Time Future
Maxine McArthur
Bantam, 2001, Australia
ISBN:1863251944
I flailed backwards as my brain finally processed what it was seeing. A body, not human, and very dead.
Something touched me and I bit off a scream.
When a ship finally breaks through the alien blockade that surrounds space station Jocasta the head of station, Commander Halley, hopes it means the end of their enforced isolation.
Liberation can't come too soon for the exhausted Halley. Supplies are dangerously low, damage from the alien's initial attack has brought all but essential functions to a halt, and relations within the mixed alien and human population are strained to breaking point.
But the new arrival is a ship from earth's past, and apparently holds no key to ending the blockade. Instead, its appearance sets in motion a chain of macabre events that are soon spiralling out of Halley's control. In a race against time, Halley must struggle to pull the pieces of the puzzle together before the station disintegrates around her.
But innovative and unfailingly entertaining, Time Future is a gripping tale of murder and mayhem, alien rivalries and human frailties.
"Time Future has the potential to be the best genuine SF book ever published by an Australian. It has all the elements that drew me to the genre in the first place - and they're handled with a maturity beyond anything I'd expect from an 'unknown' author." - Peter McNamara, founding editor of Aphelion.
Winner of the George Turner Prize.
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