Blood in the Fruit (Book 4 of the Marq'ssan Cycle)

Blood in the Fruit, the hard-hitting fourth volume of the five-novel Marq ssan Cycle, focuses sharp, analytical attention on human rights issues. The novel opens in October 2086. After ten years absence, the Marq ssan Fleet returns to Earth to determine whether humans should be quarantined, and a young alien, unprepared for the shock of human culture, becomes a dangerous loose cannon taking violent, unilateral action. In the Free Zone, a flood of renegades led by Elizabeth Weatherall establish a fortress; even Hazel Bell, Weatherall s lover, doesn t know what they re up to. In the US, when the government responds to increasing dissent and civil disorder by ratcheting up its repressive tactics, brave and dedicated human rights activists like Celia Espin join forces with the Free Zones in a global challenge that threatens to undermine governments around the world. Blood in the Fruit offers a grand, sweeping story through the eyes of four individuals with markedly contrasting perspectives and experience.

L. Timmel Duchamp is the author of the five-novel Marq’ssan Cycle, which was awarded a Special Honor by the 2009 James Tiptree Award jury; The Waterdancer’s World; two collections of short fiction, Love’s Body, Dancing in Time and Never At Home; the short novel The Red Rose Rages (Bleeding); and numerous uncollected stories, for which she has been a Nebula and Sturgeon Award finalist and short-listed numerous times for the Tiptree Award. She lives in Seattle and is the publisher of Aqueduct Press.