The Ship Avenged - Brainship, Bk 7 Author:S. M. Stirling It's not necessary to have read The City Who Fought in order to enjoy this sequel, though familiarity will certainly lend to this title's appeal. — One of the youngest commercial ship owners finds her cargo a carrier ship for a deadly worlds-destroying infection in this compelling story of resourcefulness and politics in space. — ... more »Another entry in the Brain / Brawn series created by Anne McCaffrey, and a direct sequel to the paperback The City Who Fought.
"Brains" are humans wired directly and immovably into their spaceships, "brawns" their mobile human partners. Planet Bethel bigwig Amos ben Sierra Nueva and his daughter Soamosa are kidnapped by the evil mutant, Belazair of Kolnar, in revenge for a previous defeat; Belazair plans to infect Amos with a contagious brain-destroying virus and then send him back to Bethel. So, after some arm-twisting by secret agent Bros Sperin, spaceship Wyal (brain: Rand; brawn: Joat Simeon-Hap) speeds to the rescue, though Joat and Rand don't yet know about the virus.
But then Belazair's kindly son, Karak, refuses to torture Soamosa; instead, he falls in love and escapes with her. Joat, meanwhile, discovers that one of Belazair's key associates is the drug-ruined uncle who, when she was a small girl, sold her into slavery in settlement of a gambling debt. Not to worry, though: In McCaffrey universes, the good guys always win in the end.« less