Since the dreaded Xik destroyed Earth, the corps of Beast Masters and the animal teams with which they have telepathic rapport have served as sentinels against the Xik and other threats to colony worlds throughout the galaxy.
Now a conspiracy with ties to the Thieves Guild is trying to kidnap the Beast Masters' team animals. On one world after another, they are attacking Beast Masters and targeting their animals, leaving a trail of dead or wounded Beast Masters and their animals in their wake. They haven't yet succeeded in capturing one alive . . . but they are still trying, and they're becoming more desperate---and bolder.
Laris is a young woman who works for a spacefaring circus, a bonded slave to its manager. An orphan with a troubled past, Laris is gifted with animals, a valuable asset to the circus and to her boss. But she's learned that somehow there's a connection between him and the Thieves Guild, and also the attempted abductions of Beast Masters' animals. She also knows that if her boss finds out what she has discovered, it would make her a problem, and he usually disposes of problems.
When the circus lands on Arzor, home to Beast Masters Hosteen and Tani Storm, Laris feels a kinship to them and to Hosteen's family, the Quades. She realizes, however, that she may be endangering them by exposing them to the dark interest of her boss and his ill-intentioned friends. Hosteen and Tani like Laris, too, as does Logan Quade. She would give anything to tell them her dangerous secret, but cannot. Because she knows that her friendship with the Beast Masters could be their downfall, as well as her own!
From Publishers Weekly
Telepathic beasts and the efforts of Laris, a young animal trainer, to escape her bondage to Dedran, a greedy Circus Master, add intrigue to this latest installment of Norton and McConchie's Beast Master series (Beast Master's Arc, etc.). Laris, an orphan and hardworking refugee, loves the creatures she cares for as much as she hates Dedran, who "owns" her until she can earn enough credits to buy her freedom. Fortunately, on the space-traveling freighter The Queen of the Circus and during its stops on various planets, she develops a special telepathic bond with Prauo, a big alien cat who joins her, along with Cregar, another unhappy circus employee, in trying to thwart Dedran's nefarious plan to assist fellow Thieves Guild Members in stealing and cloning gifted beasts. This big top of the future includes illegally obtained "tigerbats" and rare Terran dogs, as well as two colorful crooks, Ideena and Baris, who manage to infuse the somewhat stale plot with much-needed humor. The hints regarding Laris's true identity may be a bit too obvious for more clever readers, while older SF/fantasy fans will likely find the story too tame. Still, animal-loving young adults should be well satisfied.
Copyright Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
From Booklist
Some 50 years ago, Norton created Hosteen Storm, a beast master of Native American ancestry. A former soldier able to communicate with a team of animals, Storm now lives with his family on the planet Arzor, where he and his team protect the land and its residents. When a circus featuring exotic animals visits Arzor, the Storm family meets Laris, a young woman who performs exciting feats with a number of alien species. But Laris is bonded to the circus master, Dendran, who has ties to the interstellar Thieves Guild. At about the same time, word arrives of murders of beast masters on other planets and the loss of their teams. With McConchie's collaboration, Norton adds another fine tale to her long list of good stories with enthralling characters, one that can be enjoyed as much by those who are just encountering her work as by those who have read her with pleasure for half a century. Frieda Murray
Copyright American Library Association. All rights reserved
Library : Fantasy
Universes : Beast Master [02]
Formats : EPUB
ISBN : 9780765340108