In Volume II of the Tetralogy, The Stars Are Also Fire (New York, 1995), Ian Kenmuir contemplates "...Dagny Beynac, centuries dead...." (1, p. 16) and imagines her when young.
Chapter 2, entitled "The Mother of the Moon" for reasons yet to be explained, is an extended flashback to when Anson Guthrie was still alive, seven years after he had founded Fireball. Guthrie walks along a beach with young Dagny Ebbesen and reveals that he is her grandfather. Important events occur on beaches. See On The Beach. (Also, a Danellian tells Everard and Wanda the meaning of the Time Patrol on a beach at the end of The Shield Of Time.)
Although this is at least the third time that I have read The Stars Are Also Fire, I have no memories of this beach walk and conversation. It is as if these were new and fresh events. Meanwhile, in Kenmuir's present, his employer, the Lunarian Lilisaire, has urgently recalled him from mining in the asteroid belt but for what purpose? The plot thickens.
We are glad that Anderson wrote sequels to The Guardians Of Time and also to Harvest Of Stars.
1 comment:
Kaor, Paul!
The fact you don't recall having read important parts of THE STARS ARE ALSO FIRE kinda ties with the article I wrote in defense of rereading books. That is, interesting books should be reread because doing so will again bring back to mind interesting ideas, characters, scenarios, etc., that readers have since forgotten. As you said, it would be like reading a new story.
Sean
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