From Publishers Weekly
At first, this novel from Hugo winner Steele looks like a fairly conventional tale of high-tech intrigue-in this case, rebels against a right-wing American dictatorship plot to steal the prototype interstellar spaceship built to immortalize the government's ideology by planting a colony of fanatics on another star's planet. However, once the freedom seekers arrive on the new world, Coyote, things get a lot more interesting. Coyote is habitable but alien, full of flora and fauna that upset the colonists' easy preconceptions. The young people, in particular, have to find their identities in a dangerous but wonderful environment; their discovery of what they can do individually as well as what they owe to the group nicely illustrates the name the starship's captain, R.E. Lee, has given their settlement: Liberty. That Steele's novel has been stitched together out of a series of short stories has advantages and disadvantages. The jumping around can be repetitious, but it also lets readers see the same events from different angles. By the same token, the narrative doesn't stay with individual characters, especially adults, long enough for the reader to get to know them, but it does give a panorama of the developing community. By the end, when an especially big challenge appears, the colonists are ready to face it confidently. The discovery of a new world is one of SF's most potent themes, and Steele handles it well.Copyright 2002 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From Booklist
Steele's latest space-advocacy yarn begins late in this century and ends two centuries further on, on the distant planet Coyote. In between comes a fast-moving, vividly detailed, somewhat didactic story of gallant misfits, led by a spaceship captain named Robert E. Lee, fleeing an Earth that has lost its chances because of dictatorship and technophobia. The refugee ship Alabama is a character in its own right, as is Captain Lee, despite his name. Steele cobbles together hardware, people, and the perils of Coyote into a well-balanced whole, with not all the good guys surviving the perils and with most of the not-so-good guys developed into believable people. Reckon this Steele's most ambitious novel yet, in which he attains the level of Heinlein and Poul Anderson in that, howsoever much he preaches, he still gives us a cracking good story that even readers not of the true space-exploration faith will enjoy. Roland Green
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

USA Today, January 9, 2003
Steele has a no-nonsense style and an attention to his characters that make his books appealing...

The New York Times Book Review, January 5, 2003
...full of pleasant surprises.

Book Description
Coyote marks a dramatic new turn in the career of Allen Steele, Hugo Award-winning author of Chronospace. Epic in scope, passionate in its conviction, and set against a backdrop of plausible events, it tells the brilliant story of Earth's first interstellar colonists-and the mysterious planet that becomes their home.

Download Description
Coyote marks a dramatic new turn in the career of Allen Steele, Hugo Award-winning author of Chronospace. Epic in scope, passionate in its conviction, and set against a backdrop of plausible events, it tells the brilliant story of Earth's first interstellar colonists-and the mysterious planet that becomes their home. The crime of the century begins without a hitch. On July 5th, 2070, as it's about to be launched, the starship Alabama is hijacked-by her captain and crew. In defiance of the repressive government of The United Republic of Earth, they replace her handpicked passengers with political dissidents and their families. These become Earth's first pioneers in the exploration of space. Captain R.E. Lee, their leader. Colonel Gill Reese, the soldier sent to stop Lee. Les Gilles, the senior communications officer, a victim of a mistake that will threaten the entire mission. Crewman Eric Gunther, who has his own agenda for being aboard. His daughter, Wendy, a teenager who will grow up too quickly. Jorge and Rita Montero, ordinary people caught up in extraordinary circumstances. And their son Carlos, who will become a hero in spite of himself. After almost two-and-a-half centuries in cold sleep, they will awaken above their destination: a habitable world named Coyote. A planet that will test their strength, their beliefs, and their very humanity. In Coyote, Allen Steele delivers a grand novel of galactic adventure-a tale of life on the newest of frontiers.

About the Author
Allen Steele was born in Nashville, Tennessee, and received his B.A. in Communications from New England College and a Masters Degree in Journalism from the University of Missouri. Before turning to science fiction, he worked as a staff writer for newspapers in Tennessee, Missouri, and Massachusetts, as well as Washington, D.C. He is a two-time winner of the Hugo Award in the novella category.

FROM OUR EDITORS

The Barnes & Noble Review
Allen Steele's Coyote is reminiscent of science fiction classics like Isaac Asimov's Foundation series and Arthur C. Clarke's The Songs of Distant Earth. After stealing a starship full of political refugees, Captain Robert E. Lee and his crew travel to a distant planetary system with a habitable moon (named Coyote) with the dream of starting a colony free from governmental and social oppression.

The trip lasts 226 years, but while everyone is in biostasis, one of the crew members is accidentally awakened. With his cell permanently deactivated by the ship's AI, communications officer Leslie Gillis is doomed to a solitary life (and death) aboard the starship. When the rest of the crew is eventually reawakened as the ship reaches its destination, what they find is extraordinary.

Once the small colony is established on Coyote, they realize just how different their new world is from Earth. Exploration begins, and although a few colonists are killed by predators, the colony survives and even begins to thrive￯﾿ﾽthat is, until a strange comet appears in the sky.

Coyote is an epic in every sense of the word, with complex story lines and wonderfully realistic characters who possess real flaws and dreams and problems. Not surprisingly, parts of this novel were nominated for Hugo Awards: "The Days Between" for Best Novelette and "Stealing Alabama" for Best Novella. This is one of the best science fiction novels I've read in years. Paul Goat Allen

FROM THE PUBLISHER

"The crime of the century begins without a hitch. On July 5th, 2070, as it's about to be launched, the starship Alabama is hijacked - by her captain and crew. In defiance of the repressive government of the United Republic of Earth, they replace her handpicked passengers with political dissidents and their families. These become Earth's first pioneers in the exploration of space." "Captain R. E. Lee, their leader. Colonel Gill Reese, the soldier sent to stop Lee. Les Gillis, the senior communications officer, a victim of a mistake that will threaten the entire mission. Crewman Eric Gunther, who has his own agenda for being aboard. His daughter, Wendy, a teenager who will grow up too quickly. Jorge and Rita Montero, ordinary people caught up in extraordinary circumstances. And their son Carlos, who will become a hero in spite of himself." After almost two-and-a-half centuries in cold sleep, they will awaken above their destination: a habitable world named Coyote. A planet that will test their strength, their beliefs, and their very humanity.

FROM THE CRITICS

USA Today

Steele has a no-nonsense style and an attention to his characters that make his books appealing...

New York Times Book Review

...full of pleasant surprises.

Publishers Weekly