Soothsayer

Rescuing a little girl in trouble sets the thief, Mouse's, life on wild ride. Penelope is a seer, able to see all possible outcomes resulting from the choices that lie a few seconds ahead of her. This makes her valuable, dangerous and in danger. Leaving behind her mentor, Merlin, Mouse takes the girl on an intergalactic quest for safety from the bounty hunters who want her dead or imprisoned. With the help of the Forever Kid, an Immortal who seeks to either die or see others to their deaths, the young woman and child stay one step ahead of danger, until a desperate gamble takes a bad turn that forces Mouse to make a choice she never anticipated. *** With surprising twists, Mr. Resnick presents his readers with a true moral dilema that will make them think. More in depth characterization would have made this a more fascinating novel; nonetheless, it is thought provoking and disturbing. *** Reviewed by Amanda Killgore, Freelance Reviewer.

Keerdin obviously doesn't know the difference between first person and third person. The book is written almost entirely from the third person point of view. I have some minor quibbles with the plot, and an over usage of the word "sardonic", but overall this is an very good book.

This is a wonderful book, it's a shame that the ratings on this site suffered because someone gave it one star because he couldn't read the book due to some technical problem. Hello? We are reviewing _the book_, not the media / software / hardware, or whatever! I thought the characterizations in this book is terrific, there are so many interesting characters here, like Mouse, the Iceman, The Forever Kid etc. There's a bit of western mixed in to all the SF stuff, which is fun if done right, and Mike Resnick did a brilliant job. The book has everything, interesting plot, action, adventure, romance (only a little bit), betrayal, tragedy. The main character's very unusual form of precognition makes her more interesting than any other fictional psychics I have read about, she can see a lot of alternative futures and take action so a desired one come to pass, that means she can practically make her own universe!It's a crime that the publishers ever let this book go out of print (in paper format).

I was a fan of Mick Resnick well before I picked up Soothsayer, but this was one I just couldn't put down. His style reminds me very much or Heinlein because neither the topics, nor the situations are forced. Even as far fetched as sci-fi is by it's nature Resnick paints such a vivid scene with every word that I found myself falling into the plot.

I had never heard of Mr. Resnick until I found five of his books in a library sale. Now he is one of my favorite authors. Penelope Bailey is one of the most intriguing characters I have encountered in all of fiction. I loved the colorful characters: The Forever Kid, the Iceman, the Mock Turtle, etc. The only problem with the book , is it is to short, and the characters could have stayed around longer.