Brother to Jackals

LeRoy Parkin had a secret: a project to raise the intelligence of chimpanzees, gorillas, orangutans, and baboons to human levels. Some would say that wasn't a very high bar. Fifteen years after he began, plagues – preventable but not prevented – broke the world, killing over 99% of the world's human population. Parkin survived, moving his team and the animals to a secure island for the duration of what would become known as the Die-Back. Fifty years later, the Die-Back ended with the Restoration of the United States. The remaining humans nervously focused on recovery, trying to keep at bay old fears and prejudices long discarded in favor of survival. Parkin, now an aging patriarch, left the apes on the island and restarted LifeWorks on the mainland. After two decades, they have had some success.But three years ago, the apes began discussing who they were, what they wanted, and what they should do next. Today, they've made the decision.In this first volume of a post-apocalyptic science fiction trilogy, author Steven Popkes reminds us of the connections that both sustain and endanger humanity and the world around us. Steven Popkes lives in Massachusetts on two acres of land where he and his wife garden, grow bananas and breed turtles. His day job consists of writing support software for space and ballistic systems. He insists he is not a rocket scientist. He is a rocket engineer.

One night with reporter Tamar Longren changes everything. Exposed to the world, gorilla Lethias becomes an overnight sensation-and a political weapon. The Oregon Initiative would make his existence illegal. Religious zealot and presidential candidate Melissa Adenour brands him abomination incarnate. Thrust onto the campaign trail for incumbent President Shuman, Lethias discovers that politics is a blood sport and love more dangerous still. Between rallies and speeches, an impossible dialogue emerges across the divide-two people speaking to each other through the words they give their candidates, a conversation disguised as combat where every phrase carries the weight of desire and betrayal. On their hidden island, the ape colony's situation grows desperate. Marcus arms the apes with guns, preparing for the war he's certain is coming. But in the island interior, in Women's Country, scientist Carroll Sims and gorilla Jefferson are conducting experiments that could change everything and could save them or destroy them. As the presidential race reaches fever pitch and violence erupts at campaign events, Lethias must navigate a landscape where his celebrity has made him a target, where political forces spiral beyond anyone's control, and where Tamar crafts the very words used against him. The question isn't whether the world will discover the breeding colony. The question is what the apes will become before it does. Women's Country expands the hard SF concepts of the mind-bending Cori Field Equations while diving deep into the brutal machinery of American politics, exploring what it means to be human when humanity itself is no longer alone. Steven Popkes lives in Massachusetts on two acres of land where he and his wife garden, grow bananas and breed turtles. His day job consists of writing support software for space and ballistic systems. He insists he is not a rocket scientist. He is a rocket engineer.