's Best of 2001
Humanity has spread among the stars, colonizing new worlds. Now the species is in danger of extinction from the interrelated disasters of virulent new diseases and collapsing ecosystems. Of all the colony worlds, only Pandora is unaffected, and the Pandorans are fanatically determined to preserve both their health and the pristine ecosystem, which they keep off-limits even to themselves. But the colonies have vowed to destroy Pandora if its biogenetics experts don't find a cure for the "diversity crisis." The Pandorans struggle without hope until they discover something in the Trust family genes that might save the devastated colonies. And two innocent girls, Chena and Teal Trust, find themselves fugitives in the narrow, closed settlements of Pandora, pursued by desperate scientists and criminals who will do anything, even commit murder, to gain control of the girls' genes.

In addition to Kingdom of Cages, Sarah Zettel is the author of Reclamation, which tied for winner of the 1997 Locus Award for Best First Novel and was a Philip K. Dick Award finalist in 1996; Fool's War, a New York Times Notable Book of 1997; Playing God; and The Quiet Invasion. --Cynthia Ward


From Publishers Weekly
Nothing is the least bit forced or overly clever in this winning coming-of-age story, a seamless blend of concept, plot and characterization. Chena Trust grows up on an overcrowded space station where her family has had to toil endlessly to make enough money to pay for their air. When she finally moves down to Pandora, the planet around which the station orbits, she has to work even harder than on the space station to pay for her upkeep and has to endure the humiliation of communal showers; in addition, force fields keep her away from the native Pandoran wild life. She has no idea how lucky she is. On all the other worlds humanity has colonized, the people are dying of horrible mutations as their planets' biospheres fall apart. The Hothousers who rule Pandora, and have made protecting the biosphere their mission, are dragged into using genetic engineering to help the rest of humanity overcome the "diversity crisis." An essential part of the Eden plan involves the Trust family, but they are unwilling to cooperate. Zettel (The Quiet Invasion) masterfully creates her world and allows her adolescent protagonist to mature slowly and logically. The plot moves along nicely, but at times Pandora's general serenity seeps into the main story and smothers some of the tension. (Aug. 28)Forecast: The strong female protagonists in this work will appeal to many, and there will be some YA appeal as well. While this novel won't go flying off the shelves, its catchy title may help to get it into a solid number of hands.Copyright 2001 Cahners Business Information, Inc.


From Library Journal
As environmental deterioration and incurable pandemics sweep the colonized worlds, the Colonial Shipping Authority seeks aid from the isolated and apparently untouched planet of Pandora, resorting to threats of contamination to force assistance from a world unwilling to risk itself for the greater good. As relations between the Authority and the planet worsen, the fate of humanity hinges on two young women, whose genes hold the key to savingor destroyingthe human race. Zettel (Reclamation; Fool's War) crafts a taut, action-filled coming-of-age tale. Recommended for both adult and YA sf collections. Copyright 2001 Reed Business Information, Inc.


From Booklist
Plagues are decimating the Earth-colonized worlds known as the Called. Only Pandora thrives, thanks to immigration restriction and its cities' interaction with nature, practices enforced by the implanted mechanical consciences all Pandorans possess. Selected individuals from an industrial space station are allowed on the planet but, lacking consciences, have none of the rights and comforts of regular colonists and serve as subjects of genetics experiments. Then representatives of the desperate other planets threaten to overrun Pandora unless its genetic wizards come up with cures for them. A potential biological fix is formulated, and Pandora's leaders search for someone with the right gene map to carry it. Recent immigrant Helice Trust is discovered and pressured into becoming the host mother, which costs her her life. Helice leaves her two daughters to pursue wildly different paths, which for each girl leads to the heart of the ethical conflict that swirls around Helice's murder and the child of her womb. Zettel realizes that conflict as well as she paints the personalities driving it to a startling conclusion. Roberta Johnson
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

FROM OUR EDITORS

The end seems near. The farflung outposts that humans have planted among the stars are drying up, victims of degenerating environments, disease, bad planning, and failing food supplies. Finally, in a desperate move, the scattered remnants of the human race converge on a planet, believed to be a near match to earth. But Pandora, true to its name, is a planet that conceals puzzles-inside-puzzles. Looking down for the first time from the space station, Chena Trust can hardly imagine what horrors and murders await her.

FROM THE PUBLISHER

"Humanity's off-world colonies, the Called, were dying. Planets and peoples had been ravaged by the Diversity Crisis of environmental collapses and mutating diseases. All except Pandora, a thousand-year old biogenetics research outpost, where respect for the ecosystem had become a fanatic religion and a small, genetically controlled population lived in self-sufficient city-domes. Peaceful, benign, and smug in their isolation, the Pandorans lovingly tended their lush, perfect world - until the day an ad-hoc starfleet arrived with an ultimatum: The Pandorans must use their genius to solve the Crisis, or the Called will destroy their cities and let hordes of starving, desperate refugees overrun Paradise." "Ten years later two young girls, Chena and Teal Trust, and their mother, Helice, come to start a new life on Pandora, whose "hothouse" scientists have allowed a select few to live in guarded planetside villages. But for Chena and Teal, Utopia quickly turns into Hell." "The threatened, resentful hot-housers treat the refugees with paranoid contempt - as violent, savage, raw DNA for involuntary experiments. And there is something in the Trusts' genome that the Pandorans want badly. Badly enough to kill for." Now two innocent children are fugitives in a closed system. They can neither retreat to space nor escape into a wilderness where Nature has been programmed to destroy intruders. To survive, Chena and Teal must discover why their bodies are needed by a conspiracy called the "Eden Project." For the Crisis has become an apocalypse, the colonists are about to invade, and although the Pandorans insist the Eden Project will save all humanity, there may be a more final solution.

FROM THE CRITICS

Library Journal

As environmental deterioration and incurable pandemics sweep the colonized worlds, the Colonial Shipping Authority seeks aid from the isolated and apparently untouched planet of Pandora, resorting to threats of contamination to force assistance from a world unwilling to risk itself for the greater good. As relations between the Authority and the planet worsen, the fate of humanity hinges on two young women, whose genes hold the key to savingor destroyingthe human race. Zettel (Reclamation; Fool's War) crafts a taut, action-filled coming-of-age tale. Recommended for both adult and YA sf collections. Copyright 2001 Cahners Business Information.

Kirkus Reviews