The Joan of Arc Replay

It was the contention of one galactic historian that similar planets must have similar histories. It was the contention of another that this did not imply identical histories. The challenge could be settled only by actual testing in the infinity of the cosmos. The computer came up with the story of Joan of Arc on the Planet Earth. Programmed anew, it produced a similar world, the Planet Noldaz of Sigma 32, with a human race rising from medievalism among whom a Maid would appear to lead her country's knights on a war of liberation. The question: was she inevitably doomed to die at the stake, as Joan had before her? Did identical situations always mean identical conclusions? Pierre Barbet, master of alternate histories and parallel worlds, spins a marvelous science fiction novel out of one of the great enigmas of history.