A Rose From Old Terra (Scattered Worlds) [Kindle Edition]

Don Sakers (Author)

Editorial Reviews

Product Description

LIBRARIANS IN SPACE

A single yellow rose summons Jedrek nor Talin back to Old Earth. A decade ago, he served the Terran Grand Library as one of the guardians of Humanity’s collected knowledge. Now the last Librarian has called together the memrbers of Jedrek’s broken work circle to protect the Library from its greatest threat.

Four millennia after the Terran Empire fell, the Galaxy’s communications system is breaking down. Jedrek and his coworkers set off into deep space to repair ancient Imperial equipment. But they aren’t the only ones…for the warring remnants of the old Empire have also dispatched ships on the same mission.

Suddenly, a peaceful settlement becomes ground zero in a clash of Galactic cultures—and a bare handful of Librarians are all that stand between the Galaxy and disastrous interstellar war….

Product Details

• Format: Kindle Edition
• File Size: 264 KB
• Publisher: Speed-of-C Productions; 2 edition (June 25, 2010)
• Sold by: Amazon Digital Services
• Language: English
• ASIN: B003U4WUC4
• Text-to-Speech: Enabled
• Lending: Enabled
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (1 customer review)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #579,836 Paid in Kindle Store (See Top 100 Paid in Kindle Store)

More About the Author

Don Sakers was launched the same month as Sputnik One, so it was perhaps inevitable that he should become a science fiction writer. A Navy brat by birth, he spent his childhood in such far-off lands as Japan, Scotland, Hawaii, and California. In California, rather like a latter-day Mowgli, he was raised by dogs.

As a writer and editor, he has explored the thoughts of sapient trees (The Leaves of October, Baen 1988), brought ghosts to life (Carmen Miranda's Ghost is Haunting Space Station Three, Baen 1989), and beaten the "Cold Equations" scenario ("The Cold Solution," Analog 7/91, voted best short story of the year.)

In 2009, Don took up the position of book reviewer for Analog Science Fiction & Fact, where he writes the "Reference Library" column in every issue.

In his day job, Don works for the Anne Arundel County Public Library. His actual job title -- "Library Associate" -- makes it sound like he gives lots of money to the Library, but in fact it's the other way around.

Don lives at Meerkat Meade in suburban Baltimore with his spouse, costumer Thomas Atkinson.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Epic quality and alien ethics, August 23, 2008

By 

Richard Mandrachio (San Francisco) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: A Rose From Old Terra: a novel of the Scattered Worlds (Paperback)

The epic quality found in the future worlds of J.M. Straczynski's Babylon 5 and Frank Herbert's Dune is also apparent in the work of Don Sakers. In A Rose From Old Terra, instead of hostile aliens or experienced spaceship captains, the unlikely heroes are librarians who set out to prove that the pen is indeed mightier than the sword. From the moment protagonist Jedrek nor Talin receives his summons, I was compelled to follow him on his journey for better or worse. Credible science and powerful character dynamics were nicely integrated into a narrative colored with ingeniously placed statistics and commercial advertisements. The unpredictable plot of this book was skillfully paced, though I would have liked more detailed descriptions of its unique settings and of the societies that inhabit them. (Sakers has managed to come up with some of the most distinctive alien cultures in SF literature that it's hard not to crave more.) At times reminiscent of Mary Doria Russell's themes in both The Sparrow and Children of God, some of this material questions alien ethics and, when it does, becomes strictly adult in nature but never gratuitous. When I finished this novel, it occurred to me that some of the best genre writers are also the least acknowledged. Hopefully, in Don Sakers' case, this will be remedied as more readers of science fiction catch on. Personally, I can't seem to get enough of the Scattered World series and it's with great anticipation that I wait for the author's next installment.