Councilor
A Novel in the Grand Illusion
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- $21.99
Publisher Description
L. E. Modesitt, Jr., bestselling author of Saga of Recluce and the Imager Portfolio, continues his brand new, gaslamp, political fantasy series with Councilor the thrilling sequel to Isolate. Welcome to the Grand Illusion.
Continued poor harvests and steam-powered industrialization displace and impoverish thousands. Protests grow and gather followers.
Against this rising tide of social unrest, Steffan Dekkard, newly appointed to the Council of Sixty-Six, is the first Councilor who is an Isolate, a man invulnerable to the emotional manipulations and emotional surveillance of empaths.
This makes him dangerous.
As unknown entities seek to assassinate him, Dekkard struggles to master political intrigue and infighting, while introducing radical reforms that threaten entrenched political and corporate interests.
The Grand Illusion
Isolate
Councilor
Contrarian
Other Series by L.E. Modesitt, Jr.
The Imager Portfolio
The Corean Chronicles
The Spellsong Cycle
The Ghost Books
The Ecolitan Matter
At the Publisher's request, this title is being sold without Digital Rights Management Software (DRM) applied.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Modesitt's smart second Grand Illusion political thriller (after Isolate), set in a world of steam-powered cars and empaths who can remotely sense emotions, turns a microscope on the parliamentary process. Steffan Dekkard and Avraal Ysella-Dekkard, two former security agents for Premier Axel Obreduur, marry and strike out on their own. Steffan is appointed to the governing Council of Sixty-Six, while Avraal takes a job with a well-connected security firm. To head off the unrest fomented by the reformist New Meritorists, Steffan introduces a bill to dismantle the corrupt and out-of-control Ministry of Security. As his fellow councilors barter for compromises on the bill, Steffan is targeted by both rogue Security special agents and more radical Meritorists. He and Avraal investigate, suspecting a connection between the two groups, possibly mediated by a corporate political operative looking to increase the Meritorist threat while keeping the special police available for corporate dirty tricks. Modesitt drills deeply into the day-to-day minutiae of his world's government (including hearings on the regulation of milled sand dust and the problem of "melon misrepresentation"), perhaps to a level past the interest of most science fantasy readers. Still, his protagonists, both outsiders with integrity, will win readers over, even when they indulge in some murderous tricks to tie up loose ends. This keeps the series going strong.
