Editing The Patterns of Chaos

{{Short description|1972 novel by Colin Kapp}}
{{No footnotes|date=October 2024}}
{{Use dmy dates|date=April 2022}}
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[[File:The Patterns of Chaos.jpg|thumb|First edition (publ. [[Victor Gollancz Ltd.|Gollancz]])]]
'''''The Patterns of Chaos''''' is a 1972 [[science fiction]] novel by British writer [[Colin Kapp]]. It originally appeared in ''[[If (magazine)|If]]'' magazine, serialized in three parts.

It combines grand [[space opera]]tic themes of battle between space empires and intergalactic alien invasion with philosophical themes of predestination and destiny, and detailed character development of a tight set of central characters.

Earth's Stellar Commando has placed their secret agent Commander Bron on a planet where they hope he will be able to find out the coordinates of a rival space empire, the Destroyers.
Bron is there to impersonate a famous scientist of interest to the Destroyers, and has been given implants through which a monitoring team can see what he sees, hear what he hears and talk to him, even when separated by interstellar distances.  The plot hinges on a fictional science, the study of the [[entropic]] "patterns of Chaos", which allows predictions of events with an accuracy that was not before possible. Both Earth and the Destroyers—and specifically Bron himself—are discovered to be the target of an [[Extraterrestrial life in popular culture|extraterrestrial]] interstellar murder campaign that was hatched 700 million years ago. He succeeds in joining together the [[Earth]] and Destroyer fleets and confronts the aliens, to discover that his destiny is inextricably entangled with theirs.

==External links==
*{{isfdb title|9233}}
*{{cite web |url=http://sfreviews.com/docs/Colin%20Kapp_1970_The%20Patterns%20Of%20Chaos.htm |title=Review of ''The Patterns of Chaos'' |publisher=sfreviews.com |date=30 November 2002 |accessdate=2008-06-07}}
*{{cite web |url=http://sfreviews.com/displays/Colin%20Kapp_1970_The%20Patterns%20Of%20Chaos.htm |title=Original Panther paperback edition front cover by Chris Foss |accessdate=2008-06-07}}

{{DEFAULTSORT:Patterns Of Chaos, The}}
[[Category:1972 British novels]]
[[Category:1972 science fiction novels]]
[[Category:British science fiction novels]]
[[Category:Space opera novels]]
[[Category:Works originally published in If (magazine)]]
[[Category:Novels first published in serial form]]
[[Category:Religion in science fiction]]
[[Category:Victor Gollancz Ltd books]]


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