Mainline

Before birth Reva was exposed to a bizarre alien force that changed her genetic makeup and gave her the unique ability to see different lines of causality spread out before her. When she chooses any one of them, the other possibilities fade into nothingness and the new reality becomes her "Mainline." She uses this special talent as an assassin for hire - slipping in and out of realities, she strikes and then disappears. She is unstoppable and uncatchable.
But don't tell that to bodyguard Yavobo, an eight-foot-tall member of a warlike alien species whose hormone-induced rages make them walking machines of destruction. When Reva takes out his boss, he swears a blood oath to track down and kill the assassin.
Yavobo has set himself no easy task. Danger is Reva's game, and no one had beaten her at it yet. But when she meets a young smuggler who reminds her too much of herself, a little helpful advice soon turns into much more than that. Suddenly she is faced with the powerful urge to give up her life roaming the lines and stay forever in one "Mainline." But while friendship may dispel the demons that have haunted her since childhood, it may also prove her undoing - she may no longer be able to escape the deadly hunter on her trail.

The high-tech action in Christian's debut is propelled by an intriguing conceit: that Reva, an assassin, can pick her way across different realities branching out from her "Now," allowing her to choose an alternate "line" where she can take advantage of gaps in a victim's security system. Once Reva has switched one line too many, however, she has no way of recognizing, and returning to, her original "Mainline." Reva has spent her entire life learning to adapt to this truth, which has rendered friends, relatives and lovers into slightly, or even wholly, different people than the ones she first knew. But now Reva has grown infatuated with Lish, a female "holdout" who smuggles illicit goods to the watery planet R'debh. Reva desperately wants to remain on Lish's Mainline. As the action reaches a frantic peak, smugglers, cops, aliens and sea gods converge, and it seems ever more unlikely that Reva will be able to stay in the reality she knows, with the people she has grown to love. Christian uses this premise to explore the opacity of other's true selves. While she does not give this theme the full care it deserves, she manages to pack a lot of plot into an intelligent and thoughtful package.
Copyright 1996 Reed Business Information, Inc.

On planet R'debh, Reva grew up with an unusual psychic talent: She can view, and move among, the various probability-worlds that constitute reality. Since she can appear seemingly out of nowhere, do a deed, and vanish without trace into a nearby timeline, her lucrative adult occupation is that of assassin. As a consequence of her lifestyle, however, Reva has no friends--until, in the course of her work, she meets young, ambitious smuggler Lish, and a bond develops between them. Soon, the mysterious Vask the Fixer attaches himself to the pair by making himself useful in various ways. Like Reva, Vask is a Mutate: His psionic talent enables him to slip out of phase, so he becomes invisible and can even move through solid matter. What Vask never reveals is that he works for Commander Obray of security. Lish gets herself into trouble by triple- crossing a powerful double-crossing criminal associate. Reva's problem, meanwhile, is that she's being pursued by the bodyguard of one of her victims, the seemingly unkillable, huge, red-and-black alien warrior, Yavobo, who's sworn a blood oath of vengeance. Christian's well-articulated, cleverly constructed plot hurtles along at a blistering pace, and those new psi-power wrinkles provide additional gratification: a debut of splendid promise. -- Copyright ©1996, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.

Reva, an assassin for hire, can slip between alternate timelines to evade detection. When the smuggler Lish befriends her, Reva vows to remain in the mainline to protect this woman?a commitment she's never before made. When security agent Vask infiltrates Lish's organization and discovers Reva's secret, the three must escape an alien hunter, foil terrorists, and outwit a crime boss while saving Lish's assets. The intricately drawn characterizations and the believability of Reva and Vask's timeslips strengthen the solid plotting. This first novel contains all the ingredients of a science fiction thriller, making this a good choice for sf collections.
Copyright 1996 Reed Business Information, Inc.

The premise of Christian's brilliant first novel is as ingenious as its execution: a career assassin's unique ability to shift between alternate time lines grants her almost perfect immunity from the law. During her latest assassination of a prominent politico, hit woman Reva attracts the unwelcome attention of her victim's bodyguard, a powerful alien warrior who swears revenge. As if one pursuer weren't enough, Reva is also being tailed by an imperial security agent with his own special talent--invisibility. Yet Reva's developing friendship with an imperiled black marketeer persuades her to remain in the current time line to protect her protegefrom crime lords while staving off her own enemies. Christian packs a relentlessly paced story line with enough explosive action, interesting characters, and technological gadgetry, such as intelligence enhancers for beast as well as human, to fill a dozen novels. Hers is an exciting new voice that should engage a wide range of readers, from military enthusiasts to cyberpunk fans. Carl Hays