Dreamfall (Cat, #3)

Cat, the halfbreed telepath hero of Catspaw and Psion , joins a research team on Refuge, homeworld of his mother's people, the Hydrans. Immediately, he finds trouble when he helps a Hydran woman escape human pursuers. The decimated Hydran population of Refuge is confined to a bleak "homeland," by a huge corporate state, Tau Biotech. Tau also controls Refuge's one unique natural resource, "Dreamfall." The tangible residue of cast-off thoughts from beautiful, enigmatic "cloud whales," dreamfall forms vast reefs, sacred to the Hydrans, but mere exploitable data to Tau. Caught between Tau and desperate Hydrans who fight to reclaim their world, Cat must somehow forge the ruins of the past into a means to defeat Tau's brutality to save his people--and himself.

A science fiction adventure-thriller by Hugo Award-winner Joan D. Vinge. Cat, the popular anti-hero of Psion and Catspaw, tries to go home to a planet inhabited by Hydrans, the telepathic humanoid aliens from whom he gets his own mind-powers. Love, danger, and controversy all follow him as he tries to mine dreamfall, the physical embodiment of thoughts that accumulate in bizarre, fascinating deposits, like a mineral, but with far greater complexities, on the planet.

Publishers Weekly

Half human, half Hydran, Vinge's young protagonist, Cat, has always been an outcast in the world of the mid-21st century. In this richly detailed and suspenseful sequel to Catspaw (1989), Cat travels to the planet Refuge, home to the only surviving enclave of Hydrans, a once-powerful race of psions, or telepaths, whose nonviolent culture left them at the mercy of aggressive human expansion. As part of a research team sent to study the cloud-whales, aerial creatures whose lifecycle may hold the key to advances in nanotechnology, Cat also hopes to learn more about his alien heritage. When he inadvertently helps a young Hydran woman kidnap a human child, however, he is swept into a deadly conflict between the two races. Vinge deftly twists together multilayered plot strands as misguided loyalties and fanaticism, both human and Hydran, propel events toward inevitable disaster. Although the story loses momentum near the end, it deftly explores themes of family and loyalty. And, as always, Cat proves a sensitive and engagingly stubborn narrator. Author tour. (June)

From his earliest memories in the desperate slums of Oldcity, Cat has hated the pretensions of the rich, the machinations of the powerful interstellar combines; for at every turn Cat has been used. He's been a thief, a hustler, a spy, a slave. Used as a pawn. As bait. But at this moment, Cat is a scholar, a university team xenologist doing field research on the planet Refuge, home of the enigmatic cloud-whales. Vast aerial creatures created by an unknown species, the telepathic whales are far more than uniquely beautiful. Their thoughts and dreams manifest, falling from the sky to form vast reefs of solid data comprised of pure, retrievable thought... data mined by the planet's all-powerful corporate owner, Tau Biotech. Refuge is also the home of the psionic Hydrans, Cat's lost alien half. Refuge had been theirs, like much of the galaxy, long before the ascendance of the human federation. Now they live like refugees amid the ruins of their past. For the first time in his troubled life, Citizen Cat has the chance to study, reflect, seek his roots. Until he hears a woman's scream... Suddenly, Cat plunges through the false serenity of Refuge society into a nightmare of brutality, bigotry, conspiracy, and corruption, where kidnapping and terrorism are stepping-stones to revolution - or genocide. Beneath the velvet glove of Tau Biotech's corporate state is the iron fist of a government willing to kill to protect its profits. For Tau can only profit by plundering dreams. The broken dreams of Hydrans, whales, and humans... the stolen dreams of the world. Cat, the halfbreed telepath hero of "Catspaw and "Psion, joins a research team on Refuge, home-world of his mother's people, the Hydrans. Immediately, he finds trouble when he helps a Hydran woman escape human pursuers. The decimated Hydran population of Refuge is confined to a bleak "homeland" by a huge corporate state, Tau Biotech. Tau also controls Refuge's one unique natural resource, "Dreamfall." The tangible residue of cast-off thoughts from beautiful, enigmatic cloud whales, dreamfall forms vast reefs, sacred to the Hydrans but mere exploitable data to Tau. Caught between Tau and the desperate Hydrans who fight to reclaim their world, Cat must somehow forge the ruins of the past into a means to defeat Tau's brutality and save his people--and himself Cat, a halfbreed telepath, joins a research team on Refuge, home-world of his mother's people, the Hydrans. Immediately, he finds trouble when he helps a Hydran woman escape human pursuers. The decimated Hydran population of Refuge is confined to a bleak "homeland" by a huge corporate state, Tau Biotech. Tau also controls Refuge's one unique natural resource, "Dreamfall." The tangible residue of cast-off thoughts from beautiful, enigmatic cloud whales, dreamfall forms vast reefs, sacred to the Hydrans but mere exploitable data to Tau. Caught between Tau and the desperate Hydrans who fight to reclaim their world, Cat must somehow forge the ruins of the past into a means to defeat Tau's brutality and save his people--and himself On a visit to a planet to research his alien roots, an Earthman of mixed blood is sucked into a conflict between the races. He is Cat, half-human, half-Hydran, a race of non-violent telepaths colonized by humans. Problems begin when Cat becomes involved with a Hydran woman A telepathic, half-human Cat travels to his mother's native world of Refuge, where he faces an ecological catastrophe caused by greedy humans.