Orion Arm The Rampart Worlds Book 2 [Paperback]

After a brief (but heroic) fling with all that is right and just, Asahel Frost has reverted to his true nature--undisciplined and feckless, according to the girlfriend who just dumped him. Now he is once again the legal nonentity known as Helmut Icicle, living the riverboat skipper life in a tiny galactic outpost with the rest of the ne'er-do-wells.

That is until his sister Eve, herself genetically altered by the alien Haluk, begs Helmut to expose the Haluk's conspiracy, which threatens humans throughout the Spur worlds. Genetic alteration is tightly controlled, yet now it's running rampant. Helmut must find the culprits, but time is running out. Too many people have vanished into the secret empire where an evil genius reigns supreme. Worse yet, there's an unknown traitor in Helmut's own family who is quite willing to murder. Only one thing's clear: Helmut will emerge either triumphant . . . or dead."May has cemented her position as one of this generation's foremost storytellers."
--Library Journal

Julian May "is one of the few such writers I not only enjoy but read with only the faintest nagging sense of guilty pleasure."
--LocusJulian May was born in Chicago in 1931. She has written numerous books, including the four books of The Saga of Pliocene Exile, the two books of Intervention, and The Galactic Milieu Trilogy. She has also collaborated with André Norton and Marion Zimmer Bradley on the successful fantasy novel Black Trillium. Ms. May lives in Bellevue, Washington.I'd been home for three days, and it still didn't feel like home.

Trouble was, I was depressed. Not just about bailing out of the Rampart mess, but about the resolute way that Matilde Gregoire had spoken to me after I'd quit, saying we were through. There was no place in her life for a Throwaway charterboat skipper--and evidently no place in mine for a dedicated Starcorp loyalist.

Half dressed and barefoot, I stared into the open refrigeratolC