dustydigger
10/20/2013
Excellent SF/fantasy tale about a group of eight who go through a one way portal to the Pliocene period, 6 million years before. Troubled people with a variety of reasons for wanting a new life in a simpler age, the group are following in the footsteps of nearly 90,000 other adventurers. They have tried to think of every type of danger they may face, but what they dont know is that aliens crash landed on earth 1000 years before they enter into the Pliocene, and with the help of torcs that put humans under mind control, they have enslaved the human travellers, and are using the women to have their children, since there are genetic problems. This is the jumping off point for exciting adventures and non stop action. This book deservedly won the Locus prize for best book in its year. Original engrossing and beautifully written. Marvellous descriptions of the Pliocene world.
The only downside for me was the huge number of spelling errors and typos in the 2011 edition. Just in a matter of five pages, here are a few of the mistakes lightening instead of tightening roost instead of most hive instead of live plus missing letters off the end of words, repeating words etc. Very annoying, especially for someone paying about $15 to buy it. I was really surprised at the poor editing - or no editing! - in such a famous book. One or two may be accepted, but dozens? Disgraceful.