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Book Details

The Ascension Factor

85.7% complete
Copyright © 1988 by Theresa Shackelford and Dell R. Call and Bill Ransom
1988
Science Fiction
2023
1 time
Science fiction
Multiple unnumbered chapters
Book Cover
Has a genre Has an extract Has a year read Has a rating In my library In a series 
2737
 Pandora*
#4 of 4
Pandora*     See series as if on a bookshelf
A series of science fiction books by Frank Herbert and Bill Ransom.  Also known as the Pandora Sequence.

1) Destination: Void
2) The Jesus Incident
3) The Lazarus Effect
4) The Ascension Factor
No dedication.
Jeptha Twain suffered the most exquisite pain for three days, and that was the point.
May contain spoilers
An occasional cheer broke the silence, and Twisp listened as the twinkling sounds of nighttime laughter rent the ancient cloak of death and fear.
No comments on file
Extract (may contain spoilers)
Ben undogged the hatch and Rico LaPush rushed inside.  Rico nodded once to the girl, who looked ghastly pale, and handed Ben the pocket messenger.  Most of the briefing on it was already outdated, but Ben would want to hear it, anyway.  Rico was careful to keep from touching the girl.

"Ready?" he asked.

"Ready," Ben said.

"Yes," said the girl.

Rico scratched his chin stubble and adjusted the lasgun in the back of his pants.  He had been with Ben since Guemes Island was sunk, more years than Crista Galli had been alive.  His mistrust of people had kept them alive more than once, and he did not intend to let his guard down with Her Holiness.

"Déjà vu," he said to Ben, nodding at her Islander dress.  "She reminds me of the old days, when things were simply tough.  The streets are crawling with security, she'll need a good act..."

"You can speak to me," Crista interrupted, her cheeks flushed with a run of anger.  "I have ears to hear, mouth to answer.  This sister is not a chairdog, nor a glass of water on her brother's table."

Rico had to muster a smile.  Her Islander accent was perfect, her phrasing perfect.  She was a very quick study - of course, she had more intimate ways of getting inside people's heads...

"Thank you for the lesson, sister," he said. "You are most cheerfully dressed, my compliments."

Rico noted Ben's smile, and the fact that his partner's gaze never wavered from Crista Galli's perfect face.

Rico's cameras had taped the faces of many beautiful women for Holovision and he had to admit that everything he'd heard, about Crista Galli was true.  When Ben became a reporter, Rico LaPush signed on as a field triangulator with the holography crew.  A well-placed lie got him the job, but his facility for learning kept it.  He had filmed more pomp and more horror in any given year than most cameramen witnessed in a lifetime.

She's pale, but beautiful, he thought.  Maybe the sun will give her some color.

Operations said to keep her out of the sun, but Rico thought that, given their recent bad luck, this would be impossible.  Operations, whoever they were, didn't have their butts on the line.

"We'll be walking for a while," Rico told them. "Don't hurry."

He nodded at the messenger in Ben's hand.

"Don't bother," he said.  "You might as well ####can that thing.  They tell us we're going by air but the airstrip's already locked up by Flattery's boys.  We'll have to do it by water."

"But they said..."

"I know what they said," Rico snapped.  "They said the airstrip would be secure.  They said keep her away from water.  Let's move."

Crista Galli carried a sadness about her that Rico didn't like.  He could take fear, or anger, or even hysteria but sadness felt too much like bad luck.  They'd started out with that.  When she reached out a tentative hand toward Ben, Rico stopped her with a word.

"No," he said.  "I'm sorry.  I can't let you touch him."

"Your fear?" she shot back, "or this 'Operations'?  He is clothed."

"My fear."

 

Added: 12-Jan-2020
Last Updated: 23-Dec-2024

Publications

 01-Feb-1989
Ace
Mass Market Paperback
In my libraryOrder from amazon.comHas a cover imageBook Edition Cover
Date Issued:
Cir 01-Feb-1989
Format:
Mass Market Paperback
Cover Price:
$4.50
Pages*:
359
Internal ID:
43903
Publisher:
ISBN:
0-441-03127-7
ISBN-13:
978-0-441-03127-6
Printing:
1
Country:
United States
Language:
English
Credits:
Ron Miller  - Cover Artist
NEW WORLDS. NEW DESTINIES.


The sea world of Pandora, so unlike waterless Dune, is similar in one fateful way - its struggle for survival.  An awesome conflict, one that will either transform or destroy the planet, has divided the people of Pandora: its dictator, the sadistic Raja Flattery... its resistance, the anarchistic Shadows (who may or may not exist)... and its promised savior, the beautiful near-human Crista Galli, who was raised undersea.

Now the remnants of humanity, having mastered the Void and transformed new worlds, depart once more for the waiting stars.

But this time, Man does not go alone.

THE ASCENSION FACTOR

"FANS OF THE LATE [FRANK HERBERT] WILL NOT BE DISAPPOINTED.  As with Herbert's famous Dune series, the novel boasts finely detailed characterizations and displays great concern for ecology."

- Booklist

"A WORTHY SEQUEL... WILDLY ECLECTIC!"
- Rave Reviews

THE LATE FRANK HERBERT HAS BECOME ONE OF THE BEST-LOVED SCIENCE FICTION WRITERS OF ALL TIME.  THE ASCENSION FACTOR MARKS HIS THIRD AND FINAL COLLABORATION WITH AWARD-WINNING AUTHOR AND POET BILL RANSOM.
Cover:
Book CoverBook Back CoverBook Spine
Notes and Comments:
Ace/Putnam edition / January 1088
Ace edition / February 1989
First printing based on the number line
Canada: $5.95
 21-Apr-2015
Blackstone Audio, Inc
Audiobook
I read this editionOrder from amazon.comHas a cover imageBook Edition Cover
Date Issued:
21-Apr-2015
Format:
Audiobook
Cover Price:
$14.95
Length:
14 hrs 9 min (359 pages)
"Read":
Once
Reading(s):
1)   28 Nov 2023 - 30 Nov 2023
Cover Link(s):
Internal ID:
23301
ISBN:
Unknown
Country:
United States
Language:
English
Credits:
Scott Brick  - Narration
From audible.com:

Set 25 years after The Lazarus Effect, this final book in the Destination: Void collaboration between Frank Herbert and Bill Ransom concludes the story of the planet Pandora.

Pandora's humans have been recovering land from its raging seas at an accelerated pace since The Lazarus Effect. The great kelp of the seas, sentient but electronically manipulated by humans, buffers Pandora's wild currents to restore land and facilitate the booming sea trade. New settlements rise overnight, but children starve in their shadows. An orbiting assembly station is near completion of Project Voidship, which is the hope of many for finding a better world.

Pandora is under the fist of an ambitious clone from hibernation called the Director, who rules with a sadistic security force led by the assassin Spider Nevi. Small resistance groups have had little effect on his absolute power. The Director controls the transportation of foodstuffs; uprisings are punished with starvation.

The resistance fighters' main hope is Crista Galli, a woman believed by some to be the child of God. Crista pools her talents with Dwarf MacIntosh, Beatriz Tatoosh, and Rico LaPush to transcend the barriers between the different species and overthrow the Director and the sinister cabal with which he rules.
Cover:
Book Cover
Notes and Comments:
©1988, 2012 Herbert Properties, LLC, and Bill Ransom ℗2015 Blackstone Audio, Inc.

Part of the audible.com Plus Catalog
Image File
01-Feb-1989
Ace
Mass Market Paperback

Image File
21-Apr-2015
Blackstone Audio, Inc
Audiobook

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*
  • I try to maintain page numbers for audiobooks even though obviously there aren't any. I do this to keep track of pages read and I try to use the Kindle version page numbers for this.
  • Synopses marked with an asterisk (*) were generated by an AI. There aren't a lot since this is an iffy way to do it - AI seems to make stuff up.
  • When specific publication dates are unknown (ie prefixed with a "Cir"), I try to get the publication date that is closest to the specific printing that I can.
  • When listing chapters, I only list chapters relevant to the story. I will usually leave off Author Notes, Indices, Acknowledgements, etc unless they are relevant to the story or the book is non-fiction.
  • Page numbers on this site are for the end of the main story. I normally do not include appendices, extra material, and other miscellaneous stuff at the end of the book in the page count.






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Presented: 12-Feb-2025 07:11:35

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