Aliens calling themsleves "The People" are fighting a doomed battle against environmental devestation on their homeworld. In desperation, they search for a new planet. They find a perfect candidate -- Venus. However, there are deep political disagreements about how to proceed with colonization.

Humans have established a colony that floats through the Venusian atmosphere. It is home to almost 10,000 people, but it is facing economic collapse as political pressure mounts back on Earth.

Inevitably, the two groups collide. However, there is nothing cliched about this story. Zettel's approach to the aliens' culture, politics and biology is fascinating and very "real" feeling. The interaction between the humans and aliens political problems is fascinating. The end of the story is surprising, original and heart-breaking.

All in all, this is great work. My one tiny gripe has to do with the shifting motivation of one of the main characters -- she appears ignorant of an important fact about half way through the book, but later the reader learns that she was aware of that fact all along. This shift allows Zettel to tie the story up nicely, but it continues to nag at me.