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Overview
In a world of greenhouse drought and fuel shortage the Arab National Army advances through Spain and Ukraine. Neutral Russia looks on. The Allies, even with state-of-the-art American and German technology, are losing. Then, among the misty slopes of the Pyrenees near Bagneres-de-Luchon, on a field of buttercups and corpses, a CRAV operated by Sergeant Gordon Means encounters a blue light. The light approaches the vehicle, and Gordon hears, in the back of his head, the monotonous, sleepy tap-tap-tap of sleet against a window. The light follows him like a stray dog. He calls it Rover. These hovering blue lights, are they friend or foe? If they save lives, why do they also sometimes kill, and drink the blood of the dying, every drop? And Linda Parisi, a middle-aged woman who lives with her excitable poodle, Lacy, in Arlington, Virginia, and writes books about UFOs she has never seen - why does General Lauterbach want to speak with her?As the greenhouse effect wreaks havoc with Earth's atmosphere, leading to worldwide starvation, countries fight for land where crops can be grown. Above the battlefields, an alien force materializes with the power to change the tide of the war--but which side are they on?
Editorials
Carl Hays
Widespread flooding and starvation triggered by a rampant greenhouse effect have incited the Arab republics to drive their armies deep into Europe and the Ukraine to claim their share of land and food. During the ensuing bloody clashes with the European allies, enigmatic blue lights suggestive of an extraterrestrial origin appear, hovering over dead or dying soldiers, provoking both fear and interest on either side. Anthony's debut is a stirring, at times graphic, military adventure featuring an original blend of political intrigue and unique speculations on alien first contact. She neatly threads multiple plot lines and many characters through a fabric of several shifting points of view. Among the more interesting are those of a shy sergeant piloting a high-tech, remotely operated tank and of an eccentric writer of sensational alien-encounter scenarios. Anthony's terse and inventive prose at times sinks to the level of pedestrian mass-market fiction, among whose readers the novel could find its greatest audience, but it also promises better when it focuses upon character and hauntingly vivid scenery.Kirkus Reviews
In Anthony's near/medium future, greenhouse effects have altered global climates: Florida lies under water (but not, apparently, Washington, D.C.); much of the Midwest is now desert; fuel shortages are acute; and famine is endemic. With North Africa rendered uninhabitable, the "Arabs" (actually a Muslim coalition, including Iranians and Turkic peoples) have invaded Europe. As the victorious Arabs advance through the Ukraine, and across Spain to the Pyrenees, mysterious blue lights are observed hanging over battlefields; mutilated bodies, inexplicably gutted and dehydrated, show up. Some of the rather too numerous—though well-handled—plot elements: As teenager Jerry wearily treks westward across a devastated US, he's taken up by the slug-like aliens behind the blue lights—they're curious about his powerful wishes; computer nerd and robot tank operator Gordon also shows an affinity for the blue lights; US General Lauterbach desperately tries to make contact with the aliens in the hope of enlisting their aid; and the first to be abducted, Navy pilot Justin, is forced by the aliens to relive his moment of cowardice under fire. Included as well are the exploits of a fake USO expert, a bewildered pathologist, and a drunken Ukrainian general. Can nuclear war be averted? What do the aliens really want, and will they intervene? Anthony provides absorbing if oblique answers. Gripping and realistic—despite an initial scenario that doesn't add up, rather nebulous aliens, and an overdose of military acronyms: an assured, imaginative, and distinctive debut.Book Details
Published
April 1, 1994
Publisher
New York : Ace Books, 1994, c1993.
Pages
304
Format
Paperbound
ISBN
9780441000180