After a hundred pioneer years the colony on Hestia seemed to be nearing its end. Its holdings on that green and fertile planet were still limited to a single river in one valley. Everywhere else hostile fauna hedged them in.
A dam could break the deadlock, and they needed an engineer to construct it for them. Sam Merrit was the man who came in answer to their S.O.S. – and he wanted out as soon as he had landed. But once down on Hestia, it was live or die with the colony.
So Sam stayed – to discover certain anomalies that the hardscrabble colonists had thrust from their minds.
C. J. Cherryh
C. J. Cherryh (born 1942) is the pen name of Carolyn Janice Cherry, a multiple-award-winning science fiction and fantasy writer. She currently resides in Spokane County, Washington.
Cherryh is pronounced ”Cherry”. The author appended a silent ”h” to her real name because her first editor felt that ”Cherry” sounded too much like a romance writer.
The asteroid 77185 Cherryh has been named in her honour.
