In "Babel-17," Rydra Wong, a poet and code expert, must break an enemy government's code, but discovers that the code is really a supersophisticated language, while in "Empire Star," a simple-minded teenager is entrusted to carry a vital message to a distant world.

"In the second book of the Native Tongue trilogy, a small group of women linguists have developed a women's language, Láadan, but their resistance is threatened by a group of priests who uncover their plan to spread the language throughout the world."--