The blurb to that filled in the gaps – that she had gone big into self-publishing/e-publishing in the meantime. So far as I could tell though, Nagata dropped off the map after about 2003, the year Memory came out, or at least my map, until I found a copy of The Red: First Light, the first book of an eponymous trilogy, earlier this year. But there was always enough great stuff in her books to keep me interested.
Of course a new writer always has missteps – I found Deception Well (1997), the third of the tetralogy, to be an incoherent slog, redeemed only by the magnificent abseil down the skyhook and the second half of Vast, once the protagonists arrive, is a bit of a let-down after the thrill of the journey. The relentlessly strange first half of Vast (1998), the culmination of the loose tetralogy that had begun with The Bohr Maker (1995) is still one of the best things I’ve ever read. A whole swathe of her novels came out in the late 1990’s/early 2000’s and I devoured them all eagerly. (Feb.I’ve been a fan of Linda Nagata’s work for quite a while. Predictably, the outcome leads to grudging mutual understanding as well as a more intelligent and reverential attitude toward the planet itself. While Lot's quest to be reunited with his father ultimately lacks any dramatic payoff, readers who are comfortable juggling terms such as ""Dyson spheres"" will also be satisfied by the action-packed battle between generations.
Nagata skewers organized religion, the democratic process and youth culture in scenes where the senseless crowd gives in to its chemically induced love for the young hero. What makes Lot so powerful is his natural ability, his inbred political acumen and the nano-technology that causes Lot's body to exude psychoactive enzymes that can transform anyone into his willing and loving supplicant. Years later, as an adolescent, Lot leads a rebellion of youths against the city's elders. He fails, leaving his son, Lot, to be raised in that world's only habitable environment, the sky city of Silk. Charismatic prophet Jupiter Apolinario leads his army of fanatic followers to the world of Deception Well in the hope of finding some spiritual and physical form of communal ecstasy. Fans of hard SF will find a rich and complex world in this third novel by Locus Award-winning author Nagata (The Bohr Maker).
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