Raft
by Stephen Baxter
This book doesn't take place in our universe. It takes place in one a lot like ours in most aspects, but the gravitational constant is substantially larger. This means that ordinary sized objects have measurable gravitational fields, and stars are only a few miles across.
Our characters live in a bubble of air a few hundred miles wide with life in it, but which is in bad shape. The life is all dying, the stars are running out, and the air is turning foul. If they don't find a better home pretty soon, they're doomed. The storyline follows our hero as he goes from a nothing in civilization to leading an emigration to a better place.
This book is actually related to another Stephen Baxter book, Ring, where at the end the characters escape to another universe with different physical constants. In a sense, this might be the furthest offshoot of the Xeelee books.
This book is very engaging reading; once I got far enough in, I wasn't able to put it down.
I give this book a 7/10
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