About the Author

Charles Stross was born in Leeds, England, in 1964. He has worked as a pharmacist, software engineer and freelance journalist, but now writes full-time. To date, Stross has won three Hugo Awards and been nominated twelve times. He has also won the Locus Award for Best Novel, the Locus Award for Best Novella, and has been shortlisted for the Arthur C. Clarke and Nebula Awards. His books include the Merchant Princess series, the Laundry Files series, the Singularity series, and several stand-alone novels.

Reviews

Praise for Charles Stross

“A new kind of future requires a new breed of guide—someone like Stross.”—Popular Science

“The act of creation seems to come easily to Charles Stross...[He] is peerless at dreaming up devices that could conceivably exist in six, sixty, or six hundred years’ time.”—The New York Times

“Where Charles Stross goes today, the rest of science fiction will follow tomorrow.”—Gardner Dozois, Editor, Asimov’s Science Fiction Magazine

“Smart, literate, funny.”—#1 New York Times bestselling author Lev Grossman, Time

“Much of the action is completely nuts, but Stross manages to ground it in believability through his protagonist’s deadpan reactions to both insane office politics and supernatural mayhem.”—San Francisco Chronicle

When an information plague called "The Festival" strikes the isolationist planetary colony of the New Republic, the world's economy quickly descends into chaos, and its populace becomes a hotbed of revolution against its government. A fleet of battleships approaches the beleaguered planet, but political intrigues and hidden agendas hinder the efforts to combat the plague. Set in a far-future where faster-than-light technology and artificial intelligence have molded the course of civilization, Stross's debut novel explores the concept of freedom of information and the human race's desire to forge its own destiny. This far-future visionary novel belongs in most sf collections. Copyright 2003 Reed Business Information.

Praise for Charles Stross

"A new kind of future requires a new breed of guide-someone like Stross."-Popular Science

"The act of creation seems to come easily to Charles Stross...[He] is peerless at dreaming up devices that could conceivably exist in six, sixty, or six hundred years' time."-The New York Times

"Where Charles Stross goes today, the rest of science fiction will follow tomorrow."-Gardner Dozois, Editor, Asimov's Science Fiction Magazine

"Smart, literate, funny."-#1 New York Times bestselling author Lev Grossman, Time

"Much of the action is completely nuts, but Stross manages to ground it in believability through his protagonist's deadpan reactions to both insane office politics and supernatural mayhem."-San Francisco Chronicle