Perseus Spur, published in North America by Del Rey, is the story of Asahel Frost, disgraced scion of Rampart, a family-controlled galactic corporation. When the book begins, Frost is living incognito as a tour guide on a backwater planet, but a botched attempt on his life draws him out of retirement and into an apparent conspiracy between the leading corporations and the Haluk, a malign species of aliens.

The detective thriller that follows takes Frost to several planets and embroils him in a firecracker string of adventures, but the action often falls a bit flat. As a disciple of Olaf Stapledon and other "philosophical" science-fiction writers, May is an author whose strengths lie in the creation of rich, almost archetypal imagery and plotlines that unfold with a slow but seemingly inexorable power. But in its personal scope and its pacing, Perseus Spur feels as though May wanted to write a summer action movie instead of the epic spectacles her fans have come to expect. Unfortunately, the effect just doesn't succeed.

Just as suspense is not one of May's strongest suits, she further hampers herself in this effort by focusing on Frost, an irascible and curmudgeonly hero on the model of both the Pliocene Exile's disgraced alcoholic pilot Richard Voorhees and the Galactic Milieu's Rogi Remillard. Although "Uncle Rogi" is largely redeemed by his humor, Frost takes more after the unsympathetic Voorhees in his alternation between swagger and self-pity.

While the type can be fascinating in the right hands (as in, for example, "Hamlet"), May seems to rely too heavily in this case on demonstrating the character's psychological frailties with an unending internal monologue filled with rancor and caustic humor -- a fictional strategy that wears thin after 323 pages and gives only the illusion of psychological depth. In this case, the stock May curmudgeon seems strained, distracting the reader from her considerable talents as a writer.

On the other hand, those talents are amply represented in her depiction of futuristic corporate culture. In the worlds of the Perseus Spur, federal government is largely a tool of the massive Hundred Concerns, mercantile organizations so vast they own most of the planets populated by humanity. May paints this political-economic framework with the painstaking detail of her more fully developed Galactic Milieu, blending the panoramic sweep of history with the everyday human touch that made that previous work so compelling.

As a result, this reader found himself hoping that Frost would simply shut up so May could tell us more about the setting. Compared to the vignettes of future life she offers, the childhood traumas and disappointments of any character -- no matter how rich or interesting -- would naturally fall short, and by forcing a less-than-exciting character like Frost into the spotlight, May undercuts her own virtues, leaving the reader staring sourly at the flaws.

Although a Del Rey publicist said there are no plans to continue the storyline begun in Perseus Spur into a multi-book series, the book is clearly packaged as "An Adventure of the Rampart Worlds," indicating that either May or an overly enthusiastic copywriter have more ambitious plans for the setting. Moreover, earlier industry reports and fans alike have reported working titles for at least two forthcoming books in the series, Orion Arm and Sagittarius Whorl.

If these books are indeed still planned, and if May can play to her strengths in them, building on the already rich setting outlined in Perseus Spur, they may leave a better impression.