Stephen Marlowe 13 min read

A powerful man brings his beautiful wife back to Centauri expecting a hero's welcome, and gets cold, aloof correctness instead.

Stephen Marlowe's 1956 story sits with George Haven as his wife notices, to his irritation, that the Centaurians don't seem to like him at all, hinting at what really made him important. Sharp, character-driven space opera about power and its costs. Read it for a pointed golden-age tale about the difference between being important and being loved.

In its time

Published in 1956, during the 1950s, post-war optimism meets cold war anxiety.

Reading it

13 min read (a short story, a single idea, delivered and gone).

Illustrated by

W. E. Terry