Written in 1982. Has some wear from age.      Book one of the Crystal Singer Trilogy. Killashandra Ree has spent ten years studying music and training to be a vocal soloist, anticipating interstellar celebrity. After a final exam she learns that a flaw in her voice will prevent her from singing lead. She dreads a life limited to choral work and supporting operatic roles so she plans to exit both school and home planet discreetly. At the spaceport she meets a vital, older man who uses perfect pitch, and his occupational experience as a "crystal singer" on Ballybran, to identify an incoming space shuttle on the verge of explosion. He treats her to a whirlwind romance and the experience of her home planet in ways entirely unknown to her, but sincerely warns her against the high-status, high-income occupation that makes such a vacation possible for him. Further, one of its occupational hazards leaves him in a coma, but Killashandra determines to accompany his return home under life support, and to investigate membership in the Heptite Guild of crystal singers for herself.