Against Infinity

From the author of the acclaimed Timescape (1980): an sf "wild frontier" yarn, masterly for its first two thirds, thereafter somewhat meandering and problematic. The chief characters of the frontier town Sidon on the Jovian moon Ganymede are the competent, austere Colonel Lopez, his young perceptive son Manuel, and wise centenarian Old Matt. The colonists are terraforming Ganymede using artificially created lifeforms whose metabolisms will gradually transform the icy surface into materials suitable for Earthly life, but the creatures are genetically unstable, necessitating an annual weeding out - a hunt the frontiersmen join with enthusiasm Complicating the picture is a huge, blocky alien biomechanism, Aleph, perhaps billions of years old, which burrows and floats all over and under Ganymede, to unknown purpose. During the culls, Manuel and Old Matt pursue the sometimes (unwittingly?) destructive Aleph, but years pass before - aided by aggressive once-human cyborg Eagle - they kill the indifferent alien. Old Matt dies; the Colonel (who never intended Aleph actual harm) casts Manuel out. And all this glows with a rare immediacy and realism, with sparkling descriptions, vivid dangers, and a convincing alien-frontier cast and ambiance - even if the rest loses headway amid banal political chat, unanswered questions, and other distractions. (Six years later, a group of priest-like Earth scientists come to study the dead hulk; during a series of severe quakes, Ganymede's new surface collapses, Aleph sinks into the ice - and then, inexplicably, starts up again.) Often splendid work, then; and, if less than fully satisfying, definitely worthwhile. (Kirkus Reviews)