"Tom Williams - Terra Nova" - читать интересную книгу автора (Williams Tom)

-Terra Nova-
By Tom Williams
"And though mine arm should conquer twenty worlds,
There's a lean fellow beats all conquerors,"
-- Thomas Dekker
Published by Awe-Struck E-Books
Copyright ©1999 Thomas Williams
ISBN: 1-928670-56-3
Table of Contents
Prologue Chapter One Chapter Two
Chapter Three Chapter Four Chapter Five
Chapter Six Chapter Seven Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine Chapter Ten Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve Chapter Thirteen Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen Chapter Sixteen Chapter Seventeen
Chapter Eighteen Chapter Nineteen Chapter Twenty
Chapter Twenty-One Chapter Twenty-Two Chapter Twenty-Three
Chapter Twenty-Four Chapter Twenty-Five Chapter Twenty-Six
Chapter Twenty-Seven Chapter Twenty-Eight Chapter Twenty-Nine
Cast of Characters Weights and Measures Terra Novan Terms
Imperial Terms Nations of Terra Nova
PROLOGUE: THE WINDS OF CHANGE
After the winds of change had swept across Earth in the period around the beginning of the third
millennium, the path was clear to a new world order.

Not too far into the twenty-first century, virtually all war ceased. A small part of the reason for this was
that international relationships had improved; mostly, however, it was due to the increasing effort required
by individual nations to feed and maintain rising domestic populations.

The environmental destruction characteristic of the twentieth century had largely ceased, but the damage,
some of it irreparable, was already done. It was some time before the technology and resources existed
to both feed the world's enormous population and undo some of the ruin humanity had inflicted on the
Earth.

When problems eased as populations adjusted to prevailing circumstances, it would have been easy for
humanity to regress into barbarity. But people all over the planet realized the senselessness in returning to
the old ways, realized how much better life was when resources were squandered not on the materiel of
warfare but on more worthwhile things. Moderate parties -- espousing humanist and Green policies --
were elected in an increasing number of nations.

Of course, some nations (or, more accurately, their leaders and policy- makers) did wish to go back to
the twentieth century's methods, still dealt harshly with their neighbors -- whether by military or subtler
methods, such as economic or trade embargoes and restrictions. But the more moderate nations created
multinational military juggernauts or economic unions to compel the aggressors to back down -- in effect
using their own weapons against them -- or scattered them to the winds.

Towards the middle of the twenty-first century, after a series of not inconsequential obstacles had been
overcome, a planetary government was formed, its first elected leader, President Moses Appleton. The
world parliament was based, in theory at least, in Zurich, but the two hundred senators representing each
of the old nations were rarely actually present in the European city: it was far easier for them to vote