Flux (novel)

Infobox Book
name = Flux
title_orig =
translator =


author = Stephen Baxter
cover_artist =
country = Great Britain
language = English
series = Xeelee Sequence
genre = Science fiction
publisher = Voyager (UK)
release_date = 3 December 1993
media_type = Print (Paperback)
pages =
size_weight =
isbn = ISBN 0-00-224025-4
preceded_by = Timelike Infinity
followed_by = Ring

"Flux" is a 1993 science fiction novel by British author Stephen Baxter. It is the third book in Baxter's Xeelee Sequence.

Plot Introduction

Dura and her fellow human beings live inside a neutron star, as they have for generations. As long as they can remember, "glitches" (instabilities of the magnetic field inside the star caused by changes in the star's rotation) have happened from time to time. As the novel starts, the worst glitch that anyone can remember threatens to destroy her home. In order to survive, Dura must travel to a far off city, and eventually outside of the star itself.

Explanation of the novel's title

"Flux" is so called as the main race featured, microscopic human-like beings who live within a star, travel around by manipulation of the magnetic field lines within that star. It also relates to a major element of the plot, dealing with instabilities in this field which affect many characters in different ways.

Plot Summary

As the novel begins, a glitch - an instability of the magnetic field inside the star caused by changes in the star's rotation - is about to destroy a net made up of ropes, where a group of 50 humans live. During this several of the older humans are killed, and importantly the humans lose their primary food source - a herd of "air pigs" - animals indigenous to the star.

In order to find more food, Dura, together with her young brother Farr, Adda (the oldest of the Humans and one of the novel's main characters), Philas (wife of a man killed during the glitch, this man was also seeing Dura) and 6 other adults travel high into the top of the mantle of the star to find food in the forest.

Whilst there Adda is injured by a pregnant sow air pig. Just after, the humans encounter Toba Mixxax, a human from Parz City. Parz is a massive wooden city where other star humans live, with a functioning economy and upper and lower classes etc. As becomes apparent, the ancestors of Dura's group did originally live in Parz, but left when their belief that the Xeelee should ultimately be accepted as being for the good of humanity was not accepted by the rulers of Parz. A hospital, "The Hospital of the Common Good" in the heart of Parz City is Adda's only chance for survival.

While in Parz, we meet several other characters: Muub, the head physician and advisor to Hork, the administrator of Parz. In order to pay for Adda's treatment, Dura's labour is sold to a "mantle farm" (where trees are harvested for use as fuel or as building blocks for the city), and Farr is sold to work in the underbelly of the city.

Farr makes two friends whilst here: Toba Mixxax's son Criss and Byza, a fellow miner. Criss teaches Farr to board (using a specially constructed plate to "surf" along the flux lines), an ability which allows him to escape from the eventual attack by the Xeelee.

After various plot points, the characters realise the instabilities are actually being caused by the attack of the "Xeelee", and the next instability could destroy both Parz and possibly the star itself. Hork calls a combination of Muub, Dura (called due to her experience as a star human), Adda, Farr and a scientist to go down into the inhabitable centre of the star and try and retrieve ancient weapons, supposedly left by the humans who originally created the star human race.

Characters in "Flux"

*Dura – protagonist
*Farr – brother to Dura
*Adda – The character with the oldest memories
*Philas – The 3rd in a love triangle berween Dura and Philas's husband
*Muub – the head physician
*Hork – the administrator of Parz
*Toba Mixxax – farmer, and saviour of Dura's band of humans
*Cris Mixxax – Toba's son; friend of Farr