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Loading... Genetic Soldier (edition 1994)by George Turner (Author)
Work InformationGenetic Soldier by George Turner
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Sign up for LibraryThing to find out whether you'll like this book. No current Talk conversations about this book. Genetic Soldier is from Australian writer George Turner's series of books that take as their base assumption a 21st century Earth that is ecologically overwhelmed by humanity. The novel presents the story of a spaceship launched during the ecological crisis to find new inhabitable worlds. The crew fail to find a hospitable planet and return to Earth circa 2700 (thanks to relativity and cryo-sleep). They find a radically depopulated Earth and a less-than-welcoming populace organized into workers, soldiers, and clerics. The main character is one of these future Earthers, the general of the soldiery of the Yarra Valley (outside what was once Melbourne). I won't attempt to summarize the plot, but would recommend Turner's book (and others in the series) to readers looking for science fiction that doesn't fit into a conventional genre. Note that the book is misrepresented by its title and the U.S. cover image which seem to promise take-no-prisoners military SF. In fact, the book is almost completely devoid of violent conflict. ( ) no reviews | add a review
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In a distant future, on an Earth populated by a scant few hundred thousand humans, the Atkins's Thomas performs without question the duties for which he was genetically bred. Called "Soldier" by one and all, he is a man of honor and ability, responsible for keeping the peace, for maintaining the status quo...and, most important, for guarding the great Book House on the hill - a vast repository of Last Culture knowledge presided over by Libary, Soldier's mentor, the most senior of the mystic Celibate scholars. Such is Thomas's life in the serene, semi-primitive world without nations and cities and governments - until the night the starship comes home. Having fled a dangerously overcrowded Earth years before the Collapse and the Twilight that followed, for seven centuries the men and women of the space-going vessel Search have been combing the galaxy for inhabitable planets - their aging processes dramatically slowed by the relative magic of light speed travel and cryogenic sleep. And now, lonely and frustrated, the weary voyagers have returned to a homeworld unrecognizably altered by the relentless tides of time - a world that does not want them back. A bitter welcome awaits the Searchers, as old Libary gathers Earth's Ordinands and Elders together to tap the terrifying power of the collective unconscious - in preparation of the Carnival night when they will sweep the helpless intruders back to their lonely sky in the name of Holy Science. And it is Soldier who stands in the middle, silent and alone - bound by duty to evict the homesick star-travelers...yet cursed by a preordained genetic destiny that has decreed their eviction will mean Soldier's death. No library descriptions found. |
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