The greatest Sci-fi sagas ask is there anyone out there and how do they live and exist. In towards the unMaking of Heaven, Sam Smith takes us to one of these places, where humans are not necessarily the dominant species and first steps of life are emerging from wherever it desires. Balant is book one in a series of five. Each book is intricately linked and delves deeper into what is known as the Supreme Civilisation, until the ultimate drawing together in the finale. Balant, has Dag Olvess, Malamud Bey and Pi Pandy marooned on the edge of the universe. Narrator is the priggish Pi Pandy. En route from his mother's substation to university in another galaxy, the ship he was travelling upon encountered a storm of cosmic proportions. The ship about to implode, he escaped in the ship's shuttle with two other young men, Malamud Bey and Dag Olvess. They end up on the planet, Balant, where they adapt to life in a cave, and then come across ancient robots, savages, slave traders, the Nautili.

You Human: The Leander Chronicle is the dark core, the gravitational mass of the quintet, towards the unMaking of Heaven. Within You Human genetic manipulation and genocide will be encountered, sexual obsession/gratification and the nature of love will be explored. You Human is the book towards which the first two books, Balant and Happiness, led; and spinning off from its gravitational mass will be the final two books, Not Now: Death, Dreams and Reasons for Living and finally the unMaking of Heaven.

An SF exploration of desire, dreams and self-deceit. Okinwe Orbinson is recruited from his artificial city world--part of a moribund space civilisation--his mission is to save a rumoured hybrid-human race, Talkers, from self-extinction. Talkers are telepathic, and individual suicides among the Talkers are becoming epidemic. Left on one of their planets Okinwe is witness to 3 suicides in quick succession. Suspicious of all around him, doubting himself, not knowing if his thoughts are his own, he becomes friends with a Talker woman, worries for her safety and falls in love with her daughter. Their love affair is not easy. Nor is the solution to the suicides.

In this the fifth and final book of the series all the characters are post-organic beings, minds become machines, calling themselves Synths or Eternals. Some Synths - led by the Shining Knight - decide that all Synths, including Sexthetes and Puzzlers, are Abominations, themselves included, and they set out to destroy them all. The survivors are those who hid. As initially did the Shining Knight.

towards the unMaking of Heaven, Happiness: A Planet, is the second novel in a series of five. All five novels can be read and understood independently of the others. Where the first book was about 3 young men being marooned on the planet Balant, this installment is about a planet that finds its moon has gone missing. This story is told in the third person from the viewpoint of its many different characters. At the same time that the moon disappeared all radio communication to and from that planet was blocked. Within Space only farmers and cranks live on planets. An unseen force destroys any craft that tries to leave the planet, except the one Space police ship. During the investigation into the missing moon, and its consequences, the principal one of which is the building of a road though mountainous terrain for the convenience of Nautili, there are 2 love affairs and many considerations upon the nature of government and society.

George Orwell was one of the most significant literary figures on the left in the twentieth century. While titles such as 1984, Animal Farm and Homage to Catalonia are still rightly regarded as modern classics, his own politics are less well understood.Hope Lies in the Proles offers a sympathetic yet critical account of Orwell's political thinking and its continued significance today. John Newsinger explores various aspects of Orwell's politics, detailing Orwell's attempts to change working-class consciousness, considering whether his attitude towards the working class was romantic, realistic or patronising - or all three at different times. He also asks whether Orwell's anti-fascism was eclipsed by his criticism of the Soviet Union, and explores his ambivalent relationship with the Labour Party. Newsinger also breaks important new ground regarding Orwell's shifting views on the USA, and his relationship with the New Left and feminism.Focusing on the enduring interest in Orwell and his influence on current political causes, the book is ultimately a unique, nuanced attempt to demonstrate that Orwell remained a committed socialist up until his death.

This book examines some of the ways in which sexuality has been described and interpreted in the West. The main models examined are: the Christian view of sex as sinful; the psychoanalytical model, including such notions as the sexual drive, infantile sexuality, the Oedipus complex, and the distinction between male and female sexuality; the 'social construction' model, which proposes that 'sexuality' is a modern concept; and the links between sexuality and spirituality. There is also some consideration of feminist and gay approaches to sexuality, and the complicated subject of male sexuality.