Anathem

- Blurb -

Anathem, the latest marvellous invention from the author of Cryptonomicon and the Baroque Cycle trilogy, is a magnificent creation - a work of great scope, intelligence and imagination that ushers readers into a recognizable - yet strangely inverted - world. Fraa Erasmas is a young avout living in the Concent of Saunt Edhar, a sanctuary for mathematicians, scientists and philosophers, protected from the outside 'saecular' world by ancient stone, honoured traditions and complex rituals. Over the centuries, cities and governments have risen and fallen beyond the concent's walls. Three times during history's darkest epoch, violence born of superstition and ignorance has invaded and devastated the cloistered mathic community. Yet the avout have always managed to adapt in the wake of catastrophe, becoming out of necessity even more austere and less dependent on material things. And Raz has no fear of the outside - the Extramuros - for the last of the terrible times was long, long ago. Now, in celebration of the week-long, once in a decade rite of Apert, the fraas and suurs prepare to venture beyond the concent's gates - at the same time opening them wide to welcome the curious 'extras' in. During his first Apert as a fraa, Erasmus eagerly anticipates reconnecting with the landmarks and family he hasn't seen since he was 'collected'. But before the week is out, both the existence he abandoned and the one he embraced will stand poised on the brink of cataclysmic change. Powerful unforseen forces jeopardize the peaceful stability of mathic life and the established ennui of the Extramuros - a threat that only an unsteady alliance of saecular and avout can oppose - as, one by one, Raz and his colleagues, teachers and friends are summoned forth from the safety of the concent in hopes of warding off global disaster. Suddenly burdened with a staggering responsibility, Erasmas finds himself a major player in a drama that will determine the future of his world - as he sets out on an extraordinary odysset that will carry him to the most dangerous, inhospitable corners of the planet. . . and beyond.