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Summary
Summary
Captain Ean Tephe is a man of faith, whose allegiance to his lord and to his ship is uncontested. The Bishopry Militant knows this -- and so, when it needs a ship and crew to undertake a secret, sacred mission to a hidden land, Tephe is the captain to whom the task is given.Tephe knows from that the start that his mission will be a test of his skill as a leader of men and as a devout follower of his god. It's what he doesn't know that matters: to what ends his faith and his ship will ultimately be put -- and that the tests he will face will come not only from his god and the Bishopry Militant, but from another, more malevolent source entirely...Author John Scalzi has ascended to the top ranks of modern science fiction with the best-selling, Hugo-nominated novels Old Man's War and Zoe's Tale. Now he tries his hand at fantasy, with a dark and different novella that takes your expectations of what fantasy is and does, and sends them tumbling.Say your prayers... and behold The God Engines.
Author Notes
John Michael Scalzi was born May 10, 1969 in California. He attended the University of Chicago. During his 1989 -1990 school year he was the editor-in-chief of The Chicago Maroon. After graduating in 1991, Scalzi took a job as the film critic for the Fresno Bee newspaper, eventually also becoming a humor columnist. In 1996 he was hired as the in-house writer and editor at America Online. When he was laid off in 1998, he decided to become a full-time freelance writer and author. His first published novel was Old Man's War. His other works include Agent to the Stars, The Ghosts Brigades, The Androids Team, The Sagan Diary, The Last Colony, and Redshirts: A Novel with Three Codas. In 2014 his title, Locked In, made The New York Times Best Seller List.
(Bowker Author Biography)
Reviews (2)
Publisher's Weekly Review
Readers who are used to Scalzi's straightforward, optimistic SF (e.g., Old Man's War) will be disconcerted by the dollop of ice-cold cosmic horror in this novella. Capt. Ean Tephe and his crew in the spaceship Righteous trust their Lord to protect them in combat and care for their souls; after all, He has graciously given each of His warships a defeated, enslaved god to propel the ship to its destination by warping space. After battles start going against him, however, Tephe has to struggle to keep his faith. When he meets his Lord in person, innocent belief becomes impossible, and the narrative proceeds to surgically peel away layer after layer of comforting certainty. If J.G. Ballard and H.P. Lovecraft had ever collaborated on a space opera, the results might have been like this: ferociously inventive, painfully vivid, dispassionately bleak and dreadfully memorable. (Nov.) (c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved
Booklist Review
Scalzi's rapid ascent to the ranks of speculative fiction's leading authors owes much to his award-nominated Old Man's War series. All four installments are masterpieces of pure sf. His latest novel, however, veers into a previously unexplored fantasy realm of magical starships and soul-devouring gods. Ean Tephe commands an interstellar vessel, the Righteous, which is powered by the will of a shape-shifting, apparently humanoid god. Relying on his own faith to confront the god's temperamental outbursts, his battle-weary crew, and his own personal demons, Tephe takes his ship wherever the ruling Bishopry Militant sends him. When the Bishopry promises him a place on their council in return for converting a remote planet's citizenry by a show of force, however, Tephe will find his faith and his crew's well-being sorely tested. Despite the novel's diminutive length and Scalzi's new genre makeover, his writing has never been crisper, and his ideas carry a freshness and energy most other fantasy authors will envy.--Hays, Carl Copyright 2009 Booklist
