Souls in the great machine

Electricity is banned by every major religion in this future, and wind engines supply most of the mechanical power. Librarians hold real authority, and they settle their disputes by duelling. It is a world rebuilt on strict limits, and the book is post-apocalyptic science fiction.

Highliber Zarvora Cyberline is ambitious, and she has built the Calculor, a vast construction staffed by many workers who solve equations from within it. In effect it is a computer run by people. Officially it will work out taxes and handle other modest tasks.

Zarvora has a different use in mind, a far greater purpose of her own that she has kept hidden behind that cover story. What she intends to do with the machine is the question the book turns on.

This volume opens the Greatwinter Trilogy and was published in June 1999. Australian readers first met the story in two parts: Voices In The Light came out in 1994, and Mirrorsun Rising followed a year later.