Peregrine (Psychotechnic League #Book 1)

Star Ways: Psychotechnic League Book 1 / [ASIN: B01G9MYFXK]
Star Ways (also known as The Peregrine) (1956) '-'
"Five of our worlds are missing". That was the essence of the report that shocked the galactic Nomads at their annual meeting. For each of the mighty star-ships reported vanished was a world of its own - a man-made, self-sustaining city-state housing thousands of people. The Nomads themselves were an unplanned by-product of man's conquest of the stars. They were the gypsies of the distant future, the restless rovers of outer space. But to Joachim of the peregrine tey represented a way of life that was to be dearly defended. So it fell to him to make his own world-ship the bait in a cosmic trap set to catch the galaxy's unknown foemen!

There was Joachim, captain of the Nomad star ship Peregrine, and ruler of the Peregrine clan. There were also all the ship’s officers and crew and their entire families. Bound to no world, the better part of their lives spent on the great ships, the Nomads were something like the gypsies who once roamed the lands of Earth, and something like the Vikings who once fared Earth’s seas - but different from any human society known before.

Once a year, the captains of the Nomad ships met at their secret planet called Rendezvous, where the bylaws and intricate agreements of Nomad society were made and enforced. And this year, Peregrine Joachim had a bombshell to toss into the midst of his colleagues. Five Nomad ships had disappeared, vanished completely in an uninhabited area of space. It appeared to be no accident!

There was Trevelyan Micah of Earth’s co-ordinating service, the integrating core of galactic civilization, that vast federation of planets. To Micah, the Nomads were an irresponsible, disruptive influence that had to be brought into line.

From all over the galaxy, information poured into civilization’s overloaded computers, already years behind in co-ordinating data. But now a directive had been given to Micah: investigate the fact that similar flora and fauna had been found on numerous planets within an area where such life forms could not have arisen by themselves. Then, contact the Nomads who have lost ships in the same area to investigate.

There was Sean of the Peregrines, young in years, but old in the bitterness of losing a wife who could not endure Nomad life. And, there on Rendezvous, he met the strange and lovely Ilaloa, who was either not quite human or a little more than human; different humans would draw different opinions.

Thus began the quest, part of the answer to which both Trevelyan Micah and Joachim suspected - that unknown, intelligent, heretofore unsuspected life-forms were moving purposefully toward the galaxy, expanding toward human civilization.

For the Nomads, there was the fear of being caught between civilization and the unknown aliens; for Earth, there was the fear of repeating all the old blunders in history, leading to needless conflict and destruction. Neither wanted war - either with each other or with the unknown culture they sought to uncover.

Here is a tale of a tomorrow distant in time, where the outreach of humanity has only made men realize how vast is space and how small the area of their knowledge and control projects. For although technology had reached undreamed of heights, men and women still loved, hoped, feared and hated even as their ancestors of the twentieth century had.
====
Long before Arthur C. Clarke, Ray Bradbury, or Isaac Asimov, there was an earlier generation of dreamers and writers who defined the science-fiction genre, in what today is affectionately known as the pulp era. Heralding back to the early television days of Flash Gordon and the earlier tales of Jules Verne, Bram Stoker, and H. G. Wells, these great science-fiction writers of the 1950s and 1960s included among their ranks such icons as Poul Anderson and the prolific Robert Silverberg, who would write some of the hippest genre literature of its era.

"Enjoyable from first to last. Fast-moving and convincing." -- Astounding Science-Fiction Magazine.

[About the Author] Poul Anderson (1926-2001) was one of the most prolific and popular writers in science fiction. He won the Hugo Award seven times and the Nebula Award three times, as well as many other awards, including the Grand Master Award of the Science Fiction Writers of America for a lifetime of distinguished achievement. With a degree in physics and a wide knowledge of other fields of science, he was noted for building stories on a solid foundation of real science, as well as for being one of the most skilled creators of fast-paced adventure stories. He was author of over one hundred novels and story collections, several hundred short stories, and several mysteries and nonfiction books.

Aventura / Ficção científica / Literatura Estrangeira / Romance