Book description
Earth is in crisis, virtually destroyed by overpopulation, and mankind
is teethering on the edge. ISTO - the Interstellar Trade Organization -
had demanded man's extinction, for a living planet is more important
than any race upon it, and was about to start 'reducing' mankind when
Earthgov agreed its demands, to sell 90 per cent of Earth's inhabitants
into bondage to alien races. When Margaret is six, she imagines herself
as a spy, a healer, a queen, a warrior, even a boy, to amuse herself;
when she is nine, and 12, and 20, at crisis points in her life, she
feels like parts of her have split off - like the Margaret who decided
to follow her lover to Tercis and the Margaret who said no. So now, as
well as Margaret, she is Wilvia, learning to be a queen on B'yurngrad,
and Ongamar, a spy on Cantardene, and Gretamara, a healer on Chottem,
and even Naumi, a boy on Thairy, and she is many other Margarets
besides. And all these Margarets hold the key to mankind's survival, if
only they can survive and come together again as one Margaret, with all
their different powers intact . . . Sheri S. Tepper is the author of
several resoundingly acclaimed novels, including THE MARGARETS and
GIBBON'S DECLINE AND FALL both shortlisted for the ARTHUR C. CLARKE
AWARD, A PLAGUE OF ANGELS, SIDESHOW and BEAUTY, which was voted BEST
FANTASY NOVEL OF THE YEAR by readers of LOCUS. She is one of the few
writers to have titles in both the SF and Fantasy Masterworks lists.
