Karen Lord is one of today's most brilliant young talents. Her science
fiction, like that of predecessors Ursula K. Le Guin and China Miéville,
combines star-spanning plots, deeply felt characters, and incisive
social commentary. With The Galaxy Game, Lord presents a gripping
adventure that showcases her dazzling imagination as never before.
On the verge of adulthood, Rafi attends the Lyceum, a school for the
psionically gifted. Rafi possesses mental abilities that might benefit
people... or control them. Some wish to help Rafi wield his powers
responsibly; others see him as a threat to be contained. Rafi's only
freedom at the Lyceum is Wallrunning: a game of speed and agility played
on vast vertical surfaces riddled with variable gravity fields.
Serendipity and Ntenman are also students at the Lyceum, but unlike
Rafi, they come from communities where such abilities are valued.
Serendipity finds the Lyceum as much a prison as a school, and she
yearns for a meaningful life beyond its gates. Ntenman, with his quick
tongue, quicker mind, and a willingness to bend if not break the rules,
has no problem fitting in. But he too has his reasons for wanting to
escape.
Now the three friends are about to experience a moment of violent change
as seething tensions between rival star-faring civilizations come to a
head. For Serendipity, it will challenge her ideas of community and
self. For Ntenman, it will open new opportunities and new dangers. And
for Rafi, given a chance to train with some of the best Wallrunners in
the galaxy, it will lead to the discovery that there is more to
Wallrunning than he ever suspected... and more to himself than he ever
dreamed.
