John Nephew

This book succeeds on so many levels -- awe-inspiring speculative planetary science about a tidally locked world, the xenobiology and xenosociology of a profoundly alien life form, the intimate and passionate exploration of the intense relationships arising in both youth and desperate circumstances, the plight of a human species that paid such terrible prices to survive only now to be on the verge of destroying its second home. It's a book to get absorbed in while you read it, and to spend a lot of time thinking about afterward.