Harvest of Stars

Anderson, Pohl. Harvest of Stars. New York: TOR-Tom Doherty Associates, 1993. ISBN 0-312-85277-0.

In a repressive future America, the patriarch/feudal lord/Chief-Executive-Officer of the only corporation exploiting off-Earth reseources imprints his mind into a computer. A copy of the computer personality is stolen and used by the repressive government to try to seize control of the corporation. After defeating both his "evil twin" and the government, the personality then leads its corporation and employees off Earth to colonize and terraform the Alpha Centauri system and to flee the advent of AI on Earth. Other protagonists are also imprinted into computers, one eventually joining the terraforming computer net to become a computerized Gaia. Eventually, the remnants of the human race are all imprinted and sent off to colonize other worlds prepared for them by copies of the computerized Gaia (Barnhizer). Deals with the "cutting-edge" motifs of VR, AI, and biotech (cover notes). (DDB, 23/1/95)