The Ascension Factor

Summary

Set twenty-five years after The Lazarus Effect, this final book in the Destination: Void collaboration between Frank Herbert and Bill Ransom concludes the story of the planet Pandora.

Pandora’s humans have been recovering land from its ragingseas at an accelerated pace since TheLazarus Effect. The great kelp of the seas, sentient but electronicallymanipulated by humans, buffers Pandora’s wild currents to restore land andfacilitate the booming sea trade. New settlements rise overnight, but childrenstarve in their shadows. An orbiting assembly station is near completion ofProject Voidship, which is the hope of many for finding a better world.

Pandora is under the fist of an ambitious clone fromhibernation called the Director, who rules with a sadistic security force ledby the assassin Spider Nevi. Small resistance groups have had little effect on his absolute power. TheDirector controls the transportation of foodstuffs; uprisings are punished withstarvation.

The resistance fighters’ main hope is Crista Galli, a womanbelieved by some to be the child of God. Crista pools her talents with DwarfMacIntosh, Beatriz Tatoosh, and Rico LaPush to transcend the barriers betweenthe different species and overthrow the Director and the sinister cabal withwhich he rules.