On the world called Hyperion, beyond the law of the Hegemony of Man, there waits the creature called the Shrike. There are those who worship it. There are those who fear it. And there are those who have vowed to destroy it. In the Valley of the Time Tombs, where huge, brooding structures move backward through time, the Shrike waits for them all. On the eve of Armageddon, with the entire galaxy at war, seven pilgrims set forth on a final voyage...

An adventure story set in a universe ruled by a church which rewards obedience from its citizenry by dispensing resurrection. The story centers on Raul Endymion, a woodsman from the planet Hyperion, given the task of finding the planet Earth which mysteriously disappeared. By the author of The Fall of Hyperion.