The survivors of the next great war live in isolated farming communities, disdaining technological innovations and creating a deadly mythology around the use of science.

People considered to be pursuing the old, evil art of science are burned at the stake because it has become like the witchcraft of old.

Yet, there are people who defy the odds and secretly pursue the old arts, including Allen Chandliss, an astronomer hidden in the Idaho hills.

One day Allen Chandliss discovers that an alien fleet is about to approach Earth … a discovery that will make the world re-think their whole new way of life and start the next chapter in humanity’s great cosmic adventure.
 
“Fiction that satisfies as much at the story level as it does at the idea level”—Orson Scott Card