Foreigner Series

Over the past 6 months, I’ve been reading C.J. Cherryh’s Foreigner series of books. In other words, I read through all 21 books, and look forward to the next one.

Quick run down on the series….

A human colony ship has a navigational error, and ends up losing track of where home is. Colonists after some disagreement with their administration, descend upon an inhabitated alien world. Not suprisingly, war breaks out, and the humans lose the war. A treaty is signed, granting humans safe haven on the planet, in exchange for the transfer of their knowledge and technology. The natives create an office to be occupied by a single human, whose role is the translation and negotiation of technology transfer. After 200 years, that role is assigned to Bren Cameron.

That’s the back story. The series itself largely follows the life of Bren Cameron, whose role evolves from simply handling technology transfer. His life, and ultimately the lives of everyone else on the planet are turned upside down, by the return of the colony ship, encounters with another alien race, etc.

IMO, it’s a great series. It has everything from politics, complex relationships, to open conflict.