The Spheres of Heaven - Hardcover

Sheffield, Charles

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0671319698 ISBN 13: 9780671319694

Publisher: Baen, 2001

Synopsis

LOSE THE STARS- OR LOSE EVERYTHING! Spacer Chan Dalton is torn between two masters. The pacifist aliens who hold Earth under Quarantine want him to find out why their starships have been disappearing in the Geyser Swirl, the Bermuda Triangle of the galaxy. Earth's military, which has secretly discovered a way to break the quarantine, assumes that someone out there is making ships vanish, including Earth's, and wants Dalton to find the culprits and hopefully stop them -- with extreme prejudice, if necessary. The trouble is, the aliens hold the taking of intelligent life, even in selfdefense, to be the greatest of sins. It was Earth's violent ways (in defense of the damned pacifist aliens!) that led to the quarantine in the first place -- and if Dalton is forced to fight, it will unveil, and so destroy, Earth's final chance to reach for the stars again. So when Dalton does indeed discover the hostile invaders responsible for the lost starships, he is faced with an impossible decision: Fight and lose access to space forever; or allow a rapacious enemy to run riot over all that he holds dear...

About this title

About the Author

Charles Sheffield (1935-2002) was a mathematician and theoretical physicist by training. His doctoral work was on Einstein's Special Theory of Relativity. Dr. Sheffield worked as chief scientist for the Earth Satellite Corporation, a Washington, D.C.-based firm that specializes in the analysis of data gathered from space.

The author of many science fiction novels, including "Cold as Ice" and "The Ganymede Club" from Tor, Sheffield lived in Silver Spring, Maryland, with his wife, author Nancy Kress.

From Publishers Weekly

Nebula and Hugo winner Sheffield (Convergent Series) takes a thoughtful stab at pacifism and its attendant possibilities in this engrossing sequel to The Mind Pool. In the past, Chan Dalton was forced to disband his motley crew of spacefarers when the Stellar Group, an alien pacifist outfit, banned the human race from space exploration because of its violent tendencies. Twenty years later, without frontiers or aims, human society is stagnating and crumbling. Called upon to track down stolen starships, Chan and his group are given the chance to pick up where they left off and visit uncharted regions of space. When Chan's gang reassembles, they receive instructions to refrain from violence of any sort--even in self-defense. But the first intelligent aliens they meet are warlike: the Malacostracans (a species resembling a cross between lobsters and spiders) are interested in conquest at any cost. When they capture several members of Chan's group, Chan faces an impossible question--should he resort to violence to free his crewmates, forsaking humankind's access to space forever? Is there any other way? In several places, coincidences pile up unconvincingly, and certain dangerous situations are wrapped up too easily. But Sheffield incorporates quantum physics (he is a mathematician and physicist), well-documented space travel and plenty of action into a smooth narrative. Readers of hard science fiction will find the story right up their alley.

Copyright 2001 Cahners Business Information, Inc.

About this edition

• Publisher: Baen
• Publication date: 2001
• ISBN 10: 0671319698
• ISBN 13: 9780671319694
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 448