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[malabar]

The classic trilogy of the world that is a wheel, the wheel that is a god, and the god that is Gaea.

The first book appeared in 1979; the second in 1980; and the third in 1984. The books chronicle humanity's encounter with a living being in the shape of a 1300-km diameter space habitat orbiting Saturn. The whole entity is known as Gaea, and many species live all through it, in the most inhospitable conditions.

The first book introduces an anomaly in Saturn's orbit found by the crew of the DSV Ringmaster, on their way to study that ringed planet. It turns out to be a strange, doughnut-shaped satellite, flat black on the outside. As they approach it, tentacles emerge and snag it, pulling into the satellite and destroying the ship in the process.

The crew - Cirocco Jones, the tall woman commander, astronomer Gaby Plauget, the clone twin physicists April and August Polo, pilot Eugene Springfield, physician Calvin Greene and engineer Bill (whose last name is never given) - are put into a state of suspended animation. When they awake, they are stranded in a world they are completely unprepared for, without their ship, food, or even clothing. They are in the grip of a vast and capricious power...

In the second book, Wizard, some seventy-five years have passed. Gaby and Cirocco are still in Gaea, serving as general liaisons among the various species. Gaea has decided to make herself indispensable to humanity by offering miracle cures to people on earth who manage to meet her seemingly random criteria. Two who do are Chris Major, suffering a bizarre neurological disease that, strangely, makes him luckier; and Robin of the Coven, a young witch from an isolated space colony with a gravity-induced epilepsy. They both join up with Cirocco and Gaby on a trip around the rim of Gaea, hoping to do something worthy of Gaea's notice and a cure. But the trip isn't all it seems...

The last book, Demon, set 13-21 years after Wizard, sees Gaea's becoming a refuge for thousands of refugees from earth's nuclear war. Chris Major stayed in Gaea, but Robin returned to her people and eventually gave birth to a daughter, Nova, and a son, Adam. Both are Chris's children, by a trick of Gaea's. Adam is kidnapped by the now ravingly insane Gaea (she has incarnated at a 50-foot tall Marilyn Monroe) and much of Demon concerns the fight to get him back and to overthrow Gaea.

Wow, it was hard to avoid spoilers in that lot, but I think I've managed. As much as the previous book I reviewed didn't stand up to repeat reading, these are much-loved and oft-revisited members of my library. I loved them when I was a teenager and I still love them now. The characters are great, the tone is tongue-in-cheek, and the scope is amazing. Among the very best.