Part of Series
It's been more than twenty years since the last Solar Queen novel was published. Memorable adventures like Sargasso of Space took the crew of the small interstellar trade ship across the rim of the galaxy in search of valuable cargo and profitable new markets. Business wasn't easy for small independents like the Solar Queen, but it kept Captain Jellico and his crew busy enough to keep the ship viable - and along the way, their adventures have entertained science fiction readers for decades. No matter how perilous their voyages are, the crew has always survived, even Dane Thorson, the Cargo apprentice who seemed to bring his own luck to the ship. And now there's another new crew Rael Cofort, half-sister of one of the Queen's chief competitors. Attractive and competent, she just wanted passage to the new port of call, Canuche, in the Halios system. But what seems a simple run becomes a doubly dangerous mission as first a plague of rats and then an explosive crisis on the planetary star docks threaten to end the days of the Solar Queen and wipe out the population of Canuche's capital as well. It's do-or-die time for the Solar Queen...and her mysterious new crew member!
Author
Alice Mary Norton always had an affinity to the humanities. She started writing in her teens, inspired by a charismatic high school teacher. First contacts with the publishing world led her, as many other contemporary female writers targeting a male-dominated market, to choose a literary pseudonym. In 1934 she legally changed her name to Andre Alice. She also used the names Andrew North and Allen Weston as pseudonyms. Andre Norton published her first novel in 1934, and was the first woman to receive the Gandalf Grand Master Award from the World Science Fiction Society in 1977, and won the Damon Knight Memorial Grand Master Award from the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America (SFWA) association in 1983. Norton was twice nominated for the Hugo Award, in 1964 for the novel Witch World and in 1967 for the novelette "Wizard's World." She was nominated three times for the World Fantasy Award for lifetime achievement, winning the award in 1998. Norton won a number of other genre awards, and regularly had works appear in the Locus annual "best of year" polls. On February 20, 2005, the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America, which had earlier honored her with its Grand Master Award in 1983, announced the creation of the Andre Norton Award, to be given each year for an outstanding work of fantasy or science fiction for the young adult literature market, beginning in 2006. Often called the Grande Dame of Science Fiction and Fantasy by biographers such as J. M. Cornwell and organizations such as Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America, Publishers Weekly, and Time, Andre Norton wrote novels for over 70 years. She had a profound influence on the entire genre, having over 300 published titles read by at least four generations of science fiction and fantasy readers and writers. Notable authors who cite her influence include Greg Bear, Lois McMaster Bujold, C. J. Cherryh, Cecilia Dart-Thornton, Tanya Huff, Mercedes Lackey, Charles de Lint, Joan D. Vinge, David Weber, K. D. Wentworth, and Catherine Asaro.
