A History of What Comes Next by Sylvain Neuvel

As a fan of SLEEPING GIANTS I expected Neuvel's next book to be similar but this one takes her to another level. This book is a mash up of ancient aliens and a race to be the first nation to build rockets to travel up into space. But, as humans we have almost always looked to conquer a new frontier by weaponizing the technology, this is also about war, weapons and power. It is a race between American, German and Soviet scientists to design rocket technology and an old as time secret group of people who are manipulating things to go their way. Sarah and her daughter Mia are part of the Kibsu an ancient race who have an interesting way of furthering their line. They still need a man to have a child but all female babies take all of their genetic material from the mom. They are highly intelligent, very strong , vicious when cornered and we think they have been put on this Earth to guide humans to build rockets. If only it were that simple but there is an equally ancient and vicious group called "the trackers" who are out to search and destroy all the Kibsu. This makes the story move at a very fast pace covering so many genres - historically regarding the war and efforts to steal scientists, fantasy with the ancient Kibsu and their foe and the mother/daughter relationship over time.  4 stars