New York: TOR / Tom Doherty Associates, (2005) dj. Hardcover - A first encounter novel - "A colony ship full of genetically enhanced posthumans reaches its destination only to discover that the planet is populated by batlike people at a primitive stage of technology just short of an electronic age. After millennia of expansion throughout the galaxy without having encountered another intelligent race, humans had come to think it impossible; for their part, the bat people have always thought that space aliens could exist only in engineering tales. The novel unfolds over several years through the alternating stories of two young people." (Library Journal) 303 pp. ISBN: 0-765313316.