The End of the Matter

Series Flinx of the Commonwealth
Illustrator Tim White
Author Alan Dean Foster
Year 1979 (first published 1977)
Publisher New English Library/Ballantine
ISBN 0-450-04304-5

Three entire planets are about to vanish and the Commonwealth’s scientists can do nothing to save
them.

The disappearance of several small spaceships has proven the existence of a vast collapsar, an all-devouring black hole that is carving its way across the Galaxy. To evacuate the three planets in its course would be impossible. To stop such an incomprehensible astronomical force is not even worth contemplating.

There is a slim chance, a remote possibility that the key to survival lies with a strange and seemingly insane creature named Ab that Flinx adopts as his pet. No one knows or understands what Ab is or what powers he has. All Flinx knows is that he is suddenly very important — and with a death sentence on his head, he could soon be very dead.

Following THE TAR-AIYM KRANG and ORPHAN STAR THE END OF THE MATTER is the third book in Alan Dean Foster’s brilliant sequence featuring Flinx of the Commonwealth.

The End of the Matter available on Amazon

Thanks to Still Books for the cover

“Nor Crystal Tears” Michael Whelan

The Art of Michael Whelan

Nor Crystal Tears

Illustrator Michael Whelan
Author Alan Dean Foster
Year 1982
Publisher Del Ray/Ballantine
ISBN 0-345-29141-7

In The Beginning…

Before Man and insectlike Thranx had become allies, when the reptilian AAnn were just occasional raiders of Thranx colony worlds, one young Thranx agricultural expert lived a life of quiet desperation.

A dreamer in a world of sensible, stable beings, Ryo buried himself in his work—reclaiming marshland from a tenacious jungle—until he came across a letter describing a relatives encounter with horrid, two-legged, soft-skinned space-going beasts…