'It's 2141, the weather is savage, energy politics is brutal, and millions of climate refugees from Asia eke out an existence in a greening Australian desert.
'Todd, the teenage son of powerful Indigenous energy mogul, Dr Madrigal Phipps, is kidnapped. A furious Dr Phipps gathers her old team from AuZgov Security Services and a renegade hacker, Andaman Marko, to hunt for Todd and his missing neo-Blues band, but both the climate chaos and her shadowy foes are treacherous.
'The young people are held captive in a reclusive community in a central Australian gorge, run by a cult of privacy and silence, called the Qwietude. As adolescent tensions of sex and affection escalate, Todd and his friends plan their own escape. They scramble across the ravaged central desert to beat the arrival of the supercharged monsoon, and Todd calls up skills taught by his Indigenous Elders to survive.
'Then, out of the blue, Madrigal's 120-year-old father-in-exile calls with an extraordinary request from Kyoto, the only place on the planet where cherry trees still blossom.
'Could Todd's disappearance and the Old Man's request be linked? And will the extreme weather prevent Madrigal from rescuing her son?'
Source: Publisher's blurb.
The Capricorn Sky
Hall
:
Stringybark Publishing
,
2020
20769857
2020
single work
novel
science fiction
thriller
'120 years into the future: the weather is lethal, sea levels have risen, & AuZtralia is a lot more complicated. Andaman Marko lives in the 'Ville, capital of the Joint Territory of Capricornia. He's not so much a savant on the virtual, as a fraudster: making millions of $NEW by discretely decoding corporate and gov komms and using the secret intel to make insider trades. But he is not quite as good as he thinks. Marko's activity is detected by someone, who goes after his strokes. Then, in a world where a prolonged peace is enforced through surveillance, eugenics and social engineering, a bomb goes off. Marko realizes he is the target and flees north to Cape York & is pursued by Dr Madrigal Phipps, an agent of the Government who is tasked to retrieve the savant and his secrets. Dr Phipps must manage the diplomatic intricacies of the new politics while hunting her target - who is hiding at an unauthorized township of criminals. But Marko's other pursuers haven't given up, and he is attacked and captured during a severe thermocell event as the weather moves south. At the same time, one of his assassins - Baabi, who is from an earlier, angrier Australia - has a personal agenda: a bitter vengeance against the man who destroyed her comrades as they waged a civil war 50 years earlier against AuZgov & its policy of The Blend, which authorized a massive influx of climate refugees into the country. This man is the father of Marko's lover, Flick. Marko's actions create a storm of his own making - and endanger everyone's lives. The Capricorn Sky is a thriller - about a world where the weather is the singular enemy, governance is fraught, a prolonged peace is cracking apart, and people are repudiating The Age of Purity and Virtue.'
Source: Publisher's blurb.
