Phoenix - Richard Cowper - 1968 Ballantine Books Hardback

Condition: Acceptable. Please see the images for more details. May show signs of wear such as:
• Shelf wear or scuffing on the cover
• Creases, marks, or tears on pages or dust jacket
• Possible remainder marks or previous owner’s name/notes inside

Cover art: Seymour Chwast

Blurb: “He was hopelessly trapped in a primitive future, as if he'd gone back in time, to the very beginning...

Bard felt the walls closing in on him-the shining, synthetic walls of 24th-century civilization. Young and full of rebellion, he knew there was only one way to escape having his mind "rehabilitated" in an Adjustment Center-The Caves of Sleep.

In the vast underground complex of The Caves of Sleep, he prepared to enter three years of suspended animation. When he emerged, physically 18 but legally 21, he'd inherit a fortune large enough to free him from the restrictions placed on ordinary men. Just before he became unconscious, Bard was suddenly gripped by the belief that he was making the most appalling mistake of his young life-but by then it was already too late.

Wrapped in a placental cocoon, he slept for three years-and beyond! For while he slept, the Great Death moved across the Earth, and mankind was devastated nearly to the point of extinction. The few survivors degenerated into savages living off the ruins of the past.

In time, The Caves of Sleep became only 

a myth. Inside the mountain that housed them, a miner's pick struck into the rock.

Dislodged by the concussion, a pebble in an adjacent cavern hit the end of a lever, and Bard's long-delayed awakening began.

Naked and delirious, Bard groped his way to the mine entrance and collapsed.

When he regained his senses, he found himself in the home of Margolis, Tribune of the Settlement. Margolis listened to Bard's strange story with growing excitement, and then the truth dawned. Bard was one of the legendary Old Ones, and he had slept, not three, but 1500 years!

What great secrets of the past could this young man reveal? Margolis was thrilled-and terrified-by the possibilities. For Bard was doomed if the Brotherhood learned his true identity. Bard's knowledge would be a direct threat to the power of these sinister guardians of a repressive cult, and they would stop at nothing to silence him.

In spite of Margolis' efforts to protect Bard, rumors of his presence soon reached the Brotherhood, and they were coming for him. There was only one hope. Bard learned of an island, a last refuge of enlightenment.

Somehow he had to reach this mysterious stronghold of knowledge... or suffer an agonizing death as a heretic!“