Titan is a science fiction

Science fiction

Science fiction is a genre of fiction dealing with imaginary but more or less plausible content such as future settings, futuristic science and technology, space travel, aliens, and paranormal abilities...

 novel written by Ben Bova

Ben Bova

Benjamin William Bova is an American science-fiction author and editor. He is the recipient of six Hugo Awards for Best Professional Editor for his work at Analog Science Fiction in the 1970's.-Personal life:...

 as part of the Grand Tour novel series

Grand Tour (novel series)

-Summary:The novels present a theme of exploration and colonization of the solar system by humans in the late 21st century. Most of the books focus on the exploration of one particular planet or planetary moon....

. It directly follows the novel Saturn, in which the space habitat Goddard has finished its two-year journey from Earth, and has settled into the orbit of Saturn.

Plot

The ten thousand civilians of the space habitat Goddard have now finally begun their lives in the Saturn system, after an exhausting two-year journey that almost plunged the infant colony into an authoritative regime. As the probe "Titan Alpha" lands on the moon's surface, a number of strange electrical problems begin happening aboard the space habitat.

Characters

• Holly Lane - Director of Human Resources aboard the Goddard. Her sister, Pancho Lane, had cryo-freezed her for a couple of decades, starting in her late teens, until a cure for her disease could be found. Now, years later, after learning everything from scratch and receiving many neural boosters, Holly has become a strong-willed individual, with an eidetic memory
  Eidetic memory
  Eidetic , commonly referred to as photographic memory, is a medical term, popularly defined as the ability to recall images, sounds, or objects in memory with extreme precision and in abundant volume. The word eidetic, referring to extraordinarily detailed and vivid recall not limited to, but...
  
  .
• Malcolm Eberly - A former prisoner in Austria
  Austria
  Austria , officially the Republic of Austria , is a landlocked country of roughly 8.4 million people in Central Europe. It is bordered by the Czech Republic and Germany to the north, Slovakia and Hungary to the east, Slovenia and Italy to the south, and Switzerland and Liechtenstein to the...
  
  , he was released early on commands by the religious organization "New Morality", in order to install a fixed government on the habitat Goddard. Despite being involved with several mishaps during the two-year journey, Dr. Eberly escapes conviction, and is allowed to keep his position of Chief Administrator.
• Kris Cardenas - A former Nobel Prize
  Nobel Prize
  The Nobel Prizes are annual international awards bestowed by Scandinavian committees in recognition of cultural and scientific advances. The will of the Swedish chemist Alfred Nobel, the inventor of dynamite, established the prizes in 1895...
  
   winner, she is the foremost expert in nanotechnology
  Nanotechnology
  Nanotechnology is the study of manipulating matter on an atomic and molecular scale. Generally, nanotechnology deals with developing materials, devices, or other structures possessing at least one dimension sized from 1 to 100 nanometres...
  
  ; and an outcast, due to nanomachines that live in her body, which are constantly repairing and regenerating her.
• Eduoard Urbain - Chief scientist on the "Titan Alpha" project, which sends a highly sophisticated probe to Titan.
• Nadia Wunderly - Nicknamed "Lord of the Rings", due to her obsession with Saturn's rings.
• Pancho Lane - Older sister of Holly Lane, she is a recently retired CEO of the multi-billion dollar corporation of Astro Corp.
• Manny Gaeta - A former stuntman, he originally came onto the Goddard with the intention of doing the first landing on Titan; sponsored by Astro Corp. He later falls in love with Kris Cardenas, and flies through Saturn's "B" ring, where he comes upon the mysterious ice particles that make up Saturn's rings.
• James Wilmot - The original director of Goddard, he is an anthropologist
  Anthropology
  Anthropology is the study of humanity. It has origins in the humanities, the natural sciences, and the social sciences. The term "anthropology" is from the Greek anthrōpos , "man", understood to mean mankind or humanity, and -logia , "discourse" or "study", and was first used in 1501 by German...
  
  who came aboard the space habitat, in order to study the evolving society of Goddard.
• Raoul Tavalera - Mentioned before in the novel Jupiter, he was not part of the original ten thousand, but is picked up in Saturn, when Gaeta saves him. He decides to stay in order to be with Holly Lane.
• Timoshenko - A chief engineer aboard Goddard, he ran for Chief Administrator but lost graciously to Eberly; he is looked to as a leader among the engineers.