Publisher's Weekly Review
Set 12 years after A Meeting at Corvallis (2006), Stirling's latest novel of a chaotic near-future U.S., crippled when the mysterious Change rendered most technology nonfunctional, combines vigorous military adventure with cleverly packaged political idealism. When assassins pursue a traveler into Oregon's Willamette Valley, the resulting skirmish propels the heirs of three influential local leaders on a risky continent-crossing mission to Nantucket. Stirling's narrative deftly balances sharply contrasting ideologies-the Mackenzies' proto-Celtic clan system in Oregon against Gen. Lawrence Thurston's strict and principled military democracy in Idaho, the zealotry of the Church Universal and Triumphant versus the pagan Powers venerated by the Mackenzies-though the most difficult cosmological questions are never addressed. Meanwhile, there are hints of otherworldly intervention and time travel on Nantucket, echoing the parallel continuity established in Island in the Sea of Time and its sequels. Despite these fuzzy underpinnings, the thought-provoking and engaging storytelling should please Stirling's many fans. (Sept.) (c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved
Booklist Review
What is now called the Change Saga resumes a generation after the action of Dies the Fire (2004). Rudi Mackenzie, Juniper's son, has a mission to cross post-Change North America and find out what is going on around the mysterious island of Nantucket. This entails crossing the Rockies, a literally howling wilderness, and New Deseret, semicivilized thanks to its Mormon roots. Some rump states also survive on the Great Plains, sans twentieth-century technology, but then bows and swords can keep enemies at bay, and buffalo are splendid meat animals. Avoiding the formerly urbanized Death Zones, now reduced largely to ruins, skeletons, and savage remnants of de-civilized humanity, Rudi and his companions find the sadly misnamed Valley of Paradise and its bloodthirsty leader, self-dubbed the Scourge of God. This leads to rather a cliff-hanger ending, but readers who have survived Stirling's usual high body count will recognize brilliant action fiction and alternate history when they see it and happily hang fire for more.--Green, Roland Copyright 2007 Booklist
Library Journal Review
Two decades after the Change brought about the end of advanced technology and thrust the world into a new dark ages, Clan Mackenzie and the Bearkillers have forged a peaceful and prosperous civilization in what was once Oregon. A stranger from the unknown lands to the east requests assistance from Rudi Mackenzie, son of the clan head and, apparently, the fulfillment of a prophecy for the newcomer. As Rudi journeys east with Ingolf, the visitor from Nantucket Island, he sees with his own eyes the badlands that lie to the east of his peaceful home. The fourth installment in the author's postapocalyptic novels of "The Change" series (Dies the Fire; The Protector's War; A Meeting at Corvallis) sheds light on heretofore unexplored regions of a terribly altered world. A master of speculative fiction and alternate history, Stirling delivers another chapter in an epic of survival and rebirth. For most libraries. (c) Copyright 2010. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
