Line #46 Literature/TheNightsDawnTrilogy


1	[[quoteright:350:https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/the_nights_dawn_trilogy_new_uk.jpg]]
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3	The ''Night's Dawn'' trilogy is an epic SpaceOpera series written by British author Creator/PeterFHamilton. This {{Doorstopper}} of a series was released as three immense novels in Britain; ''The Reality Dysfunction'' (1996), ''The Neutronium Alchemist'' (1997) and ''The Naked God'' (1999). Each volume was broken into two, slightly more manageable books when it was released in the States; ''The Reality Dysfunction'' into ''Emergence'' and ''Expansion'', ''The Neutronium Alchemist'' into ''Consolidation'' and ''Conflict'' and ''The Naked God'' into ''Flight'' and ''Faith''. More recent prints in the States have gone back to the three volume format, in all their [[{{Doorstopper}} 1000+ page glory]]
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5	The story is set in the 27th century, after humanity has developed faster-than-light travel through the use of artificial wormholes. Human society has been divided into two cultures that are more or less at peace with each other: Adamists, who are your typical space-going humans separated and diversified by living on a variety of worlds with different governments, economies and ecosystems, and the Edenists, who have genetically modified themselves to allow universal telepathy between each other, and their biotechnological (or ''bitek'') constructs. Both are loosely bound in [[TheFederation The Confederation]], which also includes two species of sentient aliens (or ''xenocs'').
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7	Some friction exists between Adamists and Edenists, because Edenism's universal use of the "affinity gene" has led them to cheat death (sort of) by storing their memories and personalities indefinitely in bitek space habitats, and they are socialists who breed synthetic lifeforms instead of building machines. These practices were condemned by the unified Pope and other religious leaders long ago. In addition, due to the versatility of bitek, Edenists maintain a near-complete monopoly on Helium-3, the fusion fuel used everywhere in human space. Adamists, on the other hand, are far closer to the typical human civilization of space opera, making use of mild genetic engineering to cure diseases and relying on nanotechnology implants to link themselves to their technology and each other. Many conversations in the book take place using this form of technological telepathy ("datavising") or the Edenists' form of actual telepathy.
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9	The dense and multi-threaded plot follows too many characters to note here, but runs the gamut from simple, pre-industrial settlers to the obligatory starship captains, through onto kings of interstellar empires and even the sentient bitek minds of orbital habitats. The story concerns humanity's trials and tribulations when... get this: ''the souls of the dead'' begin forcefully possessing the bodies of the living. The premise, while fantastic, is actually treated as a natural (albeit poorly understood) phenomenon. As for the novels' SF hardness, space is treated like space while retaining some elements of SpaceIsAnOcean (like navies and pirates and so forth), and most futuristic technologies are described in believable detail.
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11	This series is so long and far-reaching that it can't help but run flush up against a million and one SF tropes, in most cases smashing through them, or on the other hand, playing them so straight (and ''cool'') that you'll wonder why they never worked as well before.
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13	----
14	!!This series includes examples of:
15	* AfterlifeAntechamber: [[spoiler: The Naked God reveals that The Beyond is actually the "place" where souls go when they can't accept their death and desire to continue living as they did. The souls have the power to [[RealityWarper turn wish into reality]], but since they are dead, they can't interact with the universe and are stuck in a sort of semi-perceptive limbo, along with uncountable others, and because they still crave the sensations of life, they can only leech on each other's memories for the faint traces of life they contain. The ''real'' afterlife is the [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Omega_point Omega Point]], the final end of the Universe where all souls go to merge with each other and create a new Universe, but going there can only happen if one accepts death and leaves their old existence behind. Everyone else is stuck in the Beyond, taking TheSlowPath to the end of the Universe and [[AndIMustScream shrieking in agony all the while]]]].
16	* AgonyBeam: [[spoiler: The possessed]] can do this.
17	* AintNoRule: Antimatter is horrendously illegal. However, as Joshua Calvert points out, there's no law against having an antimatter ''drive'' so long as you never fuel it. He also has a battery of signal masers that can punch a message right through somebody's hull.
18	* [[{{UsefulNotes/AlCapone}} Al Capone]]...[[spoiler: [[RecycledInSPACE IN SPACE!]]]].
19	* AlienNonInterferenceClause: The Kiint have one for humanity, joining the Confederacy as “observers”.
20	* AllCrimesAreEqual: Earth's population is so huge, and its cities so desperately overcrowded, any and all crimes with a guilty verdict tend to result in the convict being SentencedToDownUnder as manual labor on colony worlds that have just been established.
21	** To be noted that particularly serious crime gets you sent to a penal colony, way worse than just a period of forced labour in a normal colony.
22	** Deconstructed in that despite having practiced this policy for centuries, the overcrowding is ''still'' an apocalyptic issue - especially since the selection pressure has made most Earthers so meek and hidebound they're more likely to commit suicide than any other crime. Thus, [[spoiler:Govcentral is ''sponsoring'' organized crime - in the form of the ultra-violent "[[HollywoodSatanism Light Bringer]]" cults - simply to increase the number of criminals they can deport]].
23	* AllPlanetsAreEarthLike: Played with. He describes how some terra-compatible planets are not Earth-like. Of course, in this series, Earth is not even Earth-like, by our standards.
24	* {{Antimatter}} : One of the highest crimes possible is to possess or produce antimatter (via stations orbiting distant stars). Production stations are destroyed on sight, and possessing antimatter carries the death penalty, with no exceptions.
25	** Well... mostly no exceptions; [[spoiler: a ship is allowed to use antimatter in the save-the-whole-human-race flight across the galaxy.]]
26	* AndIMustScream: Why pretty much everyone is insane in the Beyond: they can ''just'' sense the real world, but are never capable of reaching in.
27	** Also goes for [[spoiler: ghosts and whoever has the misfortune of ending up in the Melange]].
28	** And for [[spoiler: many of the unfortunate acolytes who wind up as permanent visitors to [[MadDoctor Banneth's]] laboratory.]]
29	* ArborealAbode: Laton and his followers have spent their self-exile on Lalonde living inside one of these.
30	* ArtificialGravity: Averted except for voidhawks & blackhawks; all space habitats rotate. The artificial gravity onboard bitek ships are induced by manipulating of the distortion field they generate for propulsion.
31	** In the short story "Escape Route", the derelict alien ship that Marcus Calvert finds has artificial gravity, and someone remarks on how it would cause a technological revolution and make them filthy rich if they brought it back to Earth. [[spoiler: They are forced to blow it up, in the end]].
32	* AsTheGoodBookSays: Expectedly for a priest, Father Horst will sometimes quote relevant scripture from the Bible in conversations with others.
33	* AscendToAHigherPlaneOfExistence: [[spoiler:Crossed with GoIntoTheLight; Pretty much every sentient being transcends into energy form upon death (exactly like your priest/guru/rabbi has been saying all along). What happens ''afterwards'', however, is species-dependent. The Ly-cilph hang around, collecting information about everything, while most species have psychologically-dependent fates; those among them who can accept death move on to the Omega Point, while those who ''can't'' end up in the Beyond, driving each other insane. Some unlucky ones end up as ghosts or fall into the dark Continuum. In all these cases, sentients that learn to accept death can go on to better things]].
34	* AsteroidMiners: Extremely common throughout the Confederacy. Even Lalonde, a very early-stage colony, has an asteroid named Kenyon moved into its orbit and prepared for mining and colonization.
35	* TheAtoner: By the end of ''The Reality Dysfunction'' [[spoiler: Laton becomes this. And how.]]
36	* {{Auction}}: How artifacts found by scavengers within the Ruin Ring (the remains of the Laymil habitats orbiting the gas giant Mirchusko) are distributed throughout Tranquility and the wider Confederacy. Tranquillity holds the option to supersede any winning bet within its own auction houses if they think the artefact has any scientific merit worth studying.
37	* AutomatedAutomobiles: Almost everyone uses them on the "civilized" planets. Described as "bullets on wheels" in regard to how fast they are.
38	* AwLookTheyReallyDoLoveEachOther: Len and Gail Buchannan spend the majority of the first novel’s length bickering with one another. In the aftermath of being boarded and attacked by a [[spoiler:possessed Yuri Wilken]], it becomes clear that they do at least have a sense of empathy for one another.
39	* BalkaniseMe: After being granted independence from Earth, the colony on the planet Nyvan fell into a period of political and ethnic unrest escalating into civil war. By the time the period of war had ended, Nyvan had Balkanised into individual nation-states.
40	* BodySurf: Edenists achieve "immortality" by downloading their minds into bitek habitats via affinity on death; they spend a few centuries as disembodied minds before gradually merging with the habitat personality. [[spoiler: The B7 people do a body-to-body version, incinerating the old body when they download to a new one]].
41	** [[spoiler: Those races that have survived discovering the true nature of physical death do not consider these to be any sort of immortality, since your soul goes off and does whatever it was supposed to do when your body dies anyway. These all produce a new person, which may have a soul of their own. This troubles the B7 people considerably when they find out that it means the afterlife has multiple versions of them, from each point they changed bodies.]]
42	* BanishingRitual: Father Horst Ewles [[spoiler: manages to perform one of these]]. Later, [[spoiler: Joshua does too]].
43	* BeePeople: The Tyrathca are an alien race that evolved along a path convergently similar to both insects and mammals. A Tyrathca family consists of a monogamous pair of intelligent adult breeders, a couple of breeder children...and a large number of sterile, unintelligent vassal-castes that perform specialized tasks such as Hunter, Soldier, Farmer, Builder, etc.
44	* BiotechIsBetter: Edenist voidhawks are frequently mentioned to outperform adamist ships on manoeuvrability and speed. Not to mention their ArtificialGravity.
45	* BizarreAlienSexes: The Laymil have three sexes that are required for reproduction, [[RuleofThree unsurprisingly]].
46	* BoardingParty: Done often throughout the trilogy. First by Confederation ships arresting suspected pirates and smugglers, then later by the [[spoiler: dead attacking the living]].
47	* BondCreatures: This is how bitek and Edenism started.
48	** Tyrathca vassal castes to an extent.
49	* BornLucky: Joshua "Lagrange" Calvert. His father, Marcus, features in a side story set some years prior, and he's even ''luckier''.
50	* BringThemAround: Quinn binds the rest of ivets to himself and his cult through increasingly dark means. Firstly, by offering items as simple as new shoes. Then abusing them with forced drugging and violence until they submit. The more resistant ivets are broken by Quinn forcing them to perform HumanSacrifice rituals.
51	* BritainIsOnlyLondon: This, along with [[BigApplesauce New York]], is one of the only Earth [[Main/{{Arcology}} arcologies]] named, mentioned or seen. And you see a heck of a lot more of it than New York. [[CreatorProvincialism Probably because Hamilton is British]], so would focus there.
52	** Louise Kavanagh goes to London because she's unfamiliar with Earth, but as her planet is based on [=19th=] Century England the name at least is familiar. However as the land outside the arcologies has been devastated by the armada storms and other ecological damage, it's likely that for all practical purposes the arcology of London really ''is'' all of Britain.
53	* BrownNote: The [[spoiler: Anti-Memory device is basically a computer virus that deletes all memory.]] The "computer" here is ''the human brain''. [[spoiler: It is used as a soul-killer weapon against the possessed, killing both the possessing soul and the original host.]]
54	** Originally, the technology was used to imprint memories, knowledge and experience into people as a form of fast education, that eventually replaced schools and universities.
55	* CameBackWrong: Some of the [[spoiler: possessed went genuinely insane from their time trapped in the beyond]]. With their strength, heightened senses, and RealityWarper powers, they make dangerous foes.
56	* CannotTellALie The Tyrathca are fundamentally incapable of lying, not for moral reasons, but because they lack the imagination needed to fabricate plausible scenarios that don't exist, so instead they act evasive or [[YouDidntAsk withhold information]] in situations that they believe call for it.
57	* CentrifugalGravity: The most common way of providing Earth-like gravity in deep space. Even the Edenist habitats (being shaped into hollow cylinders) rotate.
58	* ChristianityIsCatholic: Eh, sorta, back in the 21st century Christianity formally unified, however most of the Church structure retained a very Catholic feel to it. By the 27th century a person who wished could easily say that Christianity is indeed Catholic in the dictionary sense of the word, Catholic does after all mean "universal".
59	* ColdBloodedTorture: Torture is frequently used by [[spoiler: those from the beyond to get living people to willingly surrender their bodies for possession]].
60	* ColonizedSolarSystem: Starting with the Moon [[FailedFutureForecast in 2020]]. Then by asteroid settlements and orbiting habitats.
61	* ColonyDrop - The series starts off with Dr. [[ChekhovsGunman Alkad Mzu's]] world, Garissa, being hit by planet cracking antimatter bombs deployed by the Omutan government.
62	** Also, Quinn Dexter does this on the human colony of Nyvan, as an "experiment" in preparation for doing the [[TheEndOfTheWorldAsWeKnowIt same to Earth]] and every other inhabited planet out there.
63	* CoolStarship - The ''Lady Theatre/{{Macbeth}}'', and ''Oenone''.
64	* CorruptCorporateExecutive [[spoiler: The rulers of Earth, the "B7 Security Council". The Adamist/Edenist split was actually an unintended consequence of trying to monopolize Affinity technology as a form of immortality; the bitek habitats being able to cheaply extract precious metals from asteroid ore was surprising enough, but Dr. Wing Tsit-Chong figuring out a ''superior'' method to their own BodySurf technique - the neural strata of bitek habitats - created an entire civilization out of nothing]].
65	* CosmicHorrorStory: an interesting variation, but it has all the common elements.
66	* CrapsackWorld: A couple.
67	** Nyvan, both before and ''after'' Quinn Dexter has his way with it. Before it was divided into rabidly nationalistic and xenophobic nation states that where openly hostile to one another and went out of their way to destroy each other's economies, rendering the entire planet impoverished. About 50,000 people a year leave the planet with next to nobody immigrating to replace them, and since the only people who can afford to leave are middle class professionals, the planet as a whole also suffers from a constant brain drain, further retarding economic development. So intense is the mistrust between the different countries, that Nyvan doesn't even have a single global internet, with each nation maintaining its own communications network, and not even attempting link with their neighbors. There isn't even a pretense of planetary government, no UN type body, and only three of the planet's over 20 nations are even members of the Confederation, instead, the planet is dominated by a complex and shifting system of alliances lead by the "big four" planetary powers, Tonala, (the wealthiest and most developed nation, officially a democracy, but [[PeoplesRepublicOfTyranny in actual fact a single party state dominated by wealthy industrialists]]) Isfahan, (A fundamentalist Muslim Theocracy that's already conquered three other nations) Nazareth, (A fundamentalist Christian Theocracy) and New Georgia, (A federal republic based on the model of the old United States, and the only one of the "big four" nations that's actually a full democracy.) The lack of a centralised planetary government and the constant threat of war made the planet a magnet for [[WretchedHive organised crime, pirates, and mercenaries.]] Afterwards [[spoiler: it became literally uninhabitable.]]
68	** Earth is hell. Fusion reactors provide energy ''literally'' "too cheap to meter" -- priced by subscription instead of consumption -- and have annihilated atmospheric and water pollution, but the ''heat'' from forty billion humans living in first-world conditions has altered weather patterns to non-stop Cat-5 hurricanes. The population has sheltered themselves in a dozen or {{Arcolog\|y}}es. They are so overpopulated that all activities are restricted to semi-functional schedules; basically, low-security prisons where AllCrimesAreEqual; ''any'' conviction for ''any'' crime results in deportation at the individual's expense, to be repaid through IndenturedServitude on whatever terracompatible rock Govcentral decides to dump you on.
69	* CripplingOverspecialization: None of the Tyrathca castes would be able to survive on it's own for this exact reason.
70	* {{Cyborg}}: Virtually everyone, usually in the form of embedded neural nanonics.
71	* CyborgHelmsman: Captains and pilots have large amounts of neural implants for controlling the ship.
72	** In fact, ''all'' shipboard systems are controlled this way, to the extent that someone without a set of implants of some sort is incapable of serving as the crew of an Adamist ship. Edenist ships, of course, can only be crewed by people with Affinity, which basically leaves Adamists out.
73	* DealWithTheDevil: Quinn mistakes the reality dysfunction for a literal example of this. He becomes furious when he learns the truth.
74	* DeathFromAbove:
75	--> "Those aren't meteors... ''they're [[ColonyDrop fucking kinetic harpoons]]!''"
76	* DemonicPossession [[RecycledInSpace IN SPACE]]!: Except they're not demons, they're the souls of dead humans... which, you know, makes it [[HumansAreBastards that much worse]].
77	* DepravedBisexual: Quinn Dexter, and his Satanist cronies. Most Light Bringer adherents are like this, really.
78	* DeusEstMachina / DeusExMachina: [[spoiler: The Sleeping God, in the most literal way possible]]
79	** Someone actually makes a sarcastic remark about military types expecting [[HilariousInHindsight a deus-ex-machina solution floating in space somewhere]].
80	* DivideAndConquer: [[spoiler: A huge part of how Quinn Dexter was able to take down Nyvan. He took advantage of the fact that the various planetary nations hate each other to the point where their defensive systems are designed primarily to defend against other nations, rather than to protect the planet from external threats of the kind which he proved to be.]]
81	* DomedHometown - All the cities on Earth are domed, to protect them from the raging 'Aramada storms'. Before they were domed, a farmer's pickup truck was found stuck on the 70th floor of the ''Sears tower''
82	* {{Doorstopper}} - About 3200 pages total, plus the 400-page "A Second Chance At Eden" short story collection.
83	* DoubleStandard: The Tyrathca put a much higher value on the life of a breeder than any of the other castes. A Tyrathca Clan will fight to the death to protect a breeder child, and a breeder will literally lose the will to live if his or her monogamous mating partner dies, but the loss of one of their lower caste children will merely be seen as "regrettable."
84	* DroneDeployer: Adamist ships carry up to a dozen [[AttackDrone combat-wasps]] to supplement their firepower. Wasps carry a variety of lasers, missiles, cannons, and electromagnetic warfare packages, and sometimes their own [[RecursiveAMmo sub-drones]].
85	* DropShip: Spaceships (including edenist biteks) are not designed to withstand the atmosphere and gravity of planets. Thus, spaceship crews rely on deployable “spaceplanes”, which can detach for trips to the surface and back.
86	* DungeonBasedEconomy: The colony of Tranquillity was established near the remains of an ancient alien civilisation. Exploring these ruins for valuable artefacts is one of the colony's more lucrative industries.
87	* EarthThatUsedToBeBetter: Overpopulated and polluted by the time of the trilogy's present.
88	* EldritchAbomination- The [[spoiler: Orgathe are creatures of the Dark Continuum, a realm of near-absolute entropy, where every soul becomes a ghost and everything eventually falls into a central mass of ectoplasm called the Melange, unable to gather enough energy to break loose. The Orgathe can only break free for a short time by forming out of multiple souls; they wander the empty realm, devouring any soul and a shred of heat they might encounter until eventually falling back into the Melange]]. And [[DarkMessiah Dexter]] tried to bring them ''all'' to Earth.
89	* EmotionEater: The Ly-cilph identifies Dexter as a low-level one during his sacrifice ritual in the jungle. He gets more than ''just a kick'' out of seeing people in agony; Quinn's ''soul'' absorbs some of the dissipating energies. It was this energy exchange that prompted the Ly-cilph to go nosing into the lower levels of reality, inadvertently stumbling into the ''Beyond'' and opening the way for returning souls in the first place.
90	** Apparently very few humans have that sort of [[RealityWarper energistic sensitivity]]. Quinn and Father Horst are the only ones mentioned.
91	* {{EMP}}: [[spoiler: The possessed]] emit this effect on electronics, allowing them to disable weapons, cybernetics, and starships.
92	* EnergyBeings: The Ly-cilph start life as small fish-like beings on a moon orbiting a humongous gas giant. In three years' time, they grow to adult form, a cross between a snail and a deep-sea anemone. They venture onto the ground and eat the memory fruit left behind by the previous generation of Ly-ciplh; the nodes contain the memories of previous generations, elevating them to sentience. They spend the next 6 years learning and observing the world around them until the 9-year mark, when a periodic flux tube discharge from the gas giant dumps enough energy on the planet for them to AscendToAHigherPlaneOfExistence, free to roam the Universe forever, gathering knowledge.
93	** [[spoiler: Also, the "Tinkerbell species" encountered when the settlement on Ombey is taken to another dimension. They grew bored with the physical Universe and left it seeking something more exciting]].
94	** [[spoiler: Presumably, the fate of the species that constructed the titular Naked God, assuming they are not the "Tinkerbell species". It claims to have been built for such purposes.]]
95	* EnglishRose: Louise Kavanagh. In a roundabout way.
96	* EnergyEconomy: Though planets and nations sometimes use their own currencies, interstellar commerce is dominated by the mighty "fuseodollar", redeemable for Helium-3 at your friendly neighborhood Edenist cloudscoop.
97	* EscapePod: Referred to as “lifeboats”. Even most SpacePirates will look down on those who shoot at one during a raid.
98	* EveryoneHasLotsOfSex: Oh yeah. Especially Joshua Calvert, and Syrix. These ship captains make Captain Kirk look prudish.
99	* ExtinctInTheFuture: Blue whales. Fortunately, genetic samples were saved so they could be brought back centuries later via cloning and exowombs. Unfortunately, Earth is in such a terrible state, the only ocean they can live in is on an alien planet.
100	* FalseFlagOperation: The murder of Carter [=McBride=] by Laton’s compound is this. Carter’s body is strung upside down on a tree (to imitate an inverted crucifixion) so it will look like a victim of the ivets’ satanic rituals, then left for the villagers of Aberdale to find. It works very well.
101	* FantasticFlora: The wood of the mayope, a tree native to Lalonde, is mentioned to be stronger than some metals. Even regular knives are incapable of making scratches in mayope planks.
102	* FantasticReligiousWeirdness: Of all sorts, given the extreme religious diversity of the Confederation.
103	* FasterThanLightTravel: Wormholes - see our OurWormholesAreDifferent for more information on them. Notably, there are two different ways of creating them for use in FTL travel.
104	** The most common way is through the use a ZTT (Zero Temporal Transit) Drive to artificially generate them. Most ZTT Drives have a maximum range of 21 light-years, so longer distances will require the ship to recharge at each exit point.
105	** Bitek ships, meanwhile, will use their own distortion fields to generate one. Their maximum range is 12 light-years. However, they can recharge faster than their metal counterparts and have greater control over their own inertia, allowing more seamless runs.
106	*** The distortion field from biteks is also capable of cutting off other ships from their own wormholes, making voidhawks a desired recruit amongst the Adamist-majority Confederacy wishing to sign ships up for anti-pirate tours.
107	* FateWorseThanDeath- [[spoiler: Possession by the souls from the Beyond]].
108	** Also, [[spoiler: The Beyond makes people wish that death were permanent]].
109	** People [[spoiler: in the Melange]] lead a pretty wretched existence as well.
110	* TheFederation - The Confederation. [[GreyAndGrayMorality It's not quite as good as it looks at first glance]]
111	* FearlessUndead: [[spoiler: Inverted strongly. Having already died once, most of the possessed colonists are terrified of going back to the TheNothingAfterDeath]].
112	* FieryRedhead - Syrinx, all the way.
113	* FirstContact: it was kind of unimpressive: the Jiciro species were a pre-industrial agrarian civilization when first found. They've recently moved on to steam.
114	** The ''actual'' FirstContact was with the Kiint. A human exploratory vessel jumped into their [[spoiler: outpost]] star system and noticed the "Triad" of moons orbiting one of the planets in perfect symmetry and balance. It was obviously artificial, so they sent a greeting and offer of friendship to the surface. The answer came less than a minute later, in English: "YES!". Turns out that [[spoiler: a) that is not the Kiint home planet, but an outpost they had in our galaxy, b) the Triad was an "old experiment" (their home system has a large number of habitable planets all sharing the same orbit), and c) they've been watching humanity since around the first century AD through immortal ArtificialHuman agents]].
115	* FishOutOfTemporalWater: [[spoiler: Many of the possessors suffer this, being ignorant of both technology and cultural customs in the 27th century. Most notably occurs with the two possessors that try covertly attacking the Valisk habitat, unaware that without Dariat’s interference, [[BigBrotherIsWatching the living habitat would have been able to see them]]]].
116	** Ashly Hanson (a member of Joshua’s crew) is a rather minor example of this. Being from the 23rd century, she spent the intervening 400 years in a [[HumanPopsicle zero-tau pod]]. Despite this, only rarely is she fazed by the far future. It perhaps helps that she was allowed to wake up briefly every half a century to look around.
117	* ForTheEvulz: There's really no other motivation for Quinn Dexter other than revenge against his former cult leader and pure, uncompromising suffering for everyone else in the Universe. He's actually ''offended'' by the existence of decent, selfless people, swearing that he'd rather kill their souls than share Hell with the likes of them.
118	* FortuneTeller: Anastasia, using stones.
119	* FriendToAllLivingThings / PerfectPacifistPeople: The Laymil had elevated themselves to a communal-society level that was universally benevolent and cherished every living thing. The notion of "weapons" didn't exist in their culture. [[spoiler: During their possession crisis, after their planet got stolen by insane returning Laymil, their space-habitat constellation committed ''simultaneous mass suicide'' rather than submit. It is worth noting that said suicide was done with the knowledge of how to avoid being trapped in the wrong part of the afterlife, they ascended in a way]].
120	* GoodRepublicEvilEmpire: not as much as you'd expect. The Kulu Kingdom (actually a benign interstellar empire) is the second most powerful Adamist faction (after Earth) and behaves with remarkable competence in handling possession outbreaks on their planets. It [[spoiler: doesn't really help them; see the bit about a peninsula vanishing into another dimension]].
121	** Similar to the Kulu Kingdom is the Oshanko Imperium, another interstellar empire, and another major Adamist power, but this time made up of Japanese Ethnic worlds (as opposed to Kulu's Christian/European Ethnic make-up) and ruled by the Emperor of Oshanko, who's a descendent of the Japanese Imperial family on Earth, in much the same way as the Kulu royal family is descendent from the European royal families.
122	* GoodShepherd: Father Horst tries to be this to the town of Aberdale. Unfortunately, when he finds out that the ivets have fallen to satanism, he collapses into alcoholism.
123	** After the reality dysfunction, [[spoiler: he becomes this properly, with the help of [[NotAlwaysEvil Ingrid Veenkamp]]. Abstaining from alcohol and working hard to keep a growing community of orphaned children alive in the savannah as they await rescue]].
124	* GrayAndGrayMorality: Abandoning planets to the possessed make sense, given the scale of things. Also, the returning spirits aren't universally evil, but most are driven AxeCrazy with lust for life.
125	** The Kiint eventually reveal that the people trapped in the Beyond are those who are, in some way, deficient in maturity at the time of their deaths (or in some way insane). They dealt with it by giving every single one of their dead who was trapped there a new body and nurturing them until they were ready to leave and go to the Omega Point. Joshua takes a somewhat more DIRECT approach to getting the human souls there.
126	* GreenAesop: A CentralTheme, although it's only implied until the very end; Earth has become uninhabitable outside domed cities. It's not even due to air or water pollution; fusion reactors have made fissionables -- let alone burning carbon fuels -- as quaint as knapping flint, and purifying water is just a matter of energy. The catch is that there's no solution for ''heat'' pollution save to ''not'' use energy. Between choosing to live in picturesque squalor and maintaining an industrial lifestyle, humans decided to move to cities and fortify them against HostileWeather that has become so fierce it is capable of stripping topsoil down to bedrock. This process is repeating itself on every world humans colonize. Eventually, [[spoiler:the Kiint point out that this is part of the reason they are refusing to aid in the possession crisis; ''they'' cracked {{Matter Replicator}}s ''millennia'' ago, enabling them to return their blighted homeworld to pastoral splendor while maintaining their quality of life, terraform barren worlds to their desires and basically live a "post urban" existence wherever they please. As a result, their encounter with the Beyond was as simple as cloning new bodies for their possessed to live in until they were psychologically stable enough to GoIntoTheLight. Calvert - realizing that humans would never do the same as long as there are terracompatible planets to exploit - thus uses the powers of the Sleeping God to teleport every human planet and habitat to an isolated area in intergalactic space, forcing them to make the discovery themselves or die trying]].
127	* GeniusLoci: Edenist habitats are living sentient space stations. Voidhawks and Blackhawks, are living, sentient starships.
128	* AGodAmI: Quinn Dexter, [[WithGreatPowerComesGreatInsanity total goddamn psychopath]]. Anette Ekelund also has a stab at it.
129	* HandBlast: [[spoiler: How the possessed cast their white fire at targets]].
130	* HeroicSacrifice - The mercenary team at the end of ''Reality Dysfunction'', who [[spoiler:stand their ground to allow the planet's surviving children to be evacuated, in some cases fighting until they are literally torn to pieces.]]
131	** Arguably also [[spoiler:Warlow]], but somewhat subverted in that [[spoiler:he converts to Edenism and uploads his personality at the last second.]]
132	* HistoricalDomainCharacter: [[spoiler: Al Capone]] and [[spoiler: Fletcher Christian (a mutineer on the HMS Bounty)]] both appear.
133	** Shaun Wallace [[spoiler: claims to have met [[UsefulNotes/TheSeventhCavalry General George Armstrong Custer]]]] – though he never actually appears in the books and Shaun might be lying.
134	* HiveMind: The Edenist Consensus is formed via affinity by all sentient beings (humans, habitats, ships) in a star system when a big decision needs to be made.
135	** [[spoiler: The Corpus Kiint]] is similar. The Laymil also had the permanent "life-harmony gestalt" around their planet, formed by multiple space-habitats/satellites linking individual clans and continents together.
136	* HollywoodSatanism: The "Light Bringer" cults of Earth. Notably, [[spoiler:they're an InvokedTrope; sponsored by Govcentral to entrap [[TeensAreMonsters at-risk youths]] so a yearly quota can be ''[[SentencedToDownUnder deported]]'', they were '''purposefully designed''' to be ridiculously over-the-top sources of violent crime, so as to prevent courts from sympathizing with them. One of these indoctrinated is '''''[[BigBad Quinn Dexter]]''''' - and discovering that his faith was engineered by the government solely to give them the excuse to throw him off the planet pisses him off so much he dedicates all his efforts into not only yanking Earth out of reality but ''[[RealityBreakingParadox breaking]]'' reality out of sheer nihilistic rage]].
137	* HordeOfAlienLocusts - The possessed.
138	** The Tyrathca might count as well.
139	* HorrifyingTheHorror: How Quinn Dexter [[spoiler: returns. Feeding his possessor with horrifying thoughts and memories until it enters a state of catatonia, allowing Quinn to resume control]].
140	* HotGypsyWoman: Romani travellers are said to live on Norfolk. In the book where EveryoneHasLotsOfSex, it shouldn’t be a surprise when one of these appears exactly for that reason.
141	* HumanPopsicle: Zero-tau pods are used for this. Unlike more common examples, they do not freeze a person, but rather bring their subjective time to a halt, preventing ageing completely.
142	* HumanSacrifice: Quinn Dexter and his sect practice this on a few of their fellow colonists, most notably the Hoffman family.
143	* HumansThroughAlienEyes: The first time a child Kiint (a super-advanced caterpillar-like species) named Haile sees a human being, its/her thoughts are along the lines of:
144	--> "'''Panic. Alarm. Incredulity. Thing has not enough legs. Topple walk. Fall over not. Why why why? What is it?'''"\
145	"'''It communicates! Alive think'''"
146	** Also, the Kiint have [[ShapeShifting polymorphic]] hands, that can take many shapes. When invited to shake hands with a human, she can't quite replicate the human hand and asks said human to tell her how. She's mortified at the thought that human hands can't change shape.
147	** The [[spoiler: encounter with the Mosdva]] reverses the roles. Humans are much more advanced than they are, and one of them suffers a [[BizarreAlienBiology painful contraction of the marsupium]] when told that human ships can [[FasterThanLightTravel jump]] [[OurWormholesAreDifferent instantaneously]] between star systems.
148	--> "It is a good thing I didn't have any eggs in my pouch, or I would've surely broken them."
149	* HyperspeedAmbush: This occurs right in the very first chapter. It is a common tactic used by blackhawks.
150	* IdiotBall: [[spoiler: It is established quite early on that the possessed are deadlier the more of them are grouped together. In spite of this, Jacqueline Couteur has her (obviously phoney) request for a trial granted, along with two other possessed. In the same room. Without any precautions to prevent them from using their powers. With high-ranking military officers in attendance who have vital intelligence about The Organisation's next strategic target. This goes about as well as you'd expect.]]
151	* ImAHumanitarian: Laton does this to [[spoiler: Lewis Sinclair. Sorta. It occurs during a BattleInTheCenterOfTheMind. Still fatal for Lewis, though]].
152	* [[InsufficientlyAdvancedAlien Insufficiently Advanced Aliens]]: The Tyrathca are a caste-based society of phlegmatic assholes. Only the breeders are sentient, they rather lack imagination, and are fully complacent in their technological stagnancy. It's a mystery for everyone how they managed to build the [[GenerationShips ark]] that helped them leave their home system when their star, Mastrit-PJ, turned into a red giant.
153	** Also, the Jiciro and the [[spoiler: Mosdva]].
154	** It is revealed by the [[spoiler: Mosdva that both they and the Tyrathca evolved on the same planet. The Mosdva used to be slaves of a previous warlike species that exterminated itself, and they had a way with machinery and technology but were physically weak. The Tyrathca were strong herd animals that had only recently achieved sentience, and they enslaved the Mosdva themselves, forcing them to build the Arkships and leaving them to die on the planet when they were done. Bad move for the Tyrathca, because they couldn't repair their own vessels, and the Mosdva built [[SpaceStation massive diskcities]] around their dying star and survived]].
155	* IWantMyJetpack: The year 2020 saw mankind start the first Lunar colony.
156	* JerkWithAHeartOfGold: Joshua Calvert.
157	* JungleWarfare: A major part of ''The Reality Dysfunction''. The book details at least six separate missions (Lori and Darcy, the sheriffs from Durringham, Ralph Hiltch’s team, Kelven Solanki’s team, Chas Paske, and the mercenary team led by Reza Malin) into the jungles of the Juliffe basin to determine what is happening. All of these teams are set upon by [[spoiler: possessed colonists]] at some point within their respective narratives.
158	* KillItWithFire: the possessed have the ability to manifest their wishes and emotions in reality. Anger takes the appearance of their characteristic "white fire", which they fling around at people.
159	* KillSat: Most planets have them for defensive purposes.
160	* KillerSpaceMonkey: Several of these appear on Lalonde following the reality dysfunction. Whether these are [[spoiler: possessed alien creatures that happen to look like apes or just possessed humans disguising themselves as such remains unclear]].
161	* KingIncognito: Ione kept her title as Lord of Ruin hidden for years, fearing that her young age would lead to a crisis of confidence. Unlike other examples of this trope, it doesn’t cause any problems with rulership as the Lord of Ruin has mostly devolved into a ceremonial title.
162	* LatexSpaceSuit : SII smart silicon space suits, which is a black ball of silicon that when activated, surrounds the user with the silicon and forms a spacesuit.
163	* Lightworlder: Cosmoniks live on asteroids for life, thus giving them tall bodies with long limbs. Their lifestyles led to a range of health issues, often enforcing the need for [[{{Cyborg}} cybernetics]].
164	* LiteralSurveillanceBug - Edenist bitek spiders.
165	* LivingShip: Voidhawks and blackhawks. The latter is a more combat-focused counterpart of the former.
166	* LostSuperweapon : [[spoiler: The Sleeping God, a naked singularity and sentient AI.]]
167	* MeanBoss: Power Manani comes across as this, especially to the ivets. After a child is killed under his watch, it becomes clear he’s more of a JerkWithAHeartOfGold.
168	* MadDoctor: Banneth is a particularly perverted example.
169	* MatterReplicator: [[spoiler: The Kiint]] have created these.
170	* MegaCorp - Earth is controlled by these, secretly. Oh, and [[spoiler: the {{Corrupt Corporate Executive}}s that run them are ReallySevenHundredYearsOld and are {{Body Surf}}ing between bodies]]
171	* MindRape: This, in conjunction with extreme physical torture and sometimes ''actual'' rape, is the prelude to possession, which is itself another flavor of MindRape.
172	* MisplacedVegetation: During the crisis, Lalonde begins growing native Earth trees. A product of the {{Reality Warper}}s.
173	* MistakenForAliens: The reality dysfunction is initially mistaken for many things, the most prevalent theory being that it is a xenoc energy virus.
174	* MoreThanMindControl: what Kiera does to those Deadnight kids, to lure them to her.
175	* MulticulturalAlienPlanet: Lalonde was an attempt at this. Firstly, being a Eurochristian-ethnic colony, they recruited colonists from all across Europe (and apparently North America too- since Quinn Dexter is from Edmonton, Canada), unlike the English-ethnic Norfolk and Polish-ethnic Mazowiecki. Secondly, Lalonde was also an attempt to produce a joint colony between humanity and the Tyrathca, the latter species desiring to settle on the planet to farm its native rygar bushes.
176	* MyselfMyAvatar: The SuperSoldiers.
177	* NamingYourColonyWorld : There is a lot of "New ''[Insert-Area-Name-Here]''" planets, somewhat justified by most of the settlers all coming from said region. Many colonies have original names, as well.
178	** The Tyrathca have strange (for us) names like "Hesperi-LN" and "Goertht-WN".
179	* NegativeSpaceWedgie: The Ly-cilph creates one when it investigates [[spoiler: Powel Manani’s murder, creating a doorway between life and death]].
180	* NighInvulnerability : Cosmoniks, which are described as having "diamond armor", and many redundant organs. [[spoiler: Also, the possessed are almost immune to advanced weaponry, because of their electronics-scrambling energy, and still take quite a beating from regular bullets.]]
181	** The possessed themselves are very hard to kill initially, since they have RealityWarper abilities and can repair wounds almost instantly. Then their vulnerability to [[AchillesHeel electricity]] is discovered...
182	* NoBiochemicalBarriers: Largely played straight. Humans will frequently eat alien plants and animals, whilst aliens will frequently eat earth plants, such as lettuce.
183	** Zigzagged with the rygar bushes, which are said to taste extremely bitter to humans, but likened to a sweet chocolate-analogue for Tyrathca.
184	* NoSell: Shooting [[spoiler: possessed]] with energy weapons does nothing, due to their [[EnergyBeings energistic state]].
185	* NoTranshumanismAllowed: [[PlayingWithATrope Attempted, but ultimately failed.]] Part of the BackStory is that [[GeneticEngineeringIsTheNewNuke Genetic Engineering]] led to the creation of a completely synthetic "[[HumansArePsychicInTheFuture affinity gene]]" that conveyed ''[[TelepathicSpacemen telepathy]]''. {{The Fundamentalist}}s had a ''colossal'' freak-out upon discovering that affinity permitted BrainUploading - and that the creator of affinity did so ''specifically'' to make humans [[OutgrownSuchSillySuperstitions Outgrow Such Silly Superstitions]]. Why go to church to save your soul if DeathIsCheap? Unfortunately for him, the [[ChristianityIsCatholic Catholic/Protestant split]] had healed by the time he succeeded, meaning a papal decree of excommunication (AKA "God Hates Freaks") held about as much weight as a ''Presidential declaration of war.'' The only reason it ''didn't'' result in a war was because the breakthrough occurred on a newly-independent space colony orbiting Jupiter. Instead, it resulted in a culture split; the fundies declared themselves "Adamists", named for the biblical Adam, who was "[[IncorruptiblePurePureness Pure]]". The augmented declared themselves "Edenists", [[InsultBackfire mocking their opponents]]. Edenists then developed "bitek" to incredible levels; OrganicTechnology is commonplace, and their {{Living Ship}}s outperform baseline vessels easily. Even their ''space stations'' are organic and ''[[GeniusLoci sentient]]''. In the face of such developments, the Adamists were forced to develop [[{{Nanomachines}} nanotechnology]] just to keep from being left behind, resulting in equally prevalent cybernetics. {{Super Soldier}}s are common, often bearing [[ArmCannon modular arms with gun attachments]] and extra forearms for MoreDakka, and even ''[[{{Cyborg}} totally bionic bodies]] [[ClingyCostume with crazy-ass ceramic-gel skin]]''. Dedicated spacers or "cosmoniks" casually let their bodies atrophy in microgravity or "astrophy", [[WeCanRebuildHim replacing organs as they fail]] until [[BrainInAJar only the brain remains human]], taking the RuleOfCool to a new height. The implication is that transhumanism is inevitable.
186	* NonHumanSidekick: Randolf, a domesticated sayce, to Yuri Wilken.
187	* NoodleIncident: Whatever happened on the last flight of the ''Lady Macbeth'' to leave it in its inoperable state. Joshua tells several false stories throughout the trilogy, but never the real one.
188	** The real one is revealed in ''A Second Chance at Eden''.
189	* NotAlwaysEvil: [[spoiler: The possessed]]. As the novels develop, it becomes apparent most are just normal people. Standout examples of this trope are demonstrated with Ingrid Veenkamp and Shaun Wallace.
190	--> '''Shaun Wallace''': [[spoiler: ''[after creating a butterfly]'']] “There, you see? We don’t always destroy.”
191	* OhCrap: Multiple moments throughout the series, however the biggest one was when Calvert and crew realized that [[spoiler: the Tyrathca, who were known to have exterminated ''at least'' one species and enslaved another to accomplish their own ends, had spread throughout the entire ''galaxy'' with their slower-than-light Arkships, and their diaspora now outnumbered the Confederation ten-planets-to-one.]] Good thing they don't have [[FasterThanLightTravel ZTT drives]].
192	** Oh, wait... The ones on Hesperi-LN, their colony in the Confederation, have them, [[NiceJobBreakingItHero from humans]]. OhCrap, indeed.
193	* OneWorldOrder: The general rule is that every planet, including earth, has a single global government, with each continent getting its own parliament. There are exceptions, like Nyvan, which is divided into nation-states...and is [[CrapsackWorld lesson well-learned]] because of it.
194	* OmnicidalManiac: You've read this far; take a ''wild guess''!
195	* OrbitalBombardment: Kinetic harpoons are used by orbiting ships to strike targets on a planet's surface. They carry no explosive payload, instead relying on the force of impact alone.
196	* OrganicTechnology: The Edenists base most of their technology on living creatures; they have sentient {{Living Ship}}s, sentient living space stations, and organic computers and servitors. They aren't entirely organic though; most common technology is still inorganic/non-living (They use electric jeeps in their habitats), and their ships/stations use non-living technology (like fusion reactors) when using living versions would be impractical or impossible.
197	** Laymil technology was about 80% biological: habitat interiors were closer to what we'd call a jungle, and spaceship interiors were like humid, cramped beehives. It was [[spoiler: probably the reason for their quick downfall]].
198	* OurWormholesAreDifferent: They're short-lived (0.005 seconds at most) and have a pitch-black event horizon. They come in spherical (for Adamist, technological ships) and portal-like (for Bitek starships) varieties, and God helps you and your ship if you [[StuffBlowingUp touch the edges]].
199	** [[spoiler: The bitek habitat Tranquility]] can create a ''humongous'' one in order to escape immediate danger, in the same manner as voidhawks and blackhawks. That "trick" took ''everyone'' by surprise.
200	** There's also something called a "Fantasy Wormhole" at one point. It's implied to be a recreational device with a nice name, and it most likely involves sex.
201	** There's also that portal-like [[spoiler: [[TimeTravel time-travelling]] variety that Joshua's father Marcus encounters in the derelict alien ship.]]
202	* OurZombiesAreDifferent: The closest way to describe the [[spoiler: possessed. They are back from the dead, though possessing living bodies. Many of them have horrendous scars (such as open neck wounds) from when they were tortured. They can do anything the unpossessed can, including operating weapons. They are also capable of instantly incinerating anybody within their line of sight]].
203	* OutgrownSuchSillySuperstitions: subverted, in that many characters are quite religious, practicing faiths more-or-less indistinguishable from modern religions, including pioneer-style Protestantism, Sunni Islam and, largely for purposes of [[KickTheDog kicking the dog]], HollywoodSatanism - [[spoiler:though ''that'' was invented by Earth's government to entrap at-risk youths so they can be SentencedToDownUnder]]. Edenists are overwhelmingly atheists, however. They don't enforce atheism - or any other beliefs for that matter - but hanging around GeniusLoci that offers provable immortality tends to screw with one's faith.
204	* PenalColony: [[strike: One]] Two of the most despicable characters are dropped there (together with one minor crook whose only other appearance was a single page some 2000 pages earlier). This is also where you get sent if you are part of a crew whose captain was found transporting Antimatter. The captain gets shot, by the way.
205	* PlanetOfHats: The Confederation practices what they call "Ethnic Streaming"; planets are specifically stated to be Christian-ethnic, Islamic-ethnic, Jewish-ethnic, Hindi-ethnic, etc. At first, Earth's government-sponsored extrasolar colonization on a cosmopolitan basis; immigration was controlled so numerous ethnic groups were represented equally. This experiment came to a crashing end when these colonies erupted into religious conflicts, which were only solved when the minorities immigrated to planets where they were the majority. Nyvan -- the closest terracompatible world to Earth -- is the worst case; the planet has been ravaged by nonstop holy wars right up until the possessed showed up and conquered the whole planet. After those initial failures, colonies were sponsored by specific nations and corporations, which limited colonization to their own ethnic groups. These were much more successful, and by the time the trilogy begins, it's commonly accepted that only an idiot would expect multiple ethnic groups to share a planet peacefully. A similar idea would be "separateness" AKA ''"[[UsefulNotes/TheApartheidEra Apartheid]]".''
206	* PlanetaryRelocation: Lalonde’s [[spoiler: fate. Relocated to another plane by the red cloud that encompasses it]].
207	* PosthumousCharacter: Wing-Tsit Chong, a biotechnologist and founder of Edenism. He has been dead for centuries but is frequently mentioned throughout the trilogy because of his importance to the present.
208	* PoweredArmor; the ''Cosmoniks'', people who have been so heavily modified for life in space that they are barely recognizable as humans, as well as a few instances of actual (light) powered combat armor.
209	** Combat-boosted mercs and soldiers have big, hulking armors with enough weapons to level a city.
210	* PowerPerversionPotential: Give 26th-century sexually frustrated nerds the powers to [[RealityWarper bend reality to their every whim]] and you have the very ''definition'' of this trope.
211	* PutOnABus: This seems to befall many of the minor characters who appear, do something, contribute to the mess of a plot, and disappear.
212	* RealityWarper: The [[spoiler: possessed]]. [[spoiler: Quinn Dexter too, after taking back control of his body]].
213	* ReligionIsRight: All religious beliefs about post-death existence are correct.
214	* ReligionOfEvil: the version of Satanism practiced by Quinn Dexter and his sect.
215	* RightForTheWrongReasons: Power Manani and the mob are right: the ivets are child-killing Satanists. But they never hurt Carter [=McBride=]: that was Camellia.
216	* SamusIsAGirl: Ione revealing herself publicly to be the Lord of Ruin gets this reaction. As a descendant of an offshoot Saldana royal line, it has always been Saldana tradition for titles to be passed to sons only.
217	* SapientEatSapient: Poor sayce. Even though they are clearly capable of cognition and intelligence, the human colonists in rural villages are still shown to hunt and eat them.
218	* ScrewThisImOuttaHere: [[spoiler: The Kiint in Tranquility do this when the station comes under attack]].
219	* SchizoTech: The Mosdva are less advanced than humans in some ways (being unable to travel FTL), and more advanced in others (being able to mine their Sun directly for hydrogen and transform it into any element.)
220	** It could be argued that each race has the technology it does because it didn't have the other, as both are in essence a different solution to the same problem of resource scarcity. The human solution to scarce resources was to go somewhere else and look for them, the Mosdva solution was to stay where they were, but to more efficiently exploit the few resources that remain. Once this was solved in the short term, neither species had the need to develop the other technology. The humans, having FTL never needed to develop solar mining technology to acquire resources, as they could just jump to another system and set up mining colonies, whereas the Mosdva, having solar mining technology never had as much of an immediate need to develop FTL drive because why go elsewhere when the local sun provides them with all the energy and matter, they need? (However, harvesting their sun is a slow and limited process which barely supplies their matter needs; hence Mosdva's eagerness to obtain FTL technology from humans.)
221	* {{Scotireland}}: [[spoiler: Shaun Wallace, the 20th century Irishman with a Scottish surname]]. Justified trope, since he claims to be from ''Northern'' Ireland which has significant Scottish heritance due to the Plantation of Ulster, as well as more benign migrations.
222	* SealedEvilInACan: Sacrificing that dude in an alien jungle while being watched by a nosy {{Energy Being\|s}} was probably a bad idea, Dexter.
223	** Actually, in his mind, it was like a [[GoneHorriblyRight direct hotline]] to [[GodOfEvil God's Brother]].
224	* SentencedToDownUnder: The Involuntary Transportees AKA "[=IVETs=]". Earth is ''ridiculously'' overpopulated, so getting shipped off to any world willing to accept the tax credit is the punishment for ''[[AllCrimesAreEqual any]]'' conviction.
225	* SexualKarma: Good people have sex in [[ZeroGSpot Free fall cages]]. Bad people have devil worshipping rape-sex.
226	* Shapeshifter: [[spoiler: Possessed individuals]] can seemingly do this, changing their physical appearances to a range of people, including animals and even fantasy monsters like werewolves. [[spoiler: Except they can’t. They are only manipulating photons to scare the living, meaning their actual form is unchanged]].
227	* ShownTheirWork: The author put a lot of work into this series. As it happens, it's also one of the most widely-acclaimed modern Space Operas.
228	* SlaveRace: All other Tyrathca castes are this to the Breeders. [[spoiler: The Mosdva were enslaved by other intelligent species from their home world on two separate occasions, first by the extinct Ridbat who were extremely warlike, and eventually killed themselves, and 70% of their planet's animal species through the use of nuclear and biological weapons, and more recently by the Tyrathca. This has instilled them with a species wide hatred of the Tyrathca so intense, that the first thing the Mosdva can think of to do with FTL drive is invade Tyrathca colonies and commit genocide on them. The only Tyrathca that still live on the Mosdva disk cities are only allowed to do so because [[TakingYouWithMe they possess weapons that could destroy the entire disk city, and wouldn't hesitate to use them if their territory near the center of the disk city is ever threatened]], [[MutuallyAssuredDestruction resulting in a fragile peace that has lasted thousands of years]].]]
229	%%* SmugSnake: Too many to name.
230	* SpeechImpairedAnimal: Sayce, an aboriginal cat-like animal from Laldone, have the intelligence and vocal cords to be taught earth languages by human colonists. Despite this, they can only speak extremely short sentences with simplified grammar.
231	--> "Nooo," Randolf bayed urgently. "Baddd. Peeeople baddd."
232	* SpheroidDropship: All Adamist FTL craft(e.g. ''The Lady Macbeth''), as the stardrive teleports objects as perfect spheres. They even retract all sensors and heat emission systems prior to the jump, otherwise, the drive will shear them right off.
233	* SufficientlyAdvancedAliens: The Kiint are the resident super-civilization, with [[spoiler: outposts in multiple galaxies, secret immortal spies in almost every known civilization]], [[CasualInterstellarTravel casual intergalactic teleportation]], and a home star system that has [[spoiler: a ''collar'' of inhabited planets sharing the same orbit]]. They can also [[spoiler: casually WalkOnWater]]. Their solution for their ''own'' possession crisis was to [[spoiler: clone ''trillions'' of mindless bodies for the returning souls to inhabit]]. The planet that the Confederation knows of is [[spoiler: just an outpost in our galaxy and the accepted explanation for its almost complete ''lack'' of infrastructure is that the Kiint got so advanced that they grew bored with big technology]].
234	** The [[spoiler: Tinkerbell aliens and the creators of the Sleeping God]] are even ''more'' advanced than the Kiint. Both have learned how to create [[spoiler: Naked Singularity Gods]] and have used them to leave the universe in search of something more ''interesting''.
235	** The [[spoiler: Sleeping God]] states that it had nothing to offer the Kiint that which they could not get for themselves, and that, [[spoiler: in time, they would learn how to create its kind as well]].
236	* SpaceAmish: Recently colonized worlds, and pastoral worlds such as Norfolk, where most technology past the 20th century is banned. (though there is a basic phone network and power grid)
237	* SpaceIsAnOcean: Played with.
238	--> ‘’’Mosul’’’: “I sail across waves; you sail across light-years.”
239	* SpaceOpera: Being a mix of science fiction with an overwhelming fantasy threat, this is the most defining genre of the trilogy.
240	* SpacePirates: Andre Duchamp and his crew. Type 1, to be exact.
241	* StarfishAliens: A trademark of Hamilton's sci-fi is that ''all'' aliens are bizarre and have non-human mentalities.
242	** The Kiint are like giant philosophical caterpillars [[spoiler:with one subspecies resembling whales]]
243	** While the Tyrathca vary greatly in appearance depending on caste, breeders resemble a cross between centaurs (four hooved feet and two arms, a horse-like mane of "Hair") and some kind of insect (Antenna, compound eyes, a "dust" like coating similar to that found on the wings of a moth). Female breeders also have [[SpareBodyParts multiple sets of ovaries]], each producing a different kind of egg, with a different chromosome count, that hatches into a different caste. Psychologically, Tyrathca breeders are phlegmatic, unimaginative and incapable of telling a lie. While Breeder children are known to show the entire human range of emotions, adult Breeders have only a few emotions, namely love for their children and monogamous breeding partner, Crippling suicidal depression over the death of their breeding partner, anger over territorial violations, and indifferent contentment over pretty much everything else. Other castes ([[SlaveRace excepting the Soldier Caste, which is almost as intelligent as the Breeders]]) are little more then beasts of burden, [[CripplingOverspecialization lacking the intelligence to do anything more then the tasks they evolved to do.]] Their entire society is shaped into a rigid hierarchical caste system with it's own social rules. For example, [[DoubleStandard Only Breeder children nurse from the Breeder Females]], the rest nurse from the males AND females of the "Nurse" caste, which the breeders use like a human would use a cow. It can't be over stated just how incredibly different the Tyrathca Breeder's way of thinking is from a human's. All the knowledge of the entire race is passed on, unchanged from one Tyrathca to another through chemical encoding, but often times they'll not make use of this knowledge, and act like they don't even have it until they feel it's needed. For example, even though they have knowledge of both nuclear fusion and computers from the time they spent on board the Arc Ships, they stopped using them once they settled on their new planet, only to start using them again almost immediately when they made contact with humans. [[spoiler: For centuries, humans believed that the Tyrathca didn't have a religion because they were never observed taking part in religious activity. Turns out they've had religion all this time, they just never felt the need to pray to their God until the possession crisis.]]
244	** The extinct Laymil are tri-symmetric, with 3 legs, 3 sensor heads and 3 arms, 3 "mouths" (one for breathing in, one for exhaling and speaking, and one for eating); their society is a bit like a HiveMind. In a bizarre subversion, they also wear ''clothes''.
245	** The [[spoiler: Mosdva resemble zero-G-adapted sea horses, the Tinkerbell creatures are like floating omnipotent crystals, and the Orgathe... [[EldritchAbomination we don't talk about them]]]].
246	*** Averted with the Jiciro, which the Confederation handbook describes as being bipedal humanoids, [[UncannyValley But taller and thinner than humans, and having elongated limbs. They also have a higher vocal range, capable of producing sounds with pitches both above, and below the human ear's ability to perceive.]]
247	* SurvivalMantra: "This is not happening therefore I can feel no pain" -- [[spoiler: Syrinx]]'s mantra when being tortured by the possessed.
248	* TheNothingAfterDeath: At first. Then it became ''overpopulated''.
249	* TheQuisling: Dariat. When he first meets the [[spoiler: possessed]], he immediately joins with them. [[spoiler: [[HeelFaceTurn He doesn't stay like this, however]]]].
250	* TheSvengali: Quinn Dexter is a particularly dark version of this. Wherever he goes, he is able to effortlessly recruit an enthusiastic following to his [[HollywoodSatanism depraved religion]], often singling one individual out as a protege. However his disciples are utterly disposable to him, and he thinks nothing of murdering or betraying them when [[YouHaveOutlivedYourUsefulness it suits him to do so]].
251	* TakingYouWithMe: [[spoiler: How [[ShaggyDogStory Chas Paske's story ends]]. With him finally reaching Durringham, injured in his boat, and being tormented by a crowd of possessed from the nearby riverbank, he detonates the atomic bomb he had been carrying throughout his entire journey, killing himself and everyone in the city.]]
252	* {{Telepathy}}, whether it's the nanotechnological radio-like telepathy of the Adamists or the AppliedPhlebotinum of the Edenists' "affinity gene", making the Edenists a type of TelepathicSpacemen. Non-Edenists can still receive affinity by using an implanted brain symbiont.
253	** The Kiint can also use an affinity-like power (even on people who ''don't'' have affinity themselves). The extinct Laymil also used a similar ability in a planet-wide [[HiveMind gestalt]]. It was why [[spoiler: their possessed spread so much quicker]].
254	* TeleportersAndTransporters: The Kiint have them, and they can be used on an ''intergalactic'' scale at a moment's notice. They use them to [[spoiler: escape immediate danger, such as the imminent destruction of the Tranquility habitat at the hands of Al Capone's spacefleet]].
255	* ThereIsNoKillLikeOverkill : Starships and SD platforms are armed with everything from X-ray lasers, kinetic missile drones, antimatter drones, drones which shoot more drones, etc.
256	* TheWorldIsNotReady: The Kiint state that every civilization encounters a crisis when they find out about the afterlife, and they either collapse or emerge as a more mature, spiritual society. Of course, it was a bit early for us humans.
257	** Also the [[spoiler:Alchemist]] - the Confederation know very well they're not ready for it and do their utmost to keep the knowledge bottled up.
258	* TheyWouldCutYouUp: and they ''will''!
259	* TranquilFury: Shaun Wallace is prone to doing this to his captors.
260	* TidallyLockedPlanet: The Ly-cilph home planet is a hybrid case: it's a moon tidally locked to the planet it orbits; it thus experiences one solar day with respect to the primary star for every orbit around the planet. But it orbits a young, hot "super-Jupiter" (bordering on being a brown dwarf) which glows in the near-infrared and red. This gives rise to a less extreme version of the climate duality experienced by planets that are tidally locked to their stars. The nearside biome is dominated by plants that exploit the always present red light of the planet; the farside has plants adapted to use just the yellow light of the primary star, with long nights.
261	* TitleDrop: What's a ''"Reality Dysfunction"'', you ask? [[spoiler: It's the Laymil term for the [[RealityWarper energistic ability]].]]
262	* TyopOnTheCover: The cover of the Audible UK audio book of the first part of the trilogy calls it ''The Reality Dysfunciton''.
263	* {{Utopia}}: Edenist habitats.
264	** {{Dystopia}}: Earth. Just Earth.
265	*** Nyvan is a pretty crappy planet to live on too, mostly because it's one of the only planets divided into nation-states instead of having a unified planetary government. Nation-states that hate each other, war regularly, and do their best to get in the way of each other's economic development. Then Dexter came along and [[ColonyDrop had his way with it]].
266	* VirtualGhost; [[spoiler:some real ghosts, too.]] The Edenists upload their memories into their space habitat's 'neural strata'
267	* WeaponOfMassDestruction: The titular "Neutronium Alchemist" of the second book. Notably, it has three settings;
268	##The least destructive setting can [[spoiler:turn a gas-giant planet into a nascent star]].
269	##The standard setting can [[spoiler:turn an average star into a short-lived black hole]].
270	##The [[ThereIsNoKillLikeOverkill most destructive]] setting can [[spoiler:make a [[StarKilling star go nova]]. Ironically, this requires ''less'' power than the previous setting]].
271	* WhamLine
272	-> [[spoiler: "You ask," the singularity datavised.]]
273	* WhatTheHellHero: Shaun calls out the mercenaries when he realizes they had brought nuclear weapons to Laldone.
274	* WorthlessYellowRocks: PlayedStraight and [[InvertedTrope inverted]] with the Mosdva. The Mosdva live in massive "disk cities" made out of old asteroids that survived their sun's expansion into a Red Supergiant. Since all the system's planets where destroyed, and every last bit of the original asteroids where mined out and used to build the disk cities, the only way the Mosdva, lacking FTL travel, can gain new resources is to mine their sun for hydrogen and then use fusion to transform it into other elements. Since [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iron_peak Iron]] is the heaviest element that can be created without a supernova, it's considered the most valuable, with one character proclaiming that an FTL drive would be worth "more than the sun's mass in iron", or in other words "more valuable than a chunk of the most valuable material know to our civilization, the size of the largest object known to our civilization." However, since carbon is much easier to create through fussion, and the Mosdva have the industrial capacity to convert it into diamond, it's commonly used in a number of Mosdva technologies, with Iron being limited to upper-class bling, since apparently, the Mosdva don't need it biologically the way humans do.
275	* WouldHurtAChild: Quinn Dexter and his cult.
276	** Surprisingly averted with most [[spoiler: possessed - though not all of them]]. According to Ingrid Veenkamp, there is a lack of interest in [[spoiler: taking over their weak bodies]], so most are left alone. Unfortunately, being left alone on an alien planet means most end up starving to death.
277	* WretchedHive Nyvan had this reputation among the other human settlements of the Confederation, with good reason.
278	** Valisk also had something of this reputation.
279	* WrongGenreSavvy: When the reality dysfunction finally occurs, characters in Durringham spend too much time thinking it is an ivet rebellion. In a hard sci-fi, this would make sense. Unfortunately, it is something much worse.
280	** When it hits Norfolk, it is similarly mistaken for a re-emergence of a communist uprising that happened ten years ago. The militias sent to contain the “uprising” are only added to the growing ranks of the [[spoiler: dead]].
281	* YouDidntAsk The Tyrathca, See CannotTellALie
282	* YouHaveOutlivedYourUsefulness: During the ivet hunt, Lawrence Dillion injures his feet. Despite this, he manages to kill Vorix (Manani’s hound) – the single biggest threat to the ivets. When he later reunites with the rest of surviving ivets as they prepare to flee Aberdale, Quinn kills him to prevent Lawrence from slowing the gang down.
283	* ZeroGSpot: EveryoneHasLotsOfSex, including in space.
284	* ZombieApocalypse [[RecycledInSpace IN SPACE!]]. Except that the "zombies" are intelligent {{Reality Warper}}s. One of them is [[spoiler: Al Capone]].

Context Literature / TheNightsDawnTrilogy