The Spoils of War - Softcover

Alan Dean Foster

Softcover

ISBN 10: 1841490016 ISBN 13: 9781841490014

Publisher: Orbit, 1997

Synopsis

The Weave was on the verge of winning a decisive victory after a milennia of war, thanks to their new allies from earth. But then the birdlike Wais scholar Lalelang found evidence that Humans might not adapt well to peace. Researching further, she uncovered a secret group of telepathic Humans called the Core, who were on the verge of starting another war, and then eliminating Lalelang. At the last moment, she was saved by a lone Core commander. He took a chance on her intelligence and compassion, and gambled the fate of Humanity on the possibility that together, they could find an alternative to a galaxy-wide bloodbath....

About this title

From the Publisher:

I had just casually picked up A CALL TO ARMS to try out Foster's writing, and was engaged immediately. This is a classic SF yarn in the old style of bad guy aliens vs. good guy aliens, with humans holding a special place between them. The twist is that the special human qualities the aliens value are just the same qualities we abhor in ourselves. So while you enjoy the classic battles across the galaxy and interspecies intrigue, you have a very contemporary and critical view of humanity. The style is fluid and clear, the pace is fast and plotting well thought out--very professional. We've reprinted Foster backlist titles for years, and this new series inspired me go back and read them.

--Steve Palmer, Director of Production Mass Market

From Kirkus Reviews:

The third in the series (after A Call to Arms and The False Mirror) in which the freedom-loving alliance known as the Weave enlists the aid of the human race to win a centuries-long interstellar war. The action is seen primarily from the perspective of the historian Lalelelang, of the birdlike Wais race. Her academic specialty is warfare, a subject that horrifies the other members of her species; she herself can contemplate it only with the help of drugs and special training. She realizes, however, that she can never understand warfare without observing actual combat. And so Lalelelang journeys to a distant world to view the progress of the war against the mind-controlling Amplitur. In the process, she earns the respect of several humans--the only intelligent race that actually enjoys combat--as well as stumbles on the secret that a number of humans are themselves able to control the minds of other species. Lalelelang convinces them that, as an academic, she will protect their secret; eventually, she also learns that the Amplitur have concocted a fiendishly clever plan for winning the war in spite of apparent defeat: preying on human dissatisfaction with their status in the postwar world to win them as allies. A workmanlike job from Foster, with his usual well-drawn alien characters plus, on a deeper level, an interesting take on the choices facing America in the post-cold war world. -- Copyright ©1993, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.

About this edition

• Publisher: Orbit
• Publication date: 1997
• ISBN 10: 1841490016
• ISBN 13: 9781841490014
• Binding: Paperback