Popular American tales of alien invasion typically depict the contentious nations of the world recognizing the threat and uniting despite their differences to defeat the unearthly foe Thompson is far too canny about how even an alternate version of our planet really works politically to throw such a corny show our way. And Oyin Da, the enigmatic time-traveling woman also known as Bicycle Girl, learns some troubling truths about herself as she searches for a way to undermine the aliens and ensure humanity’s survival. Meanwhile, Femi Alaagomeji, once the head of the Nigerian intelligence agency S45, works to counter the Homian threat, enlisting her former operative Kaaro, the cowardly but powerful psychic who is sensitive to her cause even while his girlfriend, Aminat, another ex–S45 agent, feels frustrated in her current position as Rosewater’s head of security. Tensions in Rosewater rise still higher as criminal twins and rivals Taiwo and Kehinde engage in violent turf wars and the mayor legalizes gay marriage in what is still a very homophobic population. Worse still, Hannah Jacques, a lawyer and the wife of Rosewater’s mayor (who struck the deal with the Homians), publicly reveals that reanimates are capable of recovering their memories and cognitive facilities. But some Homians are trying to speed up the process through a series of mass murders. Unbeknownst to most, this is the beginning of a gradual takeover of Earth by the Homians. In an alternate near future, the threat of an alien invasion looms ever closer in the city-state of Rosewater, the surrounding nation of Nigeria, and, ultimately, all of Earth.Īs per the agreement set in the previous Wormwood novel ( The Rosewater Insurrection, 2019), the alien Homians have begun mentally occupying reanimates, apparently mindless fresh human corpses healed and revived by Homian technology.

The rosewater redemption