"A Fire Upon The Deep" By Vernor Vinge

A Fire Upon the Deep is the big, breakout book that fulfills the promise of Vinge's career to date: a gripping tale of galactic war told on a cosmic scale. In this popular and widely praised novel, a rescue mission races against time to save a pair of human children being held captive by a medieval lupine race—and to recover the weapon that will keep the universe from being changed forever.