Iron Sunrise

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Iron Sunrise is a hard science fiction novel by author Charles Stross, which follows the events in Singularity Sky. The book was nominated for the 2005 Hugo Award for Best Novel.

Singularity Sky depicts a future where human societies have been involuntarily taken from Earth and widely distributed across the galaxy, seemingly at random, in the wake of a technological singularity which has led to the onset of strong AI, in the form of the Eschaton.

The events in both novels take place consecutively some time after the immediate aftermath of the singularity.

[edit] Plot summary

Martin Springfield and Rachel Mansour return to Earth to recuperate following the events of Singularity Sky, however Rachel is quickly called upon to explain the administrative expenses she incurred during her previous assignment. Shortly thereafter she finds herself negotiating with a lunatic believing himself to be a reincarnation of Idi Amin and in possession of an armed nuclear device which, in the black humor typical of the series, he has threatened to detonate after receiving an eviction notice from his apartment.

Meanwhile, a young and hopeful planetary civilization is murdered by the apparent use of a causality violation device which explodes their sun without warning, and their defense systems are automatically deployed against the homeworld of the suspected perpetrators of the atrocity.

Rachel and Martin set off to investigate these events and prevent the assassination of the remaining members of the civilization's murdered leaders, who can abort the retaliation strike. In the background the Eschaton continues to play its own game.