´Thrilling, terrifying and fascinating´ Tim Peake, British ESA astronaut They looked into darkness. The darkness looked back . . . An utterly gripping story of survival and first contact on a hostile planet from Adrian Tchaikovsky, author of the Arthur C. Clarke Award-winning Children of Time. A commercial expedition to a distant star system discovers a pitch-black moon alive with radio activity. Its high-gravity, high-pressure, zero-oxygen environment is deadly to human life, but ripe for exploitation. They named it Shroud. Under no circumstances can a human survive Shroud´s inhospitable surface - but a catastrophic accident forces Juna Ceelander and Mai Ste Etienne to make an emergency landing in a barely adequate escape vehicle. Alone, and fighting for survival, the two women embark on a gruelling journey across land, sea and air in search of salvation. But as they travel, Juna and Mai begin to understand Shroud´s unnerving alien species. It also begins to understand them. If they escape Shroud, they´ll somehow have to explain the impossible and translate the incredible. That is, if they make it back at all . . . * * * Praise for Shroud ´Clever, vivid and terrifying . . . No one has an imagination like Adrian Tchaikovsky´ - Jim Al-Khalili, presenter of BBC Radio 4´s The Life Scientific ´Crunchy, conceptual SF at its best´ - Richard Morgan, author of Altered Carbon ´This is hard-edged science fiction that never loses its soul´ - Sue Burke, author of Semiosis ´Makes Andy Weir´s vision of Mars in The Martian look like a Caribbean beach resort´ - The Fantasy Hive