Although thirty light years distant, Mittend was Earth's nearest habitable planet. So the bored young heir, Steven Masters, contrived to join the first manned expedition just for a bit of excitement. When he found himself suddenly back on Earth in another man's body, it was more than he had expected. What then followed was a veritable kaleidoscope of events that was to involve him in multiple personalities, in more expeditions to Mittend, and in the affairs of the entity called Mother for whom Mittend itself was just a means to an end-and Steven Masters the handy next step in a galactic program. It's a brand-new novel by the Slan-man, the Weapon-Maker of Isher and Null-A mentor, A. E. VAN VOGT himself . . . with all of Van Vogt's mind-shaking fireworks and out-of-the-rut narrative mastery. Cover Illustration: Jordi Penalva
Author
Alfred Elton van Vogt was a Canadian-born science fiction author regarded by some as one of the most popular and complex science fiction writers of the mid-twentieth century—the "Golden Age" of the genre. van Vogt was born to Russian Mennonite family. Until he was four years old, van Vogt and his family spoke only a dialect of Low German in the home. He began his writing career with 'true story' romances, but then moved to writing science fiction, a field he identified with. His first story was Black Destroyer, that appeared as the front cover story for the July 1939 edtion of the popular "Astounding Science Fiction" magazine.
