CUSP

CUSP, Robert A. Metzger, Ace Books, 2005

Set in the near future, one day, the Sun throws off a solar flare of record-setting proportions. The Sun actually moves a million kilometers farther away from the Earth, because the solar flare is really a giant jet engine.

Meantime, on Earth, two planet-spanning rings come out of the ground. Many kilometers high and wide, one ring circles the Earth at the Equator, while the North-South ring cuts through eastern North America. Earth's climate is drastically altered, governments fall and millions die. The rings spout huge jet engines, which occasionally test fire. Who could be behind this, and where are the Sun and Earth going?

The destination might be the Sun's nearest neighbor, Alpha Centauri. The first unmanned probe to the system shows an amazing sight: over 200 planets orbiting the star, all at approximately the same distance from the star. Is it possible for the Sun to protect the Earth from space junk during the journey? The answer might have something to do with who is living in an artificial habitat inside the Martian moon, Phobos, which returns to Earth and lands in Alabama. Perhaps the asteroid that hit Earth 65 million years ago, and led to the extinction of the dinosaurs, was not exactly a random cosmic event. Also, CUSP is the newest thing in supercomputers, which gets a chance to interface with the ultimate supercomputer - the human mind.

I hated to reach the end of this book. It has a really interesting story, and enough mind-blowing ideas for half a dozen novels. This is what great science fiction is all about.