Banner of Souls (2004)

Liz Williams is a new author to me, and apparently she also writes great detective stories with an entirely different 'mood' to them - Banner of Souls takes place in a far far far future - in the Reynolds, Banksian style where people have re-engineered and remodeled themselves for so long they don't know what humans were originally like nor that humankind did not settle Earth from Mars but the other way around..... (Somewhere along the way men have been sidelined, but this is never explained; it's just the way it is, and it also appears that the remaining 'women' have pretty much moved away from physical contact period, with anyone. There are in fact some 'male' beings that are fundamental to the story too.) The problem, and it's a big one, is that the future has become horribly entangled with the past/present and is threatening to destroy what is left of the present with their 'haunt' technology. Souls and physical being can be separated, the soul left alive in another dimension, which, in the future has been accessed and used for space travel and other much worse things. Naturally there is ONE PERSON who can fix everything, and she must be protected and aided at all costs...... The dangers and monsters are imaginative - huge machines that were meant to manipulate earth's weather, still roaming the seas, 'dragons' and nanobots EVERYWHERE and in EVERYTHING in a creepy way..... It moves quickly, the setting is fascinating, the characters grew on me, and I began to care - all good. I'll read more Williams as I stumble across it. **** ( )

Atmospheric adventure story about saving humanity in the far future. Ending a little disappointing. Full review here. ( )

If you crossed Brackett's Mars with Nolan's Logan's Run, you might get something like this.

A Mars that has sort of gone full-circle, rather than a nearish future with remnants of ancient technology floating around, you have a far future scenario with this is being the case - but with interplanetary travel possible.

However, in this book rather than edit out the old chunk of the population, this time they have done it to the male half.

What's left is a Solar System that has fallen - the Mars is politically unsophisticated, with clans warring with each other like primitives. Technologically the advanced stuff seems to them to be magic, and strange creatures like monsters to give a definite science fantasy feel to the story.

One obvious profesionally named warrior, and opponent in opposition over a kid rather out of the ordinary.

With, of course, plenty of appearances of odd out of the past.

http://notfreesf.blogspot.com/2009/09/banner-of-souls-liz-williams.html ( )

If you crossed Brackett's Mars with Nolan's Logan's Run, you might get something like this.

A Mars that has sort of gone full-circle, rather than a nearish future with remnants of ancient technology floating around, you have a far future scenario with this is being the case - but with interplanetary travel possible.

However, in this book rather than edit out the old chunk of the population, this time they have done it to the male half.

What's left is a Solar System that has fallen - the Mars is politically unsophisticated, with clans warring with each other like primitives. Technologically the advanced stuff seems to them to be magic, and strange creatures like monsters to give a definite science fantasy feel to the story.

One obvious profesionally named warrior, and opponent in opposition over a kid rather out of the ordinary.

With, of course, plenty of appearances of odd out of the past.

http://notfreesf.blogspot.com/2009/09/banner-of-souls-liz-williams.html ( )

I'm going backwards from Williams' "Inspector Detective Chen" series. In contrast to those warm and humorous stories, this one is cold and austere - but no less compelling. Here the author's piercing intelligence envisions Earth and Mars many thousands of years in the future. Of course, the fate of life on the planets hangs in the balance. It's a "ghost story" on an interplanetary scale. ( )