Kenny Martens’s Reviews > The Horn of Time > Status Update

Progress: a crew of Mayrai merchant sailors infiltrates a secret Beneghali project-a nuclear fusion powerplant. And destroys it. To preserve the status quo and allow the various cultures of the world to mature, and to prevent another ruinous War of Judgement.

Marius: Etienne Fourre confronts Jacques Reinach, the general who won the third world war, and tries to convince him to give up his emergency powers and let democracy have a chance to flourish once more.

The Man Who Came Early: a US soldier stationed in Iceland during the Cold War is struck by lightning and transported back a thousand years to before Leif Eiriksson’s voyage to Vinland.

The High Ones: a ship from Earth (escaping from the united world soviets) runs into a hostile alien race and tracks it back to its planet of origin. There they find the perfect collectivist race. A civilization millions of years old, with the people nothing more than mindless drones servicing computers like termites in a great colony.

A Man to My Wounding: after three world wars, the nations of Earth realize war is too dangerous. Disagreement must still be resolved, so “war” now consists of ritualized assassination of political leaders. But how long until somebody breaks these unspoken rules and goes after other targets?