Remember how the fairy-tale-ish The Hobbit morphed into a wide-lens The Lord of the Rings? Plots, counterplots, and intrigue galore await readers of the Gap saga, which is still picking up speed. Allusions to Wagner's The Ring Cycle in opening book The Real Story's afterword now become clear as Earth politicians, Holt "Dragon" Fasner, and the rest of the United Mining Company Police bureaucrats enter the fray. Morn and company still teeter between exhilaration and desperation.... even readers who don't care for action or space opera may enjoy a story with this forceful a meld of character, cabal, and adventure.
From Publishers Weekly
Although this third volume of Donaldson's projected five-volume space epic doesn't answer the questions raised in the first two books ( The Real Story and Forbidden Knowledge ), it brings many new, if unsatisfying, twists to the various plots and counterplots. And the scattered main characters--captured police officer Morn Hyland and rival pirates Angus Thermopyle and Nick Succorso--are assembled by the book's end. Nick, with Morn under guard and the angry alien Amnion on his tail, has fled to the pirate trading post Billingate, where he hopes to wheel and deal his way out of the mess he's in--even if this means trading Morn to the Amnion. Angus, meanwhile, successfully programmed by the police back in human space, has been sent to Billingate as well, ostensibly to sabotage it. But it seems that Nick, who sometimes works for the cops himself, was sent to wreak havoc on Billingate, too . . . and the convolutions don't stop there. By the final pages, readers may well have no idea who is doing what, or why, or at whose bidding. Original purposes are revealed as lies; new motives contradict others; unlikely coincidences spur major plot twists. But through it all runs Donaldson's trademark sadism, betrayal, amorality and purposeless cruelty, so his fans will hardly be disappointed. Copyright 1992 Reed Business Information, Inc.
The publisher, Bantam Doubleday Dell Publishing Group, Inc.
A master storyteller, Stephen R. Donaldson established a worldwide reputation with his unforgettable, critically acclaimed fantasy series The Chronicles Of Thomas Covenant. Then, with The Real Story and Forbidden Knowledge, he launched a thrilling new science fiction series. Now the galactic epic continues as humanity struggles against the forces of ultimate evil--and its own dark nature.The stage is set of confrontation at Billingate--illegal shipyard, haven for pirates and brigands, where every vice flourishes and every appetite can be sated. Gateway to the alien realm of the Amnion, the shipyard is a clearinghouse for all they require to fulfill their mutagenic plans against humanity.It is here that the fate of Morn Hyland is to be decided amid a kaleidoscopic whirl of plot and counterplot, treachery and betrayal.As schemes unravel to reveal yet deeper designs, Morn, Nick, Angus' lives may all be forfeit as pawns in the titanic game played our between Warden Dios, dedicated director of the UMC Police, and the Dragon, greed-driven ruler of the UMC. Here, the future of humankind hangs on the uncertain fortune of Morn Hyland in a daring novel of epic power and suspense, relentlessly gripping from first page to last.
From the Inside Flap
A master storyteller, Stephen R. Donaldson established a worldwide reputation with his unforgettable, critically acclaimed fantasy series The Chronicles Of Thomas Covenant. Then, with The Real Story and Forbidden Knowledge, he launched a thrilling new science fiction series. Now the galactic epic continues as humanity struggles against the forces of ultimate evil--and its own dark nature.
The stage is set of confrontation at Billingate--illegal shipyard, haven for pirates and brigands, where every vice flourishes and every appetite can be sated. Gateway to the alien realm of the Amnion, the shipyard is a clearinghouse for all they require to fulfill their mutagenic plans against humanity.
It is here that the fate of Morn Hyland is to be decided amid a kaleidoscopic whirl of plot and counterplot, treachery and betrayal.
As schemes unravel to reveal yet deeper designs, Morn, Nick, Angus' lives may all be forfeit as pawns in the titanic game played our between Warden Dios, dedicated director of the UMC Police, and the Dragon, greed-driven ruler of the UMC. Here, the future of humankind hangs on the uncertain fortune of Morn Hyland in a daring novel of epic power and suspense, relentlessly gripping from first page to last.
Dark and Hungry God Arises: The Gap Into Power FROM THE PUBLISHER
Billingate: illegal shipyard, haven for pirates and brigands, where every vice flourishes and every appetite can be sated...gateway to the alien realm of the Amnion and clearinghouse for all they require to fulfill their mutagenic plans against humanity. It is here that beautiful UMCP cop Morn Hyland is about to be traded to the Amnion by the buccaneer Nick Succorso - an act of profiteering and revenge that pushes his crew to mutiny. Now Nick's survival depends on retrieving Morn's sixteen-year-old son "force-grown" by the Amnion, a boy struggling to gain his identity. To accomplish the rescue, Nick must turn to his mortal enemy Angus Thermopyle. Irrevocably altered, programmed for an unknown purpose, Thermopyle has apparently escaped captivity and fled to Billingate with the infamous double-dealer, Milos Taverner. Together, they will mount a raid against a man called the Bill, illegal spaceport owner and traitor to the human race - and into the center of the most heavily defended shipyard in the universe. At Billingate the stage is set for confrontation, when the fate of Morn Hyland is to be decided in a kaleidoscopic whirl of plot and counterplot, treachery and betrayal. In A Dark and Hungry God Arises, nothing is as it seems. As schemes unravel to reveal yet deeper schemes, the lives of Morn, Nick, and Angus may all be forfeit as pawns in the titanic game played out between Warden Dios, dedicated director of the UMC Police, and the Dragon, greed-driven ruler of the UMC. Here, the future of humankind hangs on the uncertain fortune of Morn Hyland in a daring novel of epic power and suspense, relentlessly gripping from first page to last.
FROM THE CRITICS
Publishers Weekly
Although this third volume of Donaldson's projected five-volume space epic doesn't answer the questions raised in the first two books ( The Real Story and Forbidden Knowledge ), it brings many new, if unsatisfying, twists to the various plots and counterplots. And the scattered main characters--captured police officer Morn Hyland and rival pirates Angus Thermopyle and Nick Succorso--are assembled by the book's end. Nick, with Morn under guard and the angry alien Amnion on his tail, has fled to the pirate trading post Billingate, where he hopes to wheel and deal his way out of the mess he's in--even if this means trading Morn to the Amnion. Angus, meanwhile, successfully programmed by the police back in human space, has been sent to Billingate as well, ostensibly to sabotage it. But it seems that Nick, who sometimes works for the cops himself, was sent to wreak havoc on Billingate, too . . . and the convolutions don't stop there. By the final pages, readers may well have no idea who is doing what, or why, or at whose bidding. Original purposes are revealed as lies; new motives contradict others; unlikely coincidences spur major plot twists. But through it all runs Donaldson's trademark sadism, betrayal, amorality and purposeless cruelty, so his fans will hardly be disappointed. (Oct.)
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