A Short, Sharp ShockKim Stanley Robinson, award-winning author of the bestselling Red Mars, Green Mars, and the soon-to-be-published Blue Mars, was called "a literary landscape artist, creating breathtaking vistas" by The Detroit Metro News. Now he confirms his reputation for brilliance and for the unexpected in this luminous short work. A Short, Sharp Shock A man tumbles through wild surf, half drowned, to collapse on a moonlit beach. When he regains consciousness, he has no memory of who he is or where he came from. he know only that the woman who washed ashore with him has disappeared sometime in the night, and that he has awakened in a surreal landscape of savage beauty -- a mysterious watery world encircled by a thin spine of land. Aided by strange tribesmen, he will journey to the cove of the spine kings, a brutal race that has enslaved the woman and several of the tribesmen. That is only the beginning of his quest, as he struggles to find her identity in this wondrous and cruel land -- and seeks out the woman whose hold on his imagination is both unfathomable and unshakable. Haunting and lyrical, filled with uncommon beauty and terrible peril, A Short, Sharp Shock is an ambitious and enthralling story by one of science fiction's most respected talents. |
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Aonia Arsia Mons beach Birsay BLUE MARS body breath brough brown cage cape circle cliff climb clouds cold color Connie Willis crest curved dark David Brin dawn driftwood dusk edge eyes face feeling feet fell felt fire fish float Garth granite GREEN MARS hand hard head hiked Hiroko horizon Isaac Asimov Julo Kim Stanley Robinson knob laughed light mirror morning Naousa never night nodded ocean pain peninsula Psara puka shells pulled purple quartz queen RED MARS RENDEZVOUS WITH RAMA ridge rock rolled rope rose rover sand seaweed seemed shell shoulder side skin sleep slope smile snow sorcerers spine kings stars STARTIDE RISING stone stood sunset swimmer Thel asked Thel's thick things Tinou took trail treefolk trees tumbling voice walked wall warm watched waves wind woman wristpad yellow