num_pages: 264
description: Alternate-cover edition can be found here Stephen Baxter's highly acclaimed first novel and the beginning of his stunning Xeelee Sequence. A spaceship from Earth accidentally crossed through a hole in space-time to a universe where the force of gravity is one billion times as strong as the gravity we know. Somehow the crew survived, aided by the fact that they emerged into a cloud of gas surrounding a black hole, which provided a breathable atmosphere. Five hundred years later, their descendants still struggle for existence, divided into two main groups. The Miners live on the Belt, a ramshackle ring of dwellings orbiting the core of a dead star, which they excavate for raw materials. These can be traded for food from the Raft, a structure built from the wreckage of the ship, on which a small group of scientists preserve the ancient knowledge which makes survival possible. Rees is a Miner whose curiosity about his world makes him stow away on a flying tree—just one of the many strange local lifeforms—carrying trade between the Belt and the Raft.
language: English
title: Raft
titlecomplete: Raft
genres: Fiction, Space Opera, Classics, Science Fiction Fantasy, Science Fiction, Hard Science Fiction, Collections, Space, Fantasy, Novels
ratings_count: 3974
series: Xeelee Sequence
awards: awardedAt: 694252800000
name: Arthur C. Clarke Award
publisher: Grafton Books