The human species is at war with the Ged, a collective species that is baffled by humankind’s ability to turn violence upon itself & yet advance into space. In order to defeat the humans, the Ged must first understand them. So they go to a world called Qom, where a lost Earth colony has forgotten its origins & regressed to pre-industrial society. They are split into two warring city-states: Delysia, town of merchants, & Jela of Spartan wariors. The Ged build a walled city out in the wilderness, promising riches & new weapons for anyone brave enough to stay in the city one year. The offer attracts a diverse collection of outcasts & adventurers, Jelite warriors & Delysian artisans. Once inside, they're taught the secrets of science & technology. In watching them learn, the Ged hope to find out how humans think. But they don’t anticipate the few humans who will cross feudal boundaries to unite against the Ged, deducing more than the Ged meant to teach about the nature of the universe & the origin of humans on Qom.
Author
Nancy Kress is an American science fiction writer. She began writing in 1976 but has achieved her greatest notice since the publication of her Hugo and Nebula-winning 1991 novella Beggars in Spain which was later expanded into a novel with the same title. In addition to her novels, Kress has written numerous short stories and is a regular columnist for Writer's Digest. She is a regular at Clarion writing workshops and at The Writers Center in Bethesda, Maryland. During the Winter of 2008/09, Nancy Kress is the Picador Guest Professor for Literature at the University of Leipzig's Institute for American Studies in Leipzig, Germany. Excerpted from Wikipedia.
