I think the book would be improved if a little attention were paid to /why/ "casual racists" feel threatened by immigrants and underrepresented by their political leaders. It just seems like just a glaring omission when the main characters are going around asking everyone 'and how do /you/ feel about this? how do you think x affects you?" It's interesting that whenever bystanders have the opportunity to voice negative opinions about aliens, they have to use stilted, coded, language, as in the story "alien" is treated like the n-word. Those who don't use this kind of language risk social censure. This makes it much harder for the main characters to engage these apprehensive bystanders and listen to them. It's also ironically stereotypical that the openly racist people we meet are violent skinheads in cheap leather jackets.

    When all's said, as much as I love playing devil's advocate and nit picking, this is a solid, well written book and a fun read.
    One person found this helpful
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  • systemguy
    5.0 out of 5 stars An interesting read from many aspects...
    Reviewed in the United States on August 27, 2014
    Verified Purchase
    This is an unusual book in a number of ways. First, it is about 1200 pages long and has no traditional chapter separations. This makes it difficult to put down once you get involved in the story. Second, it is a sci-fi story in which characters, interactions, social themes, romance, and action all dominate the "sci" part. The two main characters are Londoners, one from Ireland and the other from the Caribbean. In this story the aliens do not come from distant solar systems, but from our own 8 planets (plus Pluto). The "suspension of disbelief", required for any sci-fi story that isn't a science textbook, mainly involves not questioning how human-like life could have evolved on the planets that we are familiar with. The resulting story makes this well worthwhile.

    The plot follows the main characters as they research a succession of journalistic articles, many of them exposing social problems in a slightly futuristic London, including those experienced by Londoners that work part-time in an asteroid mining colony. In 1200 pages, you see this process happen many times, but each episode is different enough to stay interesting. Some of the social problems involve the aliens, who are treated much the same as the other non-English-speaking minorities in this future London. Some of the action scenes are generated as some of the articles offend high ranking government and criminal entities who retaliate, and with various hate groups who don't like aliens. Another aspect of the story is a rich set of many well-drawn characters and bit players with believable interactions. It is easy to like (or dislike) the characters, but almost none of them are the kind of wallpaper figures that typically make up most sci-fi stories.

    While the story and approach are unique and original, there are some familiar resonances: The aliens interact with humans in ways that are a little like "Doctor Who" and Larry Niven's "Draco Tavern". The series of journalistic assignments is a little like those in Lillian Jackson Braun's "The Cat Who..." mystery series, although these definitely have a more serious tone.

    All in all, this was an enjoyable book that was difficult to put down, (especially without chapters to park on). I notice that there is a sequel. I'll read that as soon as my eyes recover.
    2 people found this helpful
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Top reviews from other countries

  • eppingstrider
    5.0 out of 5 stars Epic tale of journalism in a near-future London - long, but wonderful
    Reviewed in the United Kingdom on January 11, 2021
    Verified Purchase
    The first good thing about what amounted to a whole week of reading (three or four hours a day) is that the writing is elegant and easy on the eye. Each character (every last one of them) is beautifully deep, and has a life outside the immediate story (although later I started to forget who was whom). This is total immersion in a near-future London where indigenous people from other planets come to visit, work and live (the use of ‘alien’ is considered an ‘n’ word). The facts and figures about how our current and historical policies and practice have brought us to this fairly dire and stratified society are perfectly accurate and elegantly taken to their logical conclusions. They bind social, political, environmental and technological developments together faultlessly. If only our politicians and their minions worked through their policy implications as diligently. And Clare O’Beara writes it like a dream: Donal (the narrator) is an English Lit graduate of Cambridge and Trinity Dublin, and it shows.

    They head off to find scoop after scoop, simply because they dig below the surface when rootling around for ‘local news’, battering me with stuff I know about. It’s almost like Ms O’Beara is trampling through my life skills. And then she throws in knowledge I picked up from my (late) brother, who did things like retrieve bombs from underwater wrecks. How does she do that? I’ve spent a lifetime acquiring all this stuff, from energy efficiency in housing and the dire state of the UK’s Victorian and post-war housing stock, through the secrets of the ghost-lines of the London Underground (sorry, I’m still a pre-TfL girl). She even follows me out to Epping where she houses the Martian workers. I was going to say there were no Martians there when I was, but come to think of it, some of them…

    The trouble with these lovely episodes of Donal and Myron’s lives? They roll on, day after day, with no discernible plot. There is love interest, danger, pathos, hardship, reward, but it’s all very level. The reader knows that, or trusts, the author will bring us to an epic conclusion, tying up all sorts of strands into some momentous climax.

    And so she does. The climax is epic, wondrous, and beautifully executed. But she just couldn’t stop there; she had to finish it off with another beautifully lyrical description of life in the modern solar system.

    If you have not read the second in the Dining Out series, you may find this hard work, and wonder whether to continue. You should. Just take it as a very different science fiction or alternative universe from that you’ve already read. This is London as you almost know it. It just has different immigrants from those you’re used to. The press are as pushy, the politicians just as greedy. Donal and Myron are a fantastic guide to their universe. I gave it five stars on Amazon, four on Goodreads, but I’d still recommend reading the second book first.

    Epic tale of journalism in a near-future London. Could also get tagged crime and suspense, but a little too drawn-out for the genre. Brilliant, but best read second.
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  • Jan Hawke
    4.0 out of 5 stars . . . including Pluto!
    Reviewed in the United Kingdom on October 22, 2013
    Verified Purchase
    Yes, Plutonian cuisine is also covered, with suitable delicacies from an ice-bound dwarf planet. However, if you're expecting futuristic fare and retrograde SF literary recipes, there's lots of pleasant surprises in store for you in this thoughtful, at times ultra-cynical, fantasy excursion into the not so very far into the future dystopian society of the UK and Eire.

    In fact, at first you'll think nothing too much has changed for most Londoners, who struggle to find just the one job that'll cover the rent, utilities and luxuries like food or a new chair-bed at mum's. Most people are faced with a stark choice between several lowly paid part-time roles, or risking their terrestrial health and peace of mind, working 6 month stints in faux gravity, mining in the asteroid belt. However, one plus of Earth's industrial exploration of the planetary system is that sentient life has been found on the other seven planets (and titchy Pluto), and guess what? They all have marketable resources, including migrant labour. And all of them want in on Terra's solo mastery of interplanetary travel.

    We see snapshots of everyday life through the eyes of cub reporters, Donal and Myron, who forge an enduring professional partnership that takes them away from their past as geeky, bookworm children of the off-planet mining culture that has probably claimed both Donal's parents' lives, and subjected Myron and his mother to violent abuse for half the year, while his father, suffering an excruciating couch-bound malaise in full gravity, catches up on an enforced 6 month alcohol ban in the mining stations. Being based on e-zine London's Eye on the Isle of Dogs in the East End, the two young lads earn their reporter spurs under the watchful eyes of their boss, ex-soldier, local news editor George, urbane former civil servant, sports editor Jeremy and the savvy features writer Pietr. Making unexpected friends along the way, Myron and Donal begin a more minute exploration of the 'little things' life is made of, navigating their way around future London, Stansted, now a spaceport, and collegiate Dublin; writing book reviews in coffee shops where they meet silent, poverty-stricken Martians; business-minded Venusians in the 'burbs, who're finding lucrative gaps in the IT market, despite having little metal on their acid-ocean world; and Shakespeare-loving, caffeine-intolerant Mercurians at Cambridge University, where Donal samples a star-crossed love affair with the daughter of the ambassador to Earth, only to lose her to her home planet.

    After taking a sabbatical from journalism to take his Phd in Eire, ace hacker Donal gradually mends his broken heart and goes on a voyage of self-discovery over his optical deficiencies that blight his urban life with migraines and curtail socialising since he's totally allergic to vid-culture. Recharged, he returns to smellier, stressful London where Myron and he plunge back into current affairs with a series of scoops on the sum of all human and interplanetary life: with affable Neptunian divers helping to salvage an explosive-laden sunken vessel in the Thames; exposing illicit tobacco-pushing on Mars; murky Jovian land deals; eternally self-exiled Saturnian dancers; and why Uranians are so snooty in their dealings with their tiny, impoverished 'neighbours' on Pluto. Things in England's capital are hardly progressive either, with slum landlords and amoral big business making ordinary folks lives a miserable slog of woefully inadequate, or non-housing, in rapidly eroding sink estates and condemned Tube stations. There are few long-term job prospects and social inequities from the top to the lowest echelons of the population, as the rich get richer; the government, local and central, veers from corruption to ineptitude in effortless leaps and bounds; and the press and police have a wary trade-off on natural justice and maintaining the nebulous status quo. Donal and Myron run a teetering gauntlet between drug traffickers, offending the great and the not so good, and running through their true life investigations and the criminal subversion of labour regulations by British Space Mining, as the intrepid reporters gradually uncover the awful truth about the fate of Donal's mother's fatal illness and his father's 'disappearance'.

    Despite the title, this is high concept fantasy that does science in an holistic and well-researched manner that takes you to unexpected places in the human spirit, whether that resides in the breast of a native of London, or Dublin, or Mercury, or Mars, or Saturn. For good or ill. Well-written and observed, Claire O'Beara brings her considerable experience as a journalist to bear in conjuring a totally believable future multicultural society with bells (and knobs) on, and without hammering on the pathos and hysterics. This is a subtle meandering burn of a book with a gentle but inexorable stranglehold on the suspense that pulls no punches for realism, whether or not that's politically incorrect. The A-word causes a world of pain for both our heroes, but they stick at it, and so should you, because the rewards are all threaded through the whole and, most definitely, there in the ending.

    Highly recommended for all those who don't need ray guns (or any guns much) at regular intervals in their intellectual fantasy thrillers.
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  • Robis
    4.0 out of 5 stars Dining Out Around The Solar System : Review
    Reviewed in the United Kingdom on November 19, 2013
    Verified Purchase
    This book follows the paths of two journalists set some time way into the future. Aliens inhabit the Earth and set up restaurants around London based on their culture and cuisine. Whilst the title of the book gives the impression that it mainly features this cuisine, this is only a small part of the storyline. The plot actually follows the paths of these two journalists from their education and as they develop their careers. It leads to some thrilling story-lines as we follow some of the main stories they cover. The two main characters, Donal and Myron are very endearing and they have a close bond and friendship that is rare in any time!

    I'm not actually a fan of science fiction, so the futuristic concepts in technology and idea of Aliens weren't exactly my cup of tea but may well appeal to other audiences. I enjoyed the human aspects in this book and really enjoyed when the journalists dipped into history. It would regularly occur to me that even though this book is based in the future, the main characters had quite old fashioned morals and values. Two very chivalrous gentlemen who cared for their mothers, family members and any lady they may have gone out with. It would leave the reader with hope for a future society.

    As a person who works in the medical field I felt the author had a good grip of medical terminology and radiation protection. She especially described an Emergency department as it is today which will possibly be an accurate description also in the future, unfortunately!

    I felt the middle section of the novel had a few too many stories covered by the journalists and some of these could be cut out to make it slightly shorter. However, the last 25% has some dramatic twists and turns that will have every reader gripped!

    I would recommend this book to Science Fiction fans but also to people who enjoy stories based around a strong friendship where a bond is so great they would sacrifice anything and everything for the other.
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