Calculating God is the new near-future SF thriller from the popular and award-winning Robert J. Sawyer.
An alien shuttle craft lands outside the Royal Ontario Museum in Toronto. A six-legged, two-armed alien emerges, who says, in perfect English, "Take me to a paleontologist."
It seems that Earth, and the alien's home planet, and the home planet of another alien species traveling on the alien mother ship, all experienced the same five cataclysmic events at about the same time (one example of these "cataclysmic events" would be the meteor that wiped out the dinosaurs). Both alien races believe this proves the existence of God: i.e. he's obviously been playing with the evolution of life on each of these planets.
From this provocative launch point, Sawyer tells a fast-paced, and morally and intellectually challenging, SF story that just grows larger and larger in scope. The evidence of God's universal existence is not universally well received on Earth, nor even immediately believed. And it reveals nothing of God's nature. In fact. it poses more questions than it answers.
When a supernova explodes out in the galaxy but close enough to wipe out life on all three home-worlds, the big question is, Will God intervene or is this the sixth cataclysm:?
Calculating God is SF on the grand scale.
Calculating God is a 2001 Hugo Award Nominee for Best Novel.

Robert J. Sawyer,
a Member of the Order of Canada and a Globe and Mail and Maclean's bestseller, is the author of 23 previous novels, including FlashForward, the basis for the ABC TV series. His most recent novel, Quantum Night, was long-listed for CBC's Canada Reads

Praise for Robert J. Sawyer

"A new Robert J. Sawyer book is always cause for celebration."
— Analog Science Fiction and Fact

"Robert J. Sawyer is a writer of boundless confidence and bold scientific extrapolation."
— The New York Times

"Sawyer not only has an irresistibly engaging narrative voice but also a gift for confronting thorny philosophical conundrums. At every opportunity, he forces his readers to think while holding their attention with ingenious premises and superlative craftsmanship."
— Booklist

"Robert J. Sawyer is by any measure one of the world's leading (and most interesting) science-fiction writers. His fiction is a fascinating blend of intellectually compelling big ideas and humane, enduring characters."
— The Globe and Mail

"Sawyer, an articulate fountain of ideas, is the genre's northern star—in fact, one of the hottest SF writers anywhere. By any reckoning Sawyer is among the most successful Canadian authors ever."
— Maclean's: Canada's Weekly News Magazine

"A polished, exciting writer. Sawyer writes with the scientific panache and grandeur of Arthur C. Clarke and the human touch of Isaac Asimov."
— Quill & Quire

Robert J. Sawyer's profile page

• Nominated, Hugo Award - Nominee

“An enthralling story…. [The] climax [is] an exhilarating and touching glimpse of transcendence.” —Starlog
“Vigorous speculation…Sawyer ends with some grandeur worthy of vintage Arthur C. Clarke.” —The Denver Post
“Sawyer is first and foremost a writer of ideas, some concept that can drive a narrative through to a grand conclusion, one that remains true to science but often achieves that sense of transcendence that Samuel R. Delany once said was the sine qua non of science fiction. This is Sawyer's great strength, and it's fully present in Calculating God….A intellectual thriller with real bite.” —The Edmonton Journal