The novel “War of the Marionettes” by Adam-Troy Castro was published for the first time in 2010 in a German edition as “Sturz der Marionetten”. It’s the third novel in Andrea Cort’s series and follows “The Third Claw of God”.

Andrea Cort and the Porrinyards arrive on Vlhan, a planet home to a truly unique sentient species. The Vlhani have displayed extraordinary skills, but no one can fully understand them. In fact, among the other sentient species, very few individuals can even partially understand them. Despite this, many people are interested in their periodic ritual, even though countless Vlhani die each time it’s conducted.

Even by Andrea Cort’s standards, her situation is complex. The request to find a girl who arrived on the planet some time ago to participate in the ritual after physically transforming into a Vlhani doesn’t help. The Vlhani accept Andrea Cort as a friend, but this may prove to be completely useless when their ritual is disrupted by an attack from other Vlhani. This is unprecedented behavior, and, according to the AISource, the Unseen Demons are behind this anomaly.