The world has been infested with a fungus -the Job's BerryBush, that has driven mankind into a sealed environment. Anyone with who becomes contaminated with the fungus is sealed outside and left to die. The only hope - and this is where things get odd, is a project called the Pritcher Mass, a column of psychic energy, essentially a psionic telescope, built to find a planet where the human race can go to escape the blight.
Our hero is yet another sullen Dickson loner, who struggles to release his latent psychic talent, so he can go work on the Pritcher Mass project.
For those who like Phil Dick novels , this almost reads like one, and how Dickson tells this story like Dick, is not the way you would usually think a story like this would be told. It's that offbeat structure that gives the story it's charm.
It does get a little pat at the end, but there is serious ecological moral concern here on the part of the author, and the overall effect is moving. I'm just tuning in to the fact that Dickson's primary concerns in his work are largely moral -almost on the level of CS Lewis' work..
Did I mention there are witches and warlocks in this novel? And talking Tasmanian Devil familiars.You get your money's worth.
*** ( )