Women rule in Women's Country. Women live apart from men, sheltering the remains of civilization. They have cut themselves off with walls and by ordinance from marauding males. Waging war is all men are good for. Me are allowed to fight their barbaric battles.....amongst themselves, garrison against garrison. But all the secrets of civilisation are strictly in the possession of women. Naturally, there are men who want to know what the women know.....and when Stavia meets Chernon, the battle of the sexes begins all over again

Barbaric customs and bizarre human cults are preserved on the planet Elsewhere. The rest of the universe has been taken over by the Hobbs Land Gods, which means that everyone alive, except the people on Elsewhere, lives in perfect harmony with nature and with each other. But Elsewhere is ruled by computer-encrypted professors who have been dead for a thousand years. The professors were dedicated to maintaining human diversity. Their ancient analogs are dedicated to something infinitely more sinister. The time has come to consider whether enslavement by the Hobbs Land Gods is not preferable to the depravity being cultivated on Elsewhere.