EARTH MADE OF GLASS, by JOHN BARNES

In the 24th century man has created over a thousand new cultures in space, most of them artificial, idealized recreations of extinct Earth ones. Almost all the good real estate is gone, and new cultures battle for marginally habitable worlds. One of these is Briand, with heavy gravity, extreme heat, and a poisonous atmosphere. The only land masses available are Greenland sized islands which rise up into breathable air.

But the real hellishness of Briand is not its climate, it's the ethnic violence of its two cultures, the resurrected pseudo “Maya” and the poet culture of the Tamil.Although the two cultures are viciously opposed, they have each created beautiful cities. It's as though Bosnians built the Sun Palace, and the Serbs the Taj Mahal. A volcanic explosion has destroyed most of the Maya space and they are wedged into part of the largest Tamil city; acts of violence are more common here than in any other inhabited world

Into this volatile situation come Giraut and Margaret Leones, career diplomats who struggle to keep the planet from wrenching apart into outright war. They soak up each culture and entreat each side to seek peace. Margaret and Giraut's marriage is similarly being wrenched apart and neither can communicate with each other. As the Science Fiction Chronicle wrote, “the ending is both surprising and unsurprising, and to understand that paradox you'll have to read this exciting novel for yourself.” The novel is achingly beautiful and one which will remain with me for a long time.