A Dumarest of Terra novel. In which our stalwart- almost superheroic man is fleeing the Cyclad and searching for Earth as always. This time the Cyclad has hired a professional hunter to capture him. And once again the spaceship is disables and crashes on an inhospitable planet.
There should be a general notice for all space captains to keep them from permitting him on their ship- it never ends well.

read 9/13/2023 ( )

Another cyber, another space ship crash, more death, another betrayal, a beautiful competent woman, new alien creature peril...this time a version of shark while adrift on salt water. Rescue coming in a strange form and Dumarest shows mercy to a deadly enemy. Only hanging chad for me was the boy he refused a ride from a horrific planet because it would mean his death...when the reader knows full well the next handler will take his money and he will die. I wanted someone to offer the boy a place for less money. Unrealistic but it stuck with me right through...the fate of the boy. ( )

In The Quillian Sector, Dumarest finds himself in the titular neighborhood in space - supposedly known for its many unpredictable factors. Those factors don't really play into the story much, though. In it, the Cyclan (cyborgs who are after Dumarest cause he knows some of their secrets) have hired a famous and cruel hunter to find Dumarest. Meanwhile, Dumarest has found work as a gambling manager on a passenger ship. Of course, yet another lovely woman, this one the ship's engineer, finds herself besotted with Dumarest. ( )

This novel is #19 in a series of novels in which Earl Dumarest seeks to find and return to Earth, the planet of his birth. The Cyclan attempt to thwart him. The Cyclan are an organization of Cybers, men who were altered at puberty to become emotionless highly skilled human machines. Despite their singular and group intelligence and powers of prediction they have repeatedly been unable to capture Earl Dumarest. Earl has knowledge of the Cyclan that they want to retrieve and do not want shared. In this novel, "The Quillian Sector", Earl Dumarest has hidden himself amidst a dense section of stars and planets and the Cyclan's ability to find him is muddled. The radiation within the Quillian Sector causes violent and odd behaviour as well.

The Cyclan hire a trained hunter, Leo Bochner, to find and capture Dumarest. Unknown to Bochner, the Cyclan have implanted a tracker in him to monitor his location and assure his loyalty. No one escapes the control of the Cyclan and they can remotely explode the tracking device. Bochner tracks Dumarest enough to find the ship he is working on and joins it. Unfortunately a crewmember upset over the attentions a female crewmember gives Dumarest instead of himself sabotages the engines of the ship. This results in a crash on a remote planet and supplies some of the more exciting parts to the story. Eventually a few of the survivors are able to erect a makeshift emergency beacon, and who arrives to rescue them? Cyber Caradoc, the one who hired Bochner to track Dumarest. A fight erupts and Dumarest manages to escape the clutches of the Cyclan. He leaves Bochner with the wounded Caradoc, not wanting to kill those who faciliated his rescue.

This turned out to be a modestly entertaining adventure in the series, with Bochner and Dumarest at first hunter and prey, but becoming almost allies. However I found myself somewhat disappointed overall. I really didn't get caught up in this adventure. It has been a while since I've read a Dumarest adventure, but this one didn't seem to be up to the higher standard of many in the series, and predictably followed the formula for adventure established in earlier books. ( )