rbiting Marak's World, Concord Station is inhabited by three groups, each mistrusting yet dependent on the others. One group is made up of humans from the Federation of Earth and the Inner System, fanatical about maintaining genetic purity. Another consists of Outsiders, humans from the Outer Systems, who are more open to using genetic engineering and other invasive technologies to alter and improve the standard human genotype. The third group is not human, and may not be a group at all—so little is known about the alien species called the ondat that, even after the short but brutal Gene Wars, and subsequent centuries of uneasy peace, the humans on Concord do not know what the aliens look like or if there is more than a single one of them (calling itself Kekellen) in residence. Because the ondat possess superior technology and their psychology is poorly understood, the humans on Concord tiptoe around the alien presence as much as possible.
Marak's World lies in an area of space where human and ondat spheres of influence overlap. Like the station above it, the planet is riven by factions. Centuries ago, the still-fresh peace between human and ondat was nearly destroyed when the aliens discovered the planet had been colonized by the Movement, a group of humans whose unrestrained genetic experiments had unleashed the Gene Wars in the first place. To demonstrate their repudiation of these outlawed technologies, Outsiders and Federation collaborated with the ondat in scouring the planet of life ... almost. The Ila, a notorious Movement leader, and a group of Outsiders, led by Marak Trin Tain, sheltered deep within the planet as the ondat rained asteroids upon the surface. Centuries after the bombardment, the Ila, along with Marak and his companions, all immortal thanks to the Ila's viral tinkering, emerged to a world slowly returning to life.
It was a world under quarantine, for Movement tech may have survived the bombardment. And if any of that tech were to escape the planet, the ondat would resume their war. Safer just to completely destroy the planet and everyone on it ... yet aliens have a soft spot for Marak, whom they consider a rarity: an honest human. So for centuries now they have observed his adventures on the planet, either directly or through reports kept by the teams of Outsider observers who remotely monitor him and his fellows around the clock via neurological implants known as taps.
This long-standing status quo is upset when a ship arrives from Earth bearing a bellicose ambassador named Gide, whose purpose is to alter the balance of power in Federation favor by exposing forbidden transfers of Movement technology. As a first step, he summons one of Marak's observers, a young man named Procyon, to a private interview. When the meeting goes horribly wrong, a crisis erupts that threatens to enmesh Outsiders and Federation alike in a war they cannot hope to win.
Science fiction for policy wonks
When a novel begins with 16 pages of detailed history, maps and social and cultural analysis, readers may be forgiven for wondering if they've picked up a work of fiction or a textbook. These pages are so densely packed with information that more than a single reading may be required prior to moving on to the novel itself. Perhaps readers familiar with Cherryh's Hammerfall, the previous novel in the series, will be able to skim these pages, but it's asking a lot to expect your readers to plunge into a seminar before reading your book.
Is it worth the effort? Yes—barely. Beneath the SF trappings, Cherryh is writing what might be termed a bureaucratic romance. Her hero, Procyon, is a midlevel bureaucrat, and almost all the other main characters are bureaucrats of one pinstripe or another. The plot of the novel consists of the kind of intricate but tedious power plays that should be familiar to anyone who has ever worked in an office, only on galactic and genetic scales.
Cherryh alternates scenes on the station with scenes set on the planet, where a geological catastrophe unfolds, putting the lives of Marak and his wife at risk. But these scenes have little to do with the main drama, and far from centering the book in Marak's calm wisdom, or in the impersonal grandeur of planetary evolution, they come across as contrived exercises in the generation of suspense.
Another missed opportunity lies in the character of Kekellen, the ondat representative on the station. While there is every reason for the novel to begin with him as an unknown quantity, it feels like a miscalculation to end the book that way. Cherryh introduces a mechanism whereby the alien's character might be more fully explored, but she doesn't follow through.
Still, as anyone who has ever worked in an office knows, office politics can be engrossing, especially when it's someone else's job on the line. Little by little, Cherryh's orbiting office sucks you in, and you read on, impatient to learn who will get the ax, who the promotion.
