Ghost Devices (novel)

Ghost Devices is the seventh Virgin Bernice Summerfield New Adventures novel. It is the first appearance of Clarence, a representative of the People who looks like an angel.

Publisher's summary
In the evening, when the sky was the colour of burnt umber, the factories crawled down the continental shelf to drink.

The Spire is an inhuman artefact, a construction almost three hundred miles high. But it is more than just a big dumb object. Those close to it can look into the future - a future which is going to be arriving sooner than they think, and which is as bad as can be.

In the here and now, Professor Bernice Summerfield, doyenne of twenty-sixth century archaeology and seedy space-port bars, is used to seeing strange things in her rooms. So it takes the unexpected arrival of an angel to get her away from increasingly desperate professional deadlines and off to investigate one of the seven hundred and seventy-six wonders of the galaxy.

However, Benny is not the only one interested in the Spire. A mysterious race of weaponsmiths, a mutogenic assassin and a sect of fanatically anti-religious reptiles all have their reasons for learning - or concealing - the structure's secrets. And, as she struggles to unlock this ancient mystery, it soon becomes clear that the life of an eccentric professor is of very little consequence indeed.

Chapter Titles
 Angels in Dirty Places Murder Must Advertise Dark and Stormy Light  Commerce and Visitations In Search of Ancient Astronauts Sailing to Bizarrum I Am The Assassin Doctor At Large</li> High Dungeon</li> You Can't Be Too Careful With Life</li> </ol> Nostradamus Was Right</li> Turing Tests</li> The Nuclear Way To Universal Peace And Brotherhood</li> Mystery Under The Sea</li> Ah Ha!</li> When I Say Run, Run Like Rabbits</li> Up, Up and Away!</li> There Was Death From The Beginning To The End Of Time</li> Cover Stories</li> Kill The Dog On Sunday</li> </ol>
 * Prologue: Necessary But Insufficient Causes
 * Interlude: The Big, Big Picture
 * Interlude
 * Interlude: The Future
 * Epilogue

Plot
to be added

Characters

 * Bernice Summerfield
 * Clarence
 * Factory 34561239
 * The Air Vent

Individuals

 * Bernice Summerfield takes on the job of investigating the Spire for God for the payment of her second novel, written by a virtual construction of herself created by God (who incidentally didn’t finish that book either).
 * Bernice is unable to cope with her role in the temporal paradox. She overdoses on tranquilliser pills, but is saved by Clarence.
 * Clarence used to be a People ship, except he was involved in an accident. God refashioned his intelligence into something more or less humanoid. He looks a bit like an angel. Bernice thinks he looks a bit like Keanu Reeves, though naked and with wings.
 * Factory 34561239 thinks about excluding pears from its fruit and vegetable section when it hears Bernice state, "Everything’s gone pear shaped".
 * The Doctor tells Sul Starren he should invest in Telvos and in plough shares on Spindrast Maxima.

Groups

 * The Grown Not Made Special Interest Group made organic ships for other people.

Objects

 * Benny’s group are rescued by an Air Vent inside a life-hating submarine.

Planets

 * Ordifica is briefly seen here.
 * Factory 34561239 helps Benny’s group escape Vo'lach Prime.

Time travel

 * The Spire is one big time travel device, built by the Vo'lach.
 * The Spire cycles through multiple paradoxes before a balance is found between the missiles and destruction.

Continuity

 * Benny agreed to take on assignments for God in PROSE: Oh No It Isn't!.
 * The villain Morry is clearly intended to be a descendent of Professor James Moriarty, the nemesis of Sherlock Holmes (and who appeared in PROSE: All-Consuming Fire).