Infinity's Shore

Infinity's Shore is a science fiction novel by David Brin, published in 1996 and the second book of a trilogy set in the same universe as his earlier Uplift novels. Its subject is the planet Jijo, which has served as a refuge for fugitive settlers.

Six bands of sapient beings have lived on Jijo, and the book opens as starships fill its skies. The arrival brings the threat of genocide down on a world that had been sheltering them, and the different peoples who share the planet discover that their refuge was only ever temporary.

The novel is concerned with what a small and peaceful settlement can do when the powers that surround it arrive in force. It follows the human settlers of Jijo alongside the other species who live there, and the planet's own history, and the reasons it was chosen, matter more the closer the ships come.

The settlers of Jijo have built a society on the assumption that nobody would come looking for them, and the arrival of the starships ends that assumption for all six peoples at once. What follows is the story of a small world caught between larger powers.