In the near future, war has torn the United States apart. Small
communities barely scrape by amidst climate change and economic
collapse. Powerful nation-states struggle over whatever resources
remain--technology in California, money in Chicago, oil in Texas.
Some small hope has arrived in the form of the Hocq, a group of aliens
on a mission to bring their advanced knowledge to Earth. But as hostile
governments across the globe vie for that knowledge, a Hocq named Harrek
defects into outlaw territory. Diplomacy seems to have failed, and he
can't allow the wrong nation to gain such a huge advantage over the
others.
Now it's up to Lisa Marquez, the human who helped Harrek escape, and
Jeremy Clayton, a poor outland farmer, to keep the alien safe from the
military and outlaws. The clock is counting down, and Harrek needs to
get the Genesis File into the right hands before he gets found by the
humans... or the other Hocq.
In Michael Cassutt's first novel, the author takes standard SF story
situations--post-holocaust tribal human struggles, first alien
contact--blends them together and brings his own uniquely original spin
to a tried-and-true setting.
