Dead Star: Tri-Star Empire Book 1
by Simon Kewin
Selene Ada is rescued, unconscious, from her homeworld. The planet had been condemned to death by the brutal, galaxy-spanning Concordance: their sunlight slowly being blocked by a planetary shroud. Someone breaks through from space to try to save her and her family from the planet’s imminent destruction, but he is only able to save her – crushed and nearly dead.
We follow Selene through her tortuous medical rehabilitation, and slowly discover that her sad, elderly savior, Ondo Lagan, is an old friend of her archaeologist father. He is, and her father was, part of a loose confederation that was trying to tease out history of the previous galactic civilization – civilization that the 300-year-old religious Concordance is brutally trying to erase, supplant, and demonize.
Will Selene decide on an alias, a new life and name somewhere else, or will she choose to try to delve into the forbidden past by salvaging space artifacts and data? She at least decides to help Ondo find the center of the ancient, hidden civilization: the planet Coronade, hinted at in the records of derelict spaceships Ondo has salvaged over the years.
And what they find shows that there’s a lot more at stake than even Ondo dreams.
Click on the name of the book below the cover to take a look. You’ll see there’s also a prequel (Home World) and there are two sequels (Red Star and God Star). I look forward to reading the entire space opera series since it’s fresh and original – something rare in my experience.
(He is one of our authors! For a quick, free glimpse at Simon Kewin’s earlier writing take a look at his Abyss & Apex short stories here, and here.)