The Founding of the Commonwealth

Phylogenesis

B:1

11h 39m

0

(0 Ratings)

With such classic novels as Orphan Star and The Tar-Aiym-Krang, New York Times bestselling author Alan Dean Foster has captivated readers with his brilliantly imagined Humanx Commonwealth, the interstellar empire where intelligent aliens and humans live side by side. Now Foster takes us back to the unplanned beginnings of this extraordinary alliance … In the years after first contact, humans and the insect-like Thranx agreed to a tentative sharing of ideas and cultures despite the ingrained repulsion they had yet to overcome. Mindful that one day they might need each other as allies, the leaders of the two species conceded that the only way to reach an accommodation was through a slow, lengthy process of limited contact. When the time was right, the leaders of both worlds would reveal to their respective peoples that a union with an alien race was indeed possible. However, they never planned for a chance meeting between a misfit artist and a petty thief. Desvendapur was a talented Thranx poet who was bored with his life and needed new inspiration for his work. Hearing a rumor that a secret alien contact project existed on his homeworld, he recklessly forged a new identity and headed off to find his muse. In a place unlike the familiar Hives of Willow-Wane, Desvendapur ran into Cheelo Montoya, a small-time criminal with big dreams of making a fast buck. But chance and circumstance tossed the con man and the mad poet together in what was to become a journey that would forever change their beliefs, their futures, and their worlds.

Dirge

B:2

11h 20m

0

( Ratings)

Alan Dean Foster has written more than twenty novels set in the Humanx Commonwealth, an unforgettable world where humans, thranx, AAnn, and numerous other aliens live and work side by side. But the amicable relationships between species have always hung in a tenuous balance between distrust and diplomacy. Dirge is the second thrilling novel in The Founding of the Commonwealth, an adventure that delves deeper into the fragile early years when humans made first contact. In the second half of the twenty-fourth century, diplomatic relations proceed cautiously between thranx and humans, who are slow to overcome their aversion to the insect-like beings. But the lowly thranx are nearly forgotten with the sudden discovery of an ideal planet to colonize—Argus V—and the startling appearance of a new race of space-faring aliens. People are dazzled by the beautiful, glamorous pitar. Then tragedy strikes. A cargo ship making a routine delivery to Argus V finds a scene of grisly carnage has replaced the bustling new world. The entire human population—600,000 men, women, and children—has been brutally slaughtered. Not one survivor or a single clue remains to identify the unseen executioners. Even the combined efforts of all alien species prove fruitless in the search for killers who have perpetrated planetary genocide on such a vast scale. But from a tiny inner moon of Argus V comes a faint, wavering signal—and on that insignificant chunk of rubble lies the key to the crime. The cataclysm that follows is replete with shock and deadly consequences for thranx, pitar, and human alike. For their worlds will change forever by the colossal space battle that is both in their future and their destiny.