n route to the Center of the Galaxy for the Interstellar Olympic Games, the HELLAS, carrying Earth's team, intercepts a mysterious space ship, apparently derelict. Steve Frazer, champion spacesuit racer, volunteers to investigate. Once aboard, he discovers astonishing evidence of an intelligent nonhuman race that can speak by telepathy and disappear at will - a race superior in some ways to human beings. Stunned, Steve returns to the HELLAS to find that no one believes his startling story. His attempts to prove that he is telling the truth plunge Steve quickly into the midst of interstellar conflict and intrigue. Disqualified from the Games on a trumped-up charge, Steve soon realizes that someone very powerful thinks he knows too much. Tightly written and intensely dramatic, the story sweeps to the outermost reaches of the galaxy. Its picture of the Games with their brilliant color and keen competition is entirely new to the pages of science fiction. Milton Lesser was raised in Brooklyn and attended the College of William and Mary. After several years writing science fiction under his given name, including four books for the Winston Science Fiction series, he legally adopted the pen name Stephen Marlowe. He authored more than fifty novels, including nearly two dozen featuring globe-trotting private eye Chester Drum.