Ion Curtain

A bold new space opera from Aurealis Awards shortlisted author of The Firebird’s Tale and Cradle and Grave.

The AI is brutal, vicious and efficient and humanity has to fight to survive.

“Citizens of the Federation. Greetings from the Core.”

Lieutenant Kalina Sokolova is aid to Counter-Admiral Kasparov the major strategist for the Russian navy.

Kalina is also an agent of the Jinyiwei, an elite spy working for the UN. She is tasked with watching the Counter-Admiral, and assassination is not out of the question.

For decades the UN and the Russian military have navigated a tense interstellar Cold War. Peace is on the knife’s edge and events are coming ever closer to open conflict.

Solitaire Yeung is a corsair, a scavenger, a pirate, In the heart of a destroyed Russian battleship, his salvage crew discovers a mysterious device they shouldn’t have, the brain of the ship’s top secret artificial intelligence. And against all better sense they take it and run.

The UN wants it and the Russians want it back. Solitaire and his crew are on the run from the most powerful forces in the system, but they are not the only ones hunting the AI brain. An even more powerful foe grows in the darkness of space. Now all of humanity has to fight to survive…