Winner of the 2009 Prix Aurora Award for Best Long-Form Work in English
Published by DAW Books
An Alternate selection of the Science Fiction Book Club
Cover art by Steve Stone
Marseguro, a water world far distant from Earth, is home to a small colony of unmodified humans known as landlings and to the Selkies, a water-dwelling race created by geneticist Victor Hansen from modified human DNA. For seventy years the Selkies and the unmodified landlings have dwelled together in peace, safe from pursuit by the current theocratic rulers of Earth–a group intent on maintaining human genetic and religious purity.
Then landling Chris Keating, a misfit on any world, seeks personal revenge on Emily Wood and her fellow Selkies by activating a distress beacon taken from the remains of the original colony ship. When the Earth forces capture the signal and pinpoint its origin, a strikeforce, with Victor Hansen’s own grandson Richard aboard, is sent to eradicate this abomination.
Yet Marseguro will not prove as easy to conquer as the Earth force anticipates. And what Richard Hansen discovers here may alter not only his own destiny but that of Marseguro and Earth as well…
“The settings are well drawn and creative…The characters possess substance, emotions and realistic motivations…Most important, the action and surprises keep coming…with nonstop action and plot development…the flaws are minor, and this book is almost impossible to put down.
“Even people who are afraid of the water will love this book. Highly recommended.” – Lois H. Gresh, SCI FI Weekly
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