C.J. Ryan, The Fifth Quadrant

The Fifth Quadrant

C.J. Ryan

Bantam, October 2006, $6.99

ISBN: 0553589023

In the thirty-third century, Gloria Vandeen is the most beautiful and popular woman in the Empire. The intelligent female heads the Department of Extraterrestrial Affairs, Office of Strategic Affairs. The leaders of the four quadrants that make up DEXTA are determined to shut down Gloria and her cell, but she is resolute, planning to defeat them at their game. Her ex-husband the Emperor Charles V needs an heir and wants to remarry her so that he can have her and children.

Gloria investigates the recent use of plasma weapons in Quadrant Four that are traced to a shipment of armaments that were shipped there decades ago in anticipation of the onset of a war with the Ch'ignith. Obviously the weapons never made it there, and they are being used on the planet New Cambride where a DEXTRA conference is convened. Intelligence reports that there is a high degree of certainty that a plasma bomb is on the planet with a capability of eradicating the entire world. Gloria and her team take the threat seriously as they search to find the weapon of mass destruction to disable it before the catastrophe occurs.

Gloria is an intelligent sexy woman, who in her offbeat charming manner defuses many crisis on various planets before they go into hostile overdrive. She uses her perfect looks as a weapon to fool her enemies, who assume she is a dingbat, even though she always gets what she wants, mostly with out of the box logic and solutions. THE FIFTH QUADRANT is an erotic fun filled futuristic science fiction thriller that takes readers on an epic adventure, guided by a delightful one-of-a-kind heroine.