All-too-brief medium-future yarn centering on war and brain chemistry, from the author of the fine Stations of the Tide (1990), etc. Gunther Weil is just an ordinary lunar engineer, until a nuclear exchange on Earth spreads conflict to the Moon. The sublunar factory town of Bootstrap is cut off, its inhabitants rendered psychotic through brain chemicals released into the air by a saboteur; only those wearing space suits escape. Gunther's lover, Ekatarina, organizes the survivors along traditional lines, to growing resentment, until Gunther discovers that a range of new brain chemicals has been developed: Not only can the psychotics be cured, but stable personalities can be amended and improved on as a form of mental evolution. Ekatarina resists, and Gunther is forced to shoot her. Absorbing and realistic, packed with provocative ideas that deserve a more thoroughgoing workout than they get here.
