Shroud
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4.3 • 16 Ratings
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- $4.99
Publisher Description
An utterly gripping story of survival on a hostile planet from Adrian Tchaikovsky, author of the Arthur C. Clarke Award-winning Children of Time.
They looked into the darkness. The darkness looked back . . .
A commercial expedition to a distant star system discovers a pitch-black moon alive with radio activity. Its high-gravity, high-pressure, zero-oxygen environment is deadly to human life, but ripe for exploitation. They named it Shroud.
Under no circumstances can a human survive Shroud’s inhospitable surface – but a catastrophic accident forces Juna Ceelander and Mai Ste Etienne to make an emergency landing in a barely adequate escape vehicle. Alone, and fighting for survival, the two women embark on a gruelling journey across land, sea and air in search of salvation.
But as they travel, Juna and Mai begin to understand Shroud’s unnerving alien species. It also begins to understand them. If they escape Shroud, they’ll somehow have to explain the impossible and translate the incredible. That is, if they make it back at all . . .
Praise for Adrian Tchaikovsky
‘The smartest evolutionary worldbuilding you’ll ever read’ – Peter F. Hamilton, author of Salvation on Children of Time
‘Compelling on human and cosmic levels, and unputdownable’ – Stephen Baxter, author of Proxima on Alien Clay
‘Heart-in-the-mouth fantastic’ – New Scientist on Alien Clay
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
In this thrilling if somewhat long-winded meditation on extraterrestrial life and the trouble that awaits humanity if it tries to exploit the outer terra, Hugo Award winner Tchaikovsky (Service Model) imagines a distant galaxy being eyed for Earth's Third Stage Commercial Expansion. Within this galaxy, the planet Shroud appears uninhabitable, with no light source and an atmosphere of "roiling smoker's fug." But when the space vessel Garveneer detects an "all-frequencies storm of radio traffic" emanating from the planet, a Special Projects team awakens from deep-freeze hibernation to investigate. Using drones, the scientists discover the planet is crawling with a "hive mind" of tubular creatures. Before any theory about the worms' origin can be developed, however, a collision disrupts research and sends two team members—narrator Juna and macro engineer Mai—hurling toward Shroud in a two-person pod. Stranded, they manipulate the pod to cross the planet's cavernous landscape hoping for rescue even as they take the opportunity to observe Shroud's strange inhabitants—who study the humans right back. The old-fashioned Vernian adventure meshes well with the vividly rendered world full of bizarre creatures. This space fable is sure to please Tchaikovsky's fans.
