A new Ice Age has struck Earth, caused by the strife between advanced people – the Jemen war, which I don’t know much about because I didn’t read the first book. THE ICE GHOST takes up with stragglers trying to survive an increasingly dire landscape.
The modern humans appear to have left the planet, and we accompany their created descendants. Extinct races of Denisovans, Neandertals and Homo erectus were recreated, along with ice-age beasts such as mastodons, woolly rhinos and cave lions. The scientists appear to have thought that DNA could survive this way and re-evolve if conditions improved. Of course, that means all the knowledge has been lost – apart from a few books and even fewer people who can read.
A young woman, Quiller, her husband Rabbitear and her friend Lynx, belong to the fast-diminishing Sealion tribe – Denisovans – and are despised by the stronger Rust tribe, the Neandertals. A Rust holy man, or witch, called Trogon, is already Quiller’s enemy, and he only agrees to spare her family if she will accompany him to a cave he saw in a vision, looking for hidden knowledge. This is the last thing she wants to do – especially if it will make him more powerful – but she doesn’t feel she has a choice.
Kathleen O'Neal Gear has previously written exciting and evocative tales of our ancestors moving into North America, spreading out and establishing tribes and skills. She has turned that on its head now, in a story that, for me, feels depressing and brutal. We keep being told that a tribe is down to its last few members, people are regularly picked off by enemies, lions or cold, and nobody gets a good meal and celebration, unlike the prehistoric tales. We see the wreckage of past civilisations. I feel this atmosphere must be intentional, to show the calamity that can befall Earth if people muck around with the climate. In this case, a soupy algae with enzymes was released into the oceans, and now the sea is full of zyme and not much else, causing the extreme cold.
I know that my appreciation of THE ICE GHOST would be increased if I’d read the earlier story The Ice Lion, and I intend to give it a try. The series is called Rewilding Reports, and it will interest anyone who likes post-apocalyptic Science Fiction. Some excellent talking points are provided. The third book The Ice Orphan should wrap up the series, on what I hope will be a brighter note.
In the brutal Ice Age caused by the ancient Jemen war, many archaic human species, including Denisovans and Homo erectus, hover on the verge of extinction. There seems no way out, until the greatest Neandertal holy man, Trogon, has a vision. Legends say the truce that ended the old war left one hostage in the hands of the victorious rebels: the godlike Jemen leader known as the Old Woman of the Mountain. According to Trogon’s vision, only one person knows the location of that burial cave. Trogon must capture young Quiller and force her to lead him there…for the Old Woman may not be dead. She may only have been in stasis for a thousand summers, and when reawakened she will save them from oblivion. But according to the Denisovans—Quiller’s people—Trogon is the most powerful witch alive. He’s up to something evil that will surely spell their destruction. He must be stopped before it’s too late. Quiller’s best friend Lynx must brave towering glaciers, dire wolves, and prides of giant lions to save her and stop Trogon.
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