Sagramanda

August 21, 2006
At the start of bestseller Foster's lighthearted techno-thriller (after 2006's The Candle of Distant Earth
), runaway scientist Taneer Buthlahee and his gorgeous Untouchable lover, Depahli, are planning a marvelous life far from the city of Sagramunda, India—with the cash Taneer hopes to make on the stolen fruits of his mysterious research. To help broker the deal, Taneer hires fixer Sanjay Ghosh, a determined former farmer with big dreams of his own. Hot on Taneer's trail are a company operative with orders from Taneer's former employer to do whatever's necessary to get the stolen goods back, as well as Taneer's father, who's sworn to kill his son for dishonoring the family with his theft. Also along for the ride are a Hindu fundamentalist drug addict bent on offering plenty of sacrifices to her blood-loving goddess, the cop who's trying to catch her and a man-eating tiger. SF elements make colorful window dressing for this unpredictable thriller, whose multiple threads Foster juggles like the professional he is.

September 15, 2006
Taneer is an Indian scientist who has stolen a secret project code from a multinational corporation. On the run from both the organization and his unforgiving father, he meets and falls for Dephali, a beautiful woman of India's untouchable class. Add a farmer-turned-merchant, a Kali-worshipping Frenchwoman, a chief inspector, and a man-eating tiger and the result is a fast-paced urban adventure set in a near-future India of high technology and desperate people. The prolific author of the Pip and Flinx novels (his latest, Trouble Magnet, publishes in November) adds to his considerable body of work with this polished hybrid of page-turning action and taut suspense that belongs in large collections. [For another novel about a future India, see Ian Hamilton'sRiver of Gods.Ed.]

Copyright 2006 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.