Conditioned to abuse and control, Laryn is also incredibly determined to protect her family and keep them together—even if it means risking the unknown and leaving behind Earth and all the technology and security it holds.
Every aspect of life is dictated for citizens of the Federation’s lowest class, so Laryn and her sisters—despised misfits in the genetic caste system—are shocked when the Feds give them a choice: stay and face separation and the dangers of communal housing, or join a group of colonists traveling to a pastoral colony on the distant planet of Nequam.
‘Pastoral’ is just another word for primitive—a concept Federation citizens can hardly comprehend—but Laryn and her sisters decide to risk the unknown and board the colonial ship bound for frontier life.
Quickly discovering that freedom means responsibility, they struggle to learn the skills required for a life of self-sufficiency. All of it is overwhelming, but nothing compares to the difficulty of sorting out the social and emotional challenges of their new culture.
For Laryn things become even more difficult when a man slips past her carefully built defenses, and she is soon faced with the impossibility of choosing between the love of a man and the security of her family.
Wrestling with her priorities and struggling to choose between her sisters and the newly-discovered wonder of love, it seems to Laryn that both sacrifice and loss are unavoidable as the Speedwell hurtles ever closer to her new home.
Unpredictable and emotionally charged, Laryn’s story is about self-discovery and the harsh realities of choice. Desperate to find where peace and accountability meet, she must choose—but how will she decide?
