Signs of Life

Cherry Wilder entered the SF field nearly thirty years ago with her stories - and one novel, Second Nature (1982) - of Rhomary Land, a distant planet settled by the survivors of the crash of the colony ship Rho Maryland.
In Signs of Life Wilder returns to Rhomary Land to tell a new tale. Now most of the crew and passengers of an interstellar ship escape on lifeships before the ship explodes and land, widely dispersed, on Rhomary Land. This is the story of how these people survive and are reunited with each other and with the original survivors who have now been living for generations on the planet. Signs of Life is about survival and the heroic struggle to maintain civilization in the face of disaster. Wilder gives this significant theme the thoughtful treatment it deserves, producing a dramatic and powerful science fiction novel.