Notes
First published by Alfred A. Knopf in 1976.

Publisher’s Blurb – Page One
Earth-born anarchist, Paula Mendoza, had been hired by the Committee for the Revolution for a specific and vital purpose: to forge a truce between the Middle Planets and the Styths, a powerful race of mutants raiding piratically out of deep space and threatening the security of Earth. Paula’s first meeting with the Stythian warlord, Saba, was far from successful. But Paula had her own tactics of persuasion, and by employing a shrewd and unexpected political gambit she seemed to succeed in her objective . . .

But her success put her in a unique – and dangerous – position. As the only Earth-born being in the artificial cities of the Gas Planets, she was Earth’s sole link with the Stythian Empire. A link that could easily be severed . . .

Publisher’s Blurb – Lower Cover
"A magnificent novel . . . a colossal achievement . . . an instant contemporary classic"
- Science Fiction Review

"A superb, anguished panorama of the Solar System a few thousand years hence"
- Oxford Mail

"A cracking good tale . . . excellent"
- TLS

"On a par with Ursula Le Gum"
- Chicago Tribune