The Cause of Death

BSI: Starside #1

by Roger MacBride Allen

They are the elite agents of interstellar investigation. Their mission: solve off-Earth crimes and protect humanity’s starside interests. They are the men and women of the Bureau of Special Investigations—BSI—and their cases are literally out of this world.

The message was garbled, but it appeared to be a simple enough request: escort a human prisoner convicted of murder back to Earth for punishment. But when BSI agents Jamie Mendez and Hannah Wolfson arrive on a planet settled by the enigmatic Pavlat, it seems that everyone is determined to kill them before they can complete their mission—or even find out what it is. And on a planet where murder is a time-honored tradition, Death is a cause everyone believes in. Mendez and Wolfson must find a way to untangle the web of Pavlavian intrigue obscuring the case and sort out what’s really going on. But there’s far more than just one man’s life at stake—and soon they’ll have a fresh murder to solve…

Genres: Science Fiction

480 pages, Mass Market Paperback

First published January 1, 2006

About the author

Roger MacBride Allen is a US science fiction author of the Corellian Trilogy, consisting of Ambush at Corellia, Assault at Selonia, and Showdown at Centerpoint. He was born on September 26, 1957 in Bridgeport, Connecticut. He grew up in Washington D.C. and graduated from Boston University in 1979. The author of a dozen science-fiction novels, he lived in Washington D.C., for many years. In July 1994, he married Eleanre Fox, a member of the U.S. Foreign Service. Her current assignment takes them to Brasilia, Brazil, where they lived from 2007 to 2009.

Reviews

[Betty · Rating 3 out of 5]

Interesting premise. A planet where the eldest son is required to kill his father when the father reaches a particular age. (It prevents certain senility.) An Earth man is on the planet and is under a conviction with a death penalty. What can be the connection? Investigators from Earth go there due to a garbled message.

[Dawn · Rating 1 out of 5]

I was dreadfully disappointed in this book as it sounded like a fantastic concept but I found it disjointed and after 6 chapters of uninterest I gave up.

[Howard · Rating 4 out of 5]

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