A Land So Wide And Savage

Humans have been living on Mars for 55 years. The Company communities are thriving, and five Earth nations have established neighbouring colonies. The hardest part is over, and for the nearly 15,000 people on Mars life is good.Still.Anders Saugstad, the Mandate's aging security chief who led the relief force from Earth back in the War of Fifty-Two, can't shake off his suspicions that something is just not quite right. His discrete enquiries to old friends in military intelligence back on Earth turn up the unsettling truth; two of his new neighbours want the Mandate for themselves and they are preparing to bring soldiers and heavy weapons to Mars to make that happen.The failure of diplomatic efforts to stop the launches leads to humanity's first military fleet actions in space, leaving six nuclear nations on the brink of open war. Meanwhile, the Mandate and its friendly neighbours frantically prepare to meet the remnants of the space fleet in battles that will determine whether Martians will live beside each other in mutual trust and goodwill or according to the old hatreds brought from Earth.