From Publishers Weekly
Was the cataclysmic blast that blew the island of Atlantis (aka Thera) to bits a natural disaster, or was it something more sinister? In this latest fast-paced Time Traders adventure (Echoes in Time, etc.), SFWA Grandmaster Norton and Smith (Earth: Final Conflict-Augur's Teacher) take on the legend of Atlantis with a new twist-the blast had a bit of help from an alien species that our time-traveling heroes have encountered at least once before. The "Baldies," named for their complete lack of body hair, are a mysterious race of time travelers who appear to interfere in history to push humans toward some catastrophic future event-but what that event is and why the Baldies need to interfere is something the human time travelers have yet to discover. Dr. Gordon Ashe and friends are joined by a new companion, Linnea Edel, an archeologist who finds an anomalous piece of jewelry at a dig on the island of Thera and brings it to Gordon for examination. This piece of jewelry launches another harrowing time traveling trip-this time to ancient Greece. Norton lends her considerable skill and familiarity with time travel SF to this series, which poses some interesting questions about how humans view societies ancient, new and alien. There's plenty of adventure, a fair scattering of archeological trivia and some new twists on the alien-human relations that carry forward from the previous books.Copyright 2002 Reed Business Information, Inc.


From Booklist
The Time Patrol discovers that someone has tampered with events in ancient Atlantis, so it sends a team back, disguised as seafaring traders. Soon after it arrives, its members discover two sets of aliens on the scene. One is a familiar enemy, the Baldies, who are trying to mimmick their success elsewhere by preventing the rise of technology on Earth; the other is a new alien race, whose habits provide some explanation, if not an excuse, for the conduct of the Baldies. Trying to salvage Earth's future from the clutching hands of alien intervention in the past keeps the Time Patrol team hopping and will keep readers turning pages. At the end, the latter will laud the meeting of minds between Norton and Smith as well as their historical literacy--and await further volumes. Compact and briskly paced, the new Time Traders story proves that skillful writing can keep a concept launched half-a-century ago afloat today. Roland Green
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved


Book Description
Andre Norton and Sherwood Smith have collaborated on Solar Queen and Time Traders novels, but never before have they created as rousing an adventure as awaits Ross Murdock, Gordon Ashe, and the rest of the Time Patrol in Ancient Atlantis.

In Earth's future, when time travel has become possible, the Time Patrol is the top secret government agency that protects Earth's past, so that our history will not become corrupted by invaders from either our future or from other worlds. For many years, Murdock, Ashe, and other members of the Time Patrol have contended with threats to our time continuum, none more deadly than the alien Baldies, who hate other high-tech civilizations and want to destroy Earth.

Evidence of time travel has been found in ruins dating to the ancient world . . . in the legendary realm of Atlantis. So Murdock, Ashe, Eveleen Riordan, and other Time Patrollers deck themselves out as foreign traders to discover whether something is amiss in Atlantis. They find that the Baldies are there, as evidenced by sophisticated, high-tech equipment, whose purpose it is impossible to fathom. As they try to derail the Baldies' plot, the Time Patrollers realize that time is running out on their mission, when Atlantis is shaken by tremors that presage a cataclysm that may be the disaster that sank the fabulous island state.

But they must be sure they act to preserve, not destroy, history--and if they're wrong, it'll be too late . . . for them and for Earth's future.



From the Back Cover
The Time Traders

“Norton and Smith don't just send an old hero through familiar paces. This refashioned Time Traders tale should reward veteran fans of Norton and create some new ones."--Publishers Weekly on Echoes in Time

"The duo successfully 'modernized' the Solar Queen novels and now turns to the Time Traders books. Echoes in Time is an entertaining tale that stays with the essence of the original series, but updates the Cold War rivalry into a more nineties perspective. An exciting adventure that will electrify fans of the grandmaster Ms. Norton and have many new readers searching for some of the original tales."--The Midwest Book Review on Echoes in Time

"A much-improved, if more thoughtful, re-revival with believable aliens, a reasonable time-travel rationale, and properly worked-out consequences."--Kirkus Reviews on Echoes in Time

"Andre Norton is a superb storyteller whose skill draws the reader completely into a fantastic other world of transposed time."—Chicago Tribune on The Time Traders

"A fine heroic narrative, imaginative, inventive, told with the compelling pulse of the true storyteller."—New York Herald Tribune on The Defiant Agents

"The richness which Andre Norton lavishes on her portraits of the wonder-worlds of the universe, the subtle warmth of the empathic relations she portrays between men and mutated animals, and, above all, the mysteries she suggests and half-reveals--these, in the words of another book, are stories, O my brothers!"—Analog on Key Out Of Time



About the Author
For well over a half century, Andre Norton has been one of the most popular science fiction and fantasy authors in the world. Since her first SF novels were published in the 1940s, her adventure SF has enthralled readers young and old. With series such as Time Traders, Solar Queen, Forerunner, Beast Master, Crosstime, and Janus, as well as many stand-alone novels, her tales of action and adventure throughout the galaxy have drawn countless readers to science fiction.

Her fantasy, including the best-selling Witch World series, her "Magic" series, and many other unrelated novels, has been popular with readers for decades. Lauded as a Grand Master by the Science Fiction Writers of America, she is the recipient of a Life Achievement Award from the World Fantasy Convention. Not only have her books been enormously popular; she also has inspired several generations of SF and fantasy writers, especially many talented women writers who have followed in her footsteps. In the past two decades she has worked with other writers on a number of novels. Most notable among these are collaborations with Mercedes Lackey, the Halfblood Chronicles, as well as collaborations with A.C. Crispin (in the Witch World series) and Sherwood Smith (in the Time Traders and Solar Queen series). An Ohio native, Ms. Norton lived for a number of years in Winter Park, Florida, and now makes her home in Murfreesboro, Tennessee, where she continues to write, and presides over High Hallack, a writers' resource and retreat.

Sherwood Smith is the author of a number of science fiction and fantasy novels, including the Wren series for Young Adults, the Exordium novels (with Dave Trowbridge), the recent Atlantis Endgame, a novel of the Time Traders series (with Andre Norton), Solar Queen novels (also with Andre Norton), and many others. She lives south of Los Angeles.

FROM THE PUBLISHER

"In Earth's future, when time travel has become possible, the Time Patrol is the top secret government agency that protects Earth's past, so that our history will not become corrupted by invaders from either our future or from other worlds. For many years, Murdock, Ashe, and other members of the Time Patrol have contended with threats to our time continuum, none more deadly than the alien Baldies, who hate other high-tech civilizations and want to destroy Earth." "Evidence of time travel has been found in ruins dating to the ancient ... in the legendary realm of Atlantis. So Murdock, Ashe, Eveleen Riordan, and other Time Patrollers deck themselves out as foreign traders to discover whether something is amiss in Atlantis. They find that the Baldies are there, as evidenced by sophisticated, high-tech equipment, whose purpose it is impossible to fathom. As they try to derail the Baldies' plot, the Time Patrollers realize that time is running out on their mission when Atlantis is shaken by tremors that presage a cataclysm that may be the disaster that sank the fabulous island state." But they must be sure they act to preserve, not destroy, history - and if they're wrong, it'll be too late ... for them and for Earth's future.

FROM THE CRITICS

Publishers Weekly

Was the cataclysmic blast that blew the island of Atlantis (aka Thera) to bits a natural disaster, or was it something more sinister? In this latest fast-paced Time Traders adventure (Echoes in Time, etc.), SFWA Grandmaster Norton and Smith (Earth: Final Conflict-Augur's Teacher) take on the legend of Atlantis with a new twist-the blast had a bit of help from an alien species that our time-traveling heroes have encountered at least once before. The "Baldies," named for their complete lack of body hair, are a mysterious race of time travelers who appear to interfere in history to push humans toward some catastrophic future event-but what that event is and why the Baldies need to interfere is something the human time travelers have yet to discover. Dr. Gordon Ashe and friends are joined by a new companion, Linnea Edel, an archeologist who finds an anomalous piece of jewelry at a dig on the island of Thera and brings it to Gordon for examination. This piece of jewelry launches another harrowing time traveling trip-this time to ancient Greece. Norton lends her considerable skill and familiarity with time travel SF to this series, which poses some interesting questions about how humans view societies ancient, new and alien. There's plenty of adventure, a fair scattering of archeological trivia and some new twists on the alien-human relations that carry forward from the previous books. (Jan. 22) FYI: Norton is also the co-author with Sasha Miller of A Crown Disowned: Volume Three of the Cycle of Oak, Yew, Ash, and Rowan (Forecasts, Sept. 30). Copyright 2002 Cahners Business Information.

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