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The sixth novel in Cherryh's Foreigner space opera series, a groundbreaking tale of first contact and its consequences... It has been nearly ten years since the starship Phoenix returned to Alpha, the station orbiting the world of the atevi, which had been abandoned following a rift between a faction of the station's inhabitants and the spacers' Pilot's Guild. The unexpected return of the Phoenix has forever changed the lives of both atevi and Mospheirans, for over the ensuing decade, the captains of the Phoenix have brought both species into space. Their motivation seemed simple: Reunion Station, a human station in another sector of space, had been destroyed by aliens. But on his deathbed, the senior captain of the Phoenix admits that he lied to the crew--that Reunion was merely damaged, not destroyed, and many people may have survived. At this disclosure, the crew rebels and forces the Phoenix to undertake a rescue mission to Reunion. Onboard the rescue mission are Bren Cameron, brilliant human paidhi representing the atevi ruler Tabini-aiji, and Tabini's grandmother Ilisidi, a fearsome and ambitious atevi leader with an agenda of her own. Trapped in a distant star system with little fuel left, facing a bellicose alien ship, how can Bren help to avoid interspecies war when the notoriously secretive Pilot's Guild aboard Reunion Station refuse to cooperate, and may have kept the inhabitants of their own station ignorant of their true situation? The long-running Foreigner series can also be enjoyed by more casual genre readers in sub-trilogy installments. Explorer is the 6th Foreigner novel, and the 3rd book in the second subtrilogy.… (more)
User reviews
The paidhi, Bren Cameron, is in the one place he never really expected to be. He's aboard the Phoenix, heading for a damaged space station, to rescue the people who had been left behind more than a decade before. Bren Cameron is in space --
And, being older and wiser, he's really not certain it's what he truly wants anyway. But he now the Lord of the Heavens and this is his place.
Traveling with him is the aiji dowager, Ilisidi and her great-grandson, the seven year old heir. They were going to a dangerous place -- a place where the humans who are in control are not friends of the Atevi or to the humans like Bren Cameron, who is descended from people the Pilot's Guild would consider rebels and deserters, since they abandoned the station at the Atevi world.
It's a perilous position, made all the more so by the presence of a dangerous new alien race. Bren and Jas, now one of the senior captains on the ship, do their best to establish communications and learn that the station fired on what must have been a peace envoy. The aliens want back the body. Bren is determined to get it for them.
The Pilot's Guild is not cooperating, not in the action with the aliens and not with the idea of 'rescuing' everyone on the station. And Bren learns that the envoy isn't dead, but captured. It's going to be a dangerous game to get him free, satisfy the aliens who are very powerful, and rescue the humans.
This book moved at the speed of light. It was a joy to read and a great adventure with the promise of more 'adventure' than probably Bren would ever want in the future. From toy car races and dinosaur movies to daring raids on enemy territory -- this book never stops.
Arrival at Reunion has its own problems though - whose is the spaceship sitting nearby? Why is the fuel port trapped? Can Jase finally exert real leadership and earn his captains rank? How will stationers threatened with an alien presence react to the Aveti? Most importantly with Guild headquarters here who is in control, is Saibin to be trusted, does the plan still hold? Can Bren finally make peace in the galaxy when for the first time he really is in a first contact situation?
READ this book to find all the answers to all the questions beseiging a cross-cultural experiance. Gripping, explosive a perfect end to the second series with all the plot points tied neatly up - and an expectation that the third series will be just as good!
It's funny... Almost nothing at all happened in the previous book, Defender, but I found that one a surprisingly quick read. Whereas lots of important stuff happens in this one, but, at least for the first 2/3 of the book, it dragged very badly for me. That