The Marriage of the Living Dark
The Great Experiment has failed. The Ten Thousand Year Empire of the Han has lasted less than two centuries and now not a single stack remains of the great city of ice that once covered the habitable earth. Europe is DeVore's, America a brutal dictatorship, while the rest of the globe groans beneath the rule of callous warlords.
Li Yuan, once the most powerful man on earth, is now an exile in America. Sick at heart, he finds himself the unheard voice of experience in a viper's nest of political ambition. Banished to an endless round of tours and banquets, he unexpectedly finds a new role – a role which will once more tie him in to the destiny of Chung Kuo.
For DeVore these are frustrating times. Blockaded in space by the Americans, he must break their cordon or see his own scheme – no less than the seeding of the entire galaxy with his own kind – come to nothing.
And then there is Kim Ward, the Star-Seeker, the spider in the web. Will he leave Chung Kuo to its fate? Or will he turn his great fleet around and return to fight one final battle, winner takes all?
