THE HAMMER OF GOD by Arthur C. Clarke

0-553-56871-X  Paperback  New

In the year 2110 technology has cured most of our worries. But even as humankind enters a new golden age, an amateur astronomer points  his telescope at just the right corner of the night sky and sees disaster hurtling toward Earth: a chunk of rock that could annihilate civilization.  

While a few fanatics welcome the apocalyptic destruction as a sign from God, the greatest  scientific minds of Earth desperately search for a way to  avoid the inevitable. On board the starship Goliath Captain Robert Singh and his crew must race  against time to redirect the meteor form its deadly collision course.

Suddenly they find themselves  on the most important mission in human history—a mission whose success may require the ultimate sacrifice.