Life under the thumb of the Spark Lords — the League's Earthly representatives — is dull but comfortable for Philemon Abu Dhubhai and the other teachers at a third-rate private school for second-rate rich kids. But all that changes when a female student is found murdered by an unknown alien organism, and her boyfriend, the prime suspect, goes missing. Suddenly an unofficial homicide investigation has snared Philemon and five other "misfits" — plus one of the planet's most powerful criminals, the mother of the murdered girl — trapping them all in a web of terrifying conspiracy that could involve the Spark Lords ... and even the League of Peoples itself. For all is perilously notwhat it seems, on Earth and in the heavens. But then again, neither are Phil and his compatriots ...

James Alan Gardner is a 1989 graduate of the Clarion West Science Fiction Writers Workshop, and has had several science fiction stories and novellas appear in publications such as Isaac Asimov's Science Fiction Magazine, Amazing Stories, and The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction. He is the author of six previous novels: Expendable, Commitment Hour, Vigilant, Hunted, Ascending, and Trapped. He was the grand prize winner of the 1989 Writers of the Future contest, has won the Aurora Award, and has been nominated for the Hugo and Nebula Awards. He lives in Canada.