From Publishers Weekly
Swanwick's ( Gravity's Angels ) latest combines many elements common to his previous work: a solid hard-science fiction setting, an interest in the workings of interpersonal relationships, and speculation about the potentials of the mind and the nature of personality. Gunther Weil is an underachieving lunar laborer, content in his routine job and the occasional petty expression of insubordination. But when an unexpected solar flare catches him exposed on the moon's surface and his ingenuity alone saves him from death, Gunther becomes a sort of celebrity. Later, when a limited nuclear war breaks out on earth, Gunther finds himself in an even more prominent position. A terrorist has released an engineered virus into the moonbase, rendering all those within it insane, and Gunther is one of the few lucky enough to have been outside at the time. As the sane survivors use and sometimes abuse the highly suggestible insane, Gunther and a few others search for a cure. But will that cure return the sufferers to themselves or leave them irrevocably changed? Swanwick weaves the story with characteristic verve and style, and though his exploration of the issues raised by the psychological viruses falls short of its potential, this is an entertaining and provocative novella.
Copyright 1991 Reed Business Information, Inc.
--This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
From Kirkus Reviews
All-too-brief medium-future yarn centering on war and brain chemistry, from the author of the fine Stations of the Tide (1990), etc. Gunther Weil is just an ordinary lunar engineer, until a nuclear exchange on Earth spreads conflict to the Moon. The sublunar factory town of Bootstrap is cut off, its inhabitants rendered psychotic through brain chemicals released into the air by a saboteur; only those wearing space suits escape. Gunther's lover, Ekatarina, organizes the survivors along traditional lines, to growing resentment, until Gunther discovers that a range of new brain chemicals has been developed: Not only can the psychotics be cured, but stable personalities can be amended and improved on as a form of mental evolution. Ekatarina resists, and Gunther is forced to shoot her. Absorbing and realistic, packed with provocative ideas that deserve a more thoroughgoing workout than they get here. --
Copyright ©1991, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.
--This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.