Too Like the Lightning
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Sci-Fi; Fantasy
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July 2017
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UK: Head of Zeus
US: Tor Books
Terra Ignota Book I
The year is 2454.
Humanity has engineered a hard-won golden age, forged in the aftermath of a bitter conflict that wiped both religion and nation state from the planet. Now seven factions or 'hives' co-govern the world, their rule fuelled by benign censorship, oracular statistical analytics and technological abundance. But this is a fragile Utopia – and someone is intent on pushing it to breaking point.
Convicted for his crimes, celebrated for his talents, Mycroft Canner is the indentured instrument – and confidant – of some of the world's most powerful figures. When he is asked to investigate a bizarre theft, he finds himself on the trail of a conspiracy that could shatter the tranquil world order the Hives have maintained for three centuries.
But Mycroft has his own secrets. He is concealing a much greater threat to the seven Hives, a wild car no degree of statistical analysis could have prophesised. This threat takes the unlikely form of a thirteen-year-old called Bridger. For how will a world that has banished God deal with a child who can perform miracles?
WINNER OF THE JOHN W. CAMPBELL AWARD AT THE HUGO AWARDS 2016
WINNER OF THE COMPTON CROOK AWARD 2017
Selected Praise
“Provocative, erudite, inventive, resplendent”
“Incredibly ambitious and groundbreaking... Palmer writes gloriously lush prose stuffed with asides, allusions and nods to the reader”
“The kind of science fiction that makes me excited all over again about what science fiction can do”