Beyond the Burn Line

'A beautiful story of intrigue and mystery' PETER F. HAMILTON'Loss Protocol is Paul McAuley on top form' KIM NEWMAN'An eco-thriller like no other from one of Britain's best SF writers' THE GUARDIAN'Which one feels realer, truer. The world we lived in most of our lives, or the world we dreamed up?'Eight years after the catastrophic downfall of the cult his sister Izzy had joined, Marc Winters has at last found a refuge from unwanted attention. The wildlife ranger of a small, unremarkable island, he's quietly helping to preserve what survives of nature in a world wracked by climate change and chaotic weather, and trying his best to put his past behind him.But then his narrowboat is burgled, the counterterrorism police come calling, and everything he thought he knew about the cult and his sister's fate is turned upside down. A cabal of so-called deep dreamers has revived the cult's crazy belief that the world could be healed by collective dreams fuelled by psychotropic mushrooms. They appear to think that Winters possesses information crucial to their success, and when he tries to discover more about them, he becomes inextricably entangled in plans that challenge his very existence.Blending noir-inflected conspiracies and double-crosses, fantasies of dream science, and elegiac evocations of a depleted world, Loss Protocol's chimerical story keeps its secrets until the last page.

WHAT WILL BECOME OF US?<BR><BR>In the deep future beyond the burn line of the Anthropocene and the extinction of humanity, the city states of an intelligent species of bear have fallen to a mind-wrecking plague. The bears' former slaves, a peaceable, industrious and endlessly curious people, believe that they have inherited the bounty and beauty of their beloved Mother Earth. But are they alone?<BR><BR>After the death of his master, a famous scholar, Pilgrim Saltmire vows to complete their research into sightings of so-called visitors and their sky craft. To discover if they are a mass delusion created by the stresses of an industrial revolution, or if they are real - a remnant population of bears which survived the plague, or another, unknown intelligent species.<BR><BR>Risking his reputation and his life, Pilgrim's search for the truth takes him from his comfortable home in the shadow of a great library to his tribe's former home on the chilly coast of the far south, and the gathering of a dangerous cult in the high desert. Whether or not the visitors are real, one thing is certain. Pilgrim's world and everything he thought he knew about his people's history will be utterly changed.<BR><BR>McAuley's fabulous far future, impacted by the consequences of global warming, colonisation and historical injustices, explores and reflects our own challenges while telling a fast paced story of discovery and adventure.