336 pages
Published Jan. 16, 2017 by Tor Books.
The year is 2020. It's seventeen years since the Revolution overthrew the last king of the New British Empire, and the newly-reconstituted North American Commonwealth is developing rapidly, on course to defeat the French and bring democracy to a troubled world. But Miriam Burgeson, commissioner in charge of the shadowy Ministry of Intertemporal Research and Intelligence—the paratime espionage agency tasked with catalyzing the Commonwealth's great leap forward--has a problem. For years, she's warned everyone: "The Americans are coming." Now their drones arrive in the middle of a succession crisis—the leader of the American Commonwealth is dying and the vultures are circling.
In another timeline, the U.S. has recruited Rita, Miriam's estranged daughter, to spy across timelines and bring down any remaining world-walkers who might threaten national security. But her handlers are keeping information from her.
Two nuclear superpowers are set on a collision course. Two increasingly desperate paratime espionage agencies …
The year is 2020. It's seventeen years since the Revolution overthrew the last king of the New British Empire, and the newly-reconstituted North American Commonwealth is developing rapidly, on course to defeat the French and bring democracy to a troubled world. But Miriam Burgeson, commissioner in charge of the shadowy Ministry of Intertemporal Research and Intelligence—the paratime espionage agency tasked with catalyzing the Commonwealth's great leap forward--has a problem. For years, she's warned everyone: "The Americans are coming." Now their drones arrive in the middle of a succession crisis—the leader of the American Commonwealth is dying and the vultures are circling.
In another timeline, the U.S. has recruited Rita, Miriam's estranged daughter, to spy across timelines and bring down any remaining world-walkers who might threaten national security. But her handlers are keeping information from her.
Two nuclear superpowers are set on a collision course. Two increasingly desperate paratime espionage agencies are fumbling around in the dark, trying to find a solution to the first contact problem that doesn't result in a nuclear holocaust. And two women—a mother and her long-lost, adopted daughter—are about to find themselves on opposite sides of the confrontation.
This isn't my favorite Stross multiverse, but it is Stross and he knows how to write a compelling novel.
It's multidimensional geopolitics / spy-craft. More of an alternate history than Sci-Fi. Revisiting the cold war and MAD doctrine.
I will be reading the rest of this trilogy.
I seem to be having a run on failed novels. This was rather spectacularly disappointing, disjointed, muddled, and directionless. Oh well. I only read 200 pages.
Aaah! The merchant princess university is back except this time the protagonist isn't suck in some crappy medieval world's creepy breeding program (and Stross is a better writer).
Very enjoyable and will totally read the next one. Does feel very much like a direct sequel to the merchant princess series so I am not really sure why it's it's own series.
Initially a little tricky to keep track of all the people and timelines, it settles into an easier to follow set before long. This book is clearly the introduction story for what will become a detailed and complicated world.
