A Million Open Doors - Tapa blanda

"The latest galaxy-spanner by one of Heinlein's spiritual descendents." --"Science Fiction Age" "A thoroughly entertaining book." --"The West Coast Review of Books" "John Barnes's "A Million Open Doors" takes a venerable theme of classic SF--the reintegration of far-flung colony worlds into a newly resurgent human culture--and enlivens it with such zest, narrative energy and critical intelligence that readers across a wide spectrum of tastes will be charmed." --"The Washington Post" "John Barnes knows how to make readers care...Barnes combines philosophical speculation, high-speed action, and character development in a way that is the hallmark of a master, and "A Million Open Doors" is his most successful work to date." --"Los Angeles Reader" "John Barnes convinces. He may well be the new writer on whom the mantle of Robert Heinlein falls." --Poul Anderson "With this book, Barnes emerges as a name to watch in SF." --"Booklist"

Nou Occitan is a place where duels are fought with equal passion over insults and artistic views alike. Giraut--swordsman, troubador, lover--is a creature of this swashbuckling world, the most isolated of humanity's Thousand Cultures. But the winds of change have come to Nou Occitan. As the invention of the "springer"--instantaneous interstellar travel, at a price--spreads throughout the human galaxy, the stability and purity of no world, no matter how isolated, is safe. Nor can Giraut's life remain untouched. To his wonder, his is about to find himself made an ambassador to a different human world, a place strange beyond his wildest imaginings.