AustLit

'Warrain is plagued by inherited memories of dispossession and slaughter, buried deep in his DNA. Thousands of years before, his ancestors roamed the red desert sands of Australia, but colonising Europeans murdered them, robbed them of their lands, and later of their children.

'And then, when Warrain is just twelve years old, the nightmare repeats.

'But Warrain no longer lives in Australia, or even on Earth. He lives on the planet Imago, in the mixed scientific-technical community of Station One—until the technicians get high on the opioid arrash and break into the weapons’ store. In the bloodshed that follows, the scientists are expelled, Warrain’s father is killed, and his mother and unborn sibling lost to him.

'Over the next five years, the scientists carve out a new rudimentary home for themselves in the Iron Ranges, and the boys Warrain’s grown up with, start to build their own scientific skills. Not Warrain. He wanders the tunnels in the Striate Forests or climbs to the Tors to stare down at the Station, dream of his mother and sibling, and plot revenge.

'And then one day, a series of dramatic events change everything: he is involved in a murder, one of Imago’s sentient fauna, a maggot, calls him by name, and a third moon appears in the sky.

'To make matters worse, when sickness strikes the Station and technicians arrive seeking help, the woman Warrain barely knows he loves, agrees to aid them. Warrain goes too, seizing the opportunity to deal them a blow they’ll never forget. But the third moon brings changes that threaten them all and, to aid the maggot, whose kind is being dispossessed and slaughtered as Warrain’s ancestors were, he must turn his back on the hate that has long sustained him, and find another way to live.'

Source: Publisher's blurb.