A Grey Moon Over China
Thomas A. Day
Tor, May 2009, $24.95
ISBN: 9780765321428
In 2027 the world environment has been poisoned to the point of no return and consequently the global economy stands on the verge of total collapse as alternate fuels have either failed or been ignored while the oil supply is nearing depletion. War over oil and water has made for strange bedfellows as for instance a Pacific Rim alliance ties Japan and California together in combat with much of the remaining mainland American states.
Army engineer Eduardo Torres finds the solution when he uncovers plans for a quantum battery that if shared would save the planet. Instead, he decides to keep the technology setting up his own “nation” by buying a mercury force. Following up on an abandoned plan to colonize space, Torres builds starships and enters a wormhole to the Holzstein System. However, he is not welcomed as another humanoid race and aliens attack his fleet.
This grim look at the near future paints a bleak horizon as the earth is consumed by the liquid wars. The cast is powerful and realistic as Darwinism wins over creationism with survival of the most diabolical. Torres and other key characters are not likable, but that is one of the key points of this gloomy cautionary tale in which Thomas A. Day lucidly insures his players are not romantic heroes. With a wild well written military in space clash of cultures that enhance the argument how sentient are we as a species if we commit increasingly faster pandemic suicide. GREY MOON OVER CHINA is a super science fiction thriller warning us that time is running out on mankind.
Harriet Klausner
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