The Call of Earth: Homecoming: Vol. 2

In the second volume of Card's latest saga, Homecoming, the city of Basilica is a battleground for at least three parties. Its own would-be dictators have to contend with the kin of Lady Rasa, through whom the Oversoul speaks, and the ambitious, ruthless, and able foreign General Moozh, who wants Basilica as an ally for his own ambitions. The balance of action, characterization, and world building is as accomplished as we have come to expect from Card, although the book will not stand completely alone for those who have not read The Memory of Earth. Human beings caught up in the plans of a sentient computer is a venerable sf concept, and in the hands of a writer as accomplished as Card it is proving to be a theme of sufficient weight for a saga. (Reviewed Nov. 15, 1992)0312930372Roland Green

Following the sometimes dubious directives of the dying Oversoul--an orbiting computer that has preserved peace on the planet Harmony for millennia, Naifeh and his family prepare to voyage to the stars in search of the planet called Earth. With characteristic insights into the moral nature of the individual, Card explores the ramifications that face those persons chosen to answer a ``higher call.'' This second volume of the ``Homecoming'' will appeal to the author's many fans and is a good purchase for most libraries. (c) Copyright 2010. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.

Second in Card's science-fiction series (The Memory of Earth, p. 81) set on planet Harmony, whose ruling computer, the Oversoul, is breaking down after 40 million years' service. The Oversoul, therefore, is organizing the most sensitive and psychically capable humans to help it mount an expedition to seek help on long-lost Earth. The city of Basilica, ruled by women, is easily captured by the brilliant and ambitious General Moozh, thus apparently thwarting young Nafai's scheme to escape with his extended family into the desert and fulfill the initial part of the Oversoul's vast plan. Furthermore, to secure his political stranglehold on the city, Moozh proposes to appoint Nafai as Basilica's overseer. However, Nafai's faith in the Oversoul is absolute, and he refuses; he urges instead that the talented but misguided Moozh join the Oversoul's expedition to Earth. But the general continues to resist the Oversoul, or so he thinks, until the Oversoul reveals that two of Nafai's most gifted followers are actually Moozh's daughters--so Moozh can no longer deny that, willingly or not, he has always served the Oversoul. Finally, the Oversoul admits that some of the dream-visions experienced by Nafai's people were sent, somehow, from far-distant Earth. Slow, but reasonably involving and persuasive after a virtually unintelligible first 50 pages, where readers are expected to instantly recall details from volume one.