Beyond the Hallowed Sky

MacLeod's first instillation in the Lightspeed trilogy is out of this world!Mathematician Lakshmi Nayak receives a letter from her future self about faster-than-light travel. The equations work, and the letter itself seems to prove the possibility will someday be realized. But her paper on the topic is fiercely criticized, and she's warned away by a sinister Alliance agent. After defecting to the Union, she gets an unexpected offer: "I can build your ship." Shipbuilder John Grant learns of a secret project, which unknown to the world has been traveling to the stars for decades: Black Horizon.Biologist Emma Hazeldene works for Black Horizon on an alien world, Apis, whose life has clearly come from Earth, investigating rock formations that are thought to be an alien, crystal-like intelligence. But refugees exiled to a hard life in the wilds of Apis already know more than the scientists have ever suspected. Everything changes when the rocks wake up, with dire results.As secrets emerge and rival powers seize advantage, three worlds are shaken to their foundations--and all involved have to fight for their lives, and their futures.Science fiction legend Ken MacLeod begins a new space opera trilogy by imagining humankind on the precipice of discovery--the invention of faster-than-light travel unlocks a universe of new possibilities, and new dangers.


About the Author
Ken MacLeod lives in Scotland. He has honors and master's degrees in biological subjects and worked for some years in the IT industry. Since 1997 he has been a full-time writer. He is the author of nineteen novels, from The Star Fraction (1995) to Beyond the Reach of Earth (2023), and many articles and short stories. His novels and stories have received three BSFA awards and three Prometheus Awards, and several have been short-listed for the Clarke and Hugo Awards.