The Cassini Division
Book Three: The Fall Revolution Series
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- $12.99
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- $12.99
Publisher Description
'Science fiction's freshest new writer...MacLeod is a fiercely intelligent, prodigiously well-read author who manages to fill his books with big issues without weighing them down.' - SALON
'Engaged, ingenious, and wittily partisan, Ken MacLeod is a one-man revolution, SF's Billy Bragg.' - Asimov's SF
Ellen May Ngwethu is a young woman with centuries of experience, no morality and the true knowledge. The world she knows is about to end.
The Cassini Division, elite defence force of the Solar Union, sends her on a search for the man whose knowledge could save it. A search that takes her from space to the ruins of London, and back; from the margins of her socialist-anarchist world to its most dangerous edge. The Division's orbital forts around Jupiter are the front line in a centuries-long conflict with post-human AIs, whose intentions are unknown but whose powers once extended to shattering Ganymede and building a wormhole bridge to the far future. Their radio-borne viruses blanket the Solar System, keeping most of its resources from humanity's grasp.
But are the post-humans less hostile than they seem?
The acclaimed third novel from one of the genre's most exciting new talents.
Books by Ken MacLeod:
Fall Revolution
The Star Fraction
The Stone Canal
The Cassini Division
The Sky Road
Engines of Light
Cosmonaut Keep
Dark Light
Engine City
Corporation Wars Trilogy
Dissidence
Insurgence
Emergence
Novels
The Human Front
Newton's Wake
Learning the World
The Execution Channel
The Restoration Game
Intrusion
Descent
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
A rare but successful fusion of hard SF, space opera and serious political speculation, this is the third novel from MacLeod, who's Scottish, but his first to be published in the U.S. The story takes place in a 24th-century Sol system still recovering from a near-catastrophic clash between humanity and post-humanity, the latter a society of godlike, possibly insane former humans who have uploaded themselves into computers and set up their own civilization on Jupiter. At the center of the narrative stands Ellen May Ngwethu, commander of the spaceship Terrible Beauty and an officer in the Cassini Division. This semiautonomous military organization operates as Earth's frontline defense against the dangerous and enigmatic post-humans. Society on Earth, based on a unique combination of socialist and anarchist beliefs, has achieved a high degree of environmentally responsible prosperity in recent years, but the post-humans on Jupiter are an ever-increasing threat. As the forces of the Cassini Division prepare to destroy the post-humans without warning, Ngwethu finds herself on a dangerous mission through a wormhole to reestablish contact with another potential enemy, the long-lost, libertarian-capitalist interstellar colony of New Mars. Despite heavy doses of political theory, MacLeod generally manages to keep the first half of his novel moving at acceptable speed, aided by solid prose, a strong protagonist and some fascinating bits of high tech. The latter half of the tale, which features a battle in space, complete with comets used as superweapons, is more lively. This is an enjoyable and ambitious novel, and hopefully presages the American publication of MacLeod's earlier work. FYI: MacLeod's first two novels, The Star Fraction and The Stone Canal, each received the Prometheus Award from the Libertarian Futurist Society.
