The Last Hour of Gann

All of R. Lee Smith’s novels are dark, explicit, and fascinating, but my favorite (and it was a Sophie’s Choice, for sure!) is The Last Hour of Gann. The heroine, Amber, and her spaceship full of fellow pioneers crash land on a dystopian alien world inhabited by lizard people. The humans are woefully unprepared to survive in the wild and all too willing to turn on one another. When a passing lizard/warrior/judge, Meoraq, stumbles upon their camp, Amber jumps at the opportunity to beg for his aid, a near-impossible task without knowing his language. Together, they learn to communicate,… show more.

Is this a book about a human woman and a space lizard? Absolutely. Put that aside and immerse yourself in the magnificence that is The Last Hour of Gann. This is a world unlike any I’ve read before. It’s post-apocalyptic, brutal, complex, and yet deeply devout. It’s a world that not only shapes the characters but shapes the way they learn to love each other. It’s an ugly world, and they are initially ugly to each other. But it’s also a world that’s finally beginning to bloom again after a great catastrophe, and that opens the way for the… show more.