The Lamp Pullers

About this book

For four hundred years the Settled Reach has depended on lamps: beacons that let ships throw themselves between stars along ancient Lanes. The Office of the Chart says the Lanes are dying, and every few years it pulls another lamp and seals another system for good. The tender Halfpenny has done that work thirty-one times. Calder is meant to be the thirty-second, and her master's last. Then a voice from Calder's frozen moon asks them to wait. Five people tell the story, out of order: the master, the young engineer, the cook who was evacuated as a child, the Office witness whose signature declares a system empty, and the old keeper who refused to leave. Five months later, at an inquiry on Hesper, two of them are under oath and the Halfpenny is gone. Who decides how big the universe is?