Synopses & Reviews
In the distant future, corporations have become sustainable communities with their own militaries, and corporate goals have essentially replaced political ideology. On a youthful, rebellious impulse, Lawrence joined the military of a corporation that he now recognizes to be ruthless and exploitative. His only hope for escape is to earn enough money to buy his place in a better corporation. When his platoon is sent to a distant colony to quell a local resistance effort, it seems like a stroke of amazing fortune, and Lawrence plans to rob the colony of their fabled gemstone, the Fallen Dragon, to get the money he needs. However, he soon discovers that the Fallen Dragon is not a gemstone at all, but an alien life form that the local colonists have been protecting since it crashed in their area. Now, Lawrence has to decide if he will steal the alien to exploit the use of its inherent biotechnical processes -- which far exceed anything humans are capable of -- or if he will help the Resistance get the alien home.
Review
"Astounding...thrilling...surprising...Hamilton uses technology to excellent effect." Science Fiction Age
Review
"Shows how thought-provoking yet entertaining science fiction [can] be. Some of the best fiction...in years." Midwest Book Review
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"The author's expansive vision of the future combines action and intrigue on a panoramic scale." Library Journal
Review
"[Hamilton is] taking on one of sf's (and maybe all of literature's) primal jobs: the creation of a world with the scale and complexity of the real one." Locus
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"[Hamilton is] a rare talent." Denver Post
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"The depth and clarity of the future Hamilton envisions is as complex and involving as they come." Publishers Weekly (starred review)
Synopsis
From the author of the celebrated international bestselling sensations
The Reality Dysfunction,
The Neutronium Alchemist, and
The Naked God comes his astonishing new work...
Fallen Dragon
By the twenty-fifth century, the brilliant notion of a star-trading civilization linking Earth to its interstellar colonies has petered out the victim of stock market manipulation and cost-benefit analysis. Trade has been replaced by a business-friendly policy of "asset realization"...which some might call piracy.
Corporate starships of the Zantiu-Braun 3rd Fleet deploy to colonies, disgorging hordes of invulnerable soldiers called Skins. Enforcing their dictates with both orbital weapons and civilian hostages, the Skins loot whole planets, leaving only poverty, misery, and an industrial infrastructure so that a few years later, Z-B can harvest again.
But on the bucolic world of Thallspring, Z-B's plans are about to go badly awry...
About the Author
Peter F. Hamilton was born in Rutland, England in 1960. He began writing in 1987, and sold his first short story to Fear magazine in 1988. He has also been published in Interzone and the In Dreams and New Worlds anthologies, and several small press publications. His first novel was Mindstar Rising, published in 1993, and he has been steadily productive since then. Peter lives near Rutland Water with his wife and two children.