City of Pearl (Wess'Har Series #1) » (Reprint)

Karen Traviss is a former defense correspondent and TV and newspaper journalist. She has worked in public relations for the police and local government, and has served in the Royal Naval Auxiliary Service and the Territorial Army. The New York Times and USA Today bestselling author of City of Pearl, Crossing the Line, The World Before, Matriarch, Star Wars-Republic Commando: Hard Contact, Triple Zero, and Star Wars-Legacy of the Force: Bloodlines, she lives in Wiltshire, England.

Three separate alien societies have claims on Cavanagh's Star. But the new arrivals — the gethes from Earth — now threaten the tenuous balance of a coveted world.

Environmental Hazard Enforcement officer Shan Frankland agreed to lead a mission to Cavanagh's Star, knowing that 150 years would elapse before she could finally return home. But her landing, with a small group of scientists and Marines, has not gone unnoticed by Aras, the planet's designated guardian. An eternally evolving world himself, this sad, powerful being has already obliterated millions of alien interlopers and their great cities to protect the fragile native population. Now Shan and her party — plus the small colony of fundamentalist humans who preceded them — could face a similar annihilation . . . or a fate far worse. Because Aras possesses a secret of the blood that would be disastrous if it fell into human hands — if the gethes survive the impending war their coming has inadvertently hastened.

Locus March 2004 - Russell Letson

One of the things that makes the book so interesting ...(is) the skilful working of point of view, in which we get to see characters from inside and out, to lovely and often ironic effect.... City of Pearl provides large quantities of what I read SF for: situations and characters that test our assumptions about our natures and our relationships with others and offer opportunities to wear some very different skins.