num_pages: 328
description: High Crimes Call for High PunishmentIt is the twenty-first century. Convicts are sentenced to asteroids that move in ever-widening solar orbits, timed to return when their terms run out. But a few ambitious administrators discover that small "errors" in velocity can rid them of selected groups altogether: the hardcore violent, the mentally defective, and especially the political dissidents. Enduring the black vise of interstellar space-time, these human rejects--men and women mixed together--create their own Darwinian societies, struggling to survive.Back on Earth, a handful of sympathetic and curious scientists have not forgotten these lost citizens. When a technological breakthrough makes it possible to overtake these scattered asteroids, a courageous team sets out to go where none has willingly gone before. What they discover in these "brute orbits" is both provocative and moving--a startling vision of humanity you will never forget.
language: English
title: Brute Orbits
titlecomplete: Brute Orbits
genres: Science Fiction, Fiction
ratings_count: 106
awards: awardedAt: 915177600000
name: John W. Campbell Memorial Award
category: Best Science Fiction Novel
publisher: HarperPrism