George O. Smith 42 min read

At Canalopsis Spaceport on Mars, all eyes fix on the great course-chart, because in interplanetary travel, the shortest distance is never a straight line.

George O. Smith's 1943 story, part of his Venus Equilateral series, turns real orbital mechanics into drama as space travel's peculiar geometry drives a communications crisis. Clever, engineering-minded golden-age SF from a genuine radio man. Read it for smart hard SF that makes higher mathematics the stuff of adventure.

In its time

Published in 1943, during the 1940s, the golden age begins.

Reading it

42 min read (a novelette, room for a turn or two).

Illustrated by

A. Williams