From: noone@nowhere.com   
      
   The January Dancer. Michael Flynn.   
      
   A space opera involving many planets in different star systems   
   politically split between the Confederation of Central Worlds, CCW, and   
   the United League of the Periphery, ULP, with intrigue, mystery,   
   adventure, and romance.   
   A Harper walks into the bar on the planet Jehovah where the Scarred Man   
   drinks all day. In this far future where Earth is regarded as mankind's   
   mythical place of origin, a Harper is more influential than the   
   travelling minstrels of times past whose function she performs. She   
   says that she wants to make songs from the story of The January Dancer   
   but that is not the whole truth.   
   The Scarred Man begins the story with three separate threads. The tramp   
   spaceship captained by Amos January, that finds a small pre-human alien   
   shape-changing artifact with an unusual power, nicknamed Dancer. The   
   civil war on the planet New Eireann. The ULP "Hound" observing the main   
   highway from the CCW into the Rift. Pirates pass through.   
   The Harper and the Scarred Man discuss the details learning about each   
   other's secrets and personalities in interludes to the threads. The   
   variety of characters, different cultural customs, amazing technical   
   detail of futuristic tools and transport, plenty of hard science in   
   relation to travel and time all make this a brilliant read.   
   It is not an easy read. Much unknown slang and many unknown nouns in   
   invented language with terribly complicated names of places and people   
   who may have several names make it a little confusing at times.   
   There are mysterious disappearances of spaceships. Unknown routes   
   between stars may exist. There is a myth of a Treasure Fleet from the   
   original Earth where there was once an herb named coriander.   
   As the Harper learns the tale and they learn about each other, I   
   am even more of a fish out of water than either, learning about them as   
   well as different cultures and languages. And as soon as I realise what   
   is going on, one of many intriguing plausible plot twists throws me back   
   out of my goldfish bowl. As did the conclusion, almost.   
   Four stars.   
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)